Downtown Eastside ‘squeezed’ by rents
Lower-income residents being pushed to the street, while others move in out of survival
Fraser Stuart looks at a chic, new tattoo shop metres away from the heart of Vancouver’s notorious Downtown Eastside and shakes his head.
A man saunters by mumbling “Drugs?” and flashes plastic bags in the palm of each hand.
Inside, a young man in tight jeans and a toque chats with a tattoo artist, a bear’s head hangs from the wall.
“Ridiculous,” says Stuart, a longtime resident and activist in the neighbourhood. “There’s also a bicycle shop up the street where you can buy a $7,000 bicycle if you want.”
There is a shift happening in the makeup of what has been called Canada’s poorest postal code, known as home for people struggling with mental illness, addiction and homelessness.
Entrepreneurs, developers and more affluent residents have moved into the neighbourhood’s periphery at an accelerating rate thanks to skyrocketing real estate prices elsewhere in the city, loosened zoning restrictions and the community’s burgeoning appeal as a hip and happening place.
Dan Olson, who opened Railtown Cafe in the district’s northern fringe five years ago, said he was shocked when he first visited the area.
“I kind of looked around the neighbourhood and thought, ‘There’s no way that I want to open up a restaurant here,’ ” he said.
Things have changed for the better, Olson said, though there are still issues with needles in the alleys and makeshift tents around his business.
A recent surge in property values reflects the accelerating change, said Landon Hoyt, head of the area’s business improvement association.
Numbers he provided show the assessed value of commercial property in the area jumped 11 per cent in 2015, 17 per cent in 2016 and 30 per cent this year.
“We’re seeing a lot of businesses close because of that,” he said.
The transition hasn’t been without conflict.
Brandon Grossutti opened Pidgin restaurant five years ago on the border of the DTES, prompting pickets for months from protesters who said the business was a symbol of gentrification.
But for Grossutti, who also has partnerships with non-profit organizations in the area, the decision to locate in the neighbourhood was partly a matter of survival.
“The math doesn’t make sense to open an independent business anywhere in Vancouver short of lower-rent districts,” he said.
Everyone in Vancouver is being displaced by property prices, though it’s far more difficult for the city’s most vulnerable, Grossutti said.
“People always talk about pushing. I feel like it’s being squeezed,” he said, blaming a city planning project that restricted development to neighbourhoods immediately surrounding the district’s core.
Community activists are protesting the pressure felt by lower-income residents.
Jean Swanson of the Carnegie Community Action Project contributed to a report last year that criticized the city for its failure to protect the most vulnerable in the Downtown Eastside by welcoming businesses and development that cater to higher-income residents and visitors.
The pressure is inflating rental prices, which means more residents are being forced onto the street.
“Some people are pushed out of the neighbourhood,” Swanson said. “But for a lot of them, there’s just no other place to go. There’s no affordable housing, so people just stay on the streets. That’s all they can do.”