"Yaletown" Top 5 Page for this destination Vancouver Travelogue by Carmanah

Yaletown, located in the south-east corner of the downtown peninsula, is both the oldest and newest neighbourhood in downtown Vancouver. While this seems like an impossibility, there's an explanation for this.

Yaletown came into being in 1886 - the year that Vancouver was incorporated. The Canadian Pacific Railroad (CPR) had made plans to extend their transcontinental railroad tracks into Vancouver. The City of Vancouver made a deal with the CPR that if they were to build their rail yards and repair facilities on the north shore of False Creek, the city would exempt them from local taxes for 20 years. The CPR obliged. A roundhouse was soon built, and the workers started moving their equipment from the CPR's original site in Yale over to the north shore of False Creek. Apparently some of the workers literally moved their houses too, putting them on the train, bringing them to Vancouver. The new CPR terminus was appropriately called Yaletown, named after their original location in the town of Yale, which was 100 miles up the Fraser River.

Joggers and cyclists on the Yaletown seawall

For many decades, Yalehouse was a warehouse district. Industry flourished in Vancouver. The intial belief circa 1920 was that you'd want your industrial zones located next to your downtown core. However, when automobile transportation became dominant, Vancouver's industry grew around freeways and roads, not Yaletown. While light industry existed in Yaletown, the factories threatened the nearby working class neighbourhoods. Home owners moved elsewhere and even a nearby school closed.

Million dollar condos along False Creek

In the 1960's as downtown Vancouver's West End transformed into highrises, a lot of Yaletown was demolished to be turned into cheap parking lots for the downtown malls and office towers.

Through the 70's and 80's, while the parking lots and warehouses still dominated Yaletown, some intersections were known as places where both female and male prostitutes would linger. Some warehouses were bought and transformed into nightclubs and concert venues. For the most part, most locals never visited Yaletown.

Monuments and yachts at the foot of Davie Street

In the 90's, Yaletown's old brick warehouses were restored and turned into restaurants, boutiques, art galleries, and salons. It wasn't really well known though. In the late 90's the old Expo lands that surrounded the core of Yaletown were finally being put to use and were developed into multi-million dollar condos up to 30-35 floors. Most of these condos are incredibly small, but very expensive.

Magnolias along the north shore of False Creek

Yaletown has changed quite a bit since the mid-90's. It has a "scene" going on - one that I personally don't enjoy. All one has to do is see the dozens of chihuahuas in purses and teeth whitening dental clinics (oh yes, and the tanning salons) to understand that Yaletown's probably similar to LA or Miami than the rest of Vancouver... but even that is changing. Restaurants are almost all high end or trendy. Most people live here to make money off their condos. And if you're going grocery shopping, be prepared to surround yourself by yuppies in designer jeans and botox.