Horseshoe Bay (), formerly known as Whytecliff (1937–1945) and White Cliff City (1909–1937), is a

community A community is a social unit (a group of people) with a shared socially-significant characteristic, such as place, set of norms, culture, religion, values, customs, or identity. Communities may share a sense of place situated in a given g ...

West Vancouver West Vancouver is a district municipality in the province of British Columbia, Canada. A member municipality of the Metro Vancouver Regional District, West Vancouver is situated on the north shore of Burrard Inlet to the northwest of the city ...

, in the

Canadian province Canada has ten provinces and three territories that are sub-national administrative divisions under the jurisdiction of the Constitution of Canada, Canadian Constitution. In the 1867 Canadian Confederation, three provinces of British North Amer ...

British Columbia British Columbia is the westernmost Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Canada. Situated in the Pacific Northwest between the Pacific Ocean and the Rocky Mountains, the province has a diverse geography, with rugged landscapes that ...

. It is part of the

Greater Vancouver Greater Vancouver, also known as Metro Vancouver, is the metropolitan area with its major urban centre being the city of Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. The term ''Greater Vancouver'' describes an area that is roughly coterminous with the r ...

area and marks the entrance to

Howe Sound Howe Sound (, ) is a roughly triangular sound (geography), sound, that joins a network of fjords situated immediately northwest of Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. It was designated as a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve in 2021. Geography Howe Sound ...

. It is also the western terminus of both Highway 1 on the BC mainland and the main route of the

Trans-Canada Highway The Trans-Canada Highway (Canadian French, French: ; abbreviated as the TCH or T-Can) is a transcontinental federal–provincial highway system that travels through all ten provinces of Canada, from the Pacific Ocean on the west coast to the A ...

on the Canadian mainland. The Horseshoe Bay ferry terminal is one of

BC Ferries British Columbia Ferry Services Inc., Trade name, operating as BC Ferries (BCF), is a former provincial Crown corporations of Canada, Crown corporation, now operating as an independently managed, State-owned enterprise, publicly owned Canadian c ...

' busiest terminals, serving an estimated 7 million passengers and 3 million vehicles every year.

History

The indigenous

Squamish people The Squamish people ( , historically transliterated as Sko-ko-mish) are an indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest Coast, indigenous people of the Pacific Northwest Coast. Archaeological evidence shows they have lived in the area for more th ...

of the area called the bay , meaning "sizzling waters", because they observed

salmon Salmon (; : salmon) are any of several list of commercially important fish species, commercially important species of euryhaline ray-finned fish from the genera ''Salmo'' and ''Oncorhynchus'' of the family (biology), family Salmonidae, native ...

pushing

schools A school is the educational institution (and, in the case of in-person learning, the building) designed to provide learning environments for the teaching of students, usually under the direction of teachers. Most countries have systems of ...

herring Herring are various species of forage fish, belonging to the Order (biology), order Clupeiformes. Herring often move in large Shoaling and schooling, schools around fishing banks and near the coast, found particularly in shallow, temperate wate ...

to the surface, giving the appearance of bubbling or sizzling water.

() was later charted in 1909 by an Admiralty Survey Expedition, which, upon seeing the white weathered cliffs of the peninsula's tip south of Horseshoe Bay, named the area White Cliff Point. An existing settlement there was also given the name White Cliff City. In the late 1930s, Colonel Albert Whyte, one of the sponsors of the expedition, purchased a large amount of land in the area and persuaded the Pacific Great Eastern Railway (present-day

BC Rail The British Columbia Railway Company , commonly known as BC Rail, is a railway in the Canadian province of British Columbia. Chartered as a private company in 1912 as the Pacific Great Eastern Railway (PGE), it was acquired by the provincial ...

) to adopt the name Whytecliffan intentional misspelling of White Cliffas the official name of the settlement on December 7, 1937. Whyte was thus able to memorialize himself until July 28, 1945, when the community elected to adopt the present name of Horseshoe Bay, on account of the adjacent bay's

horseshoe A horseshoe is a product designed to protect a horse hoof from wear. Shoes are attached on the palmar surface (ground side) of the hooves, usually nailed through the insensitive hoof wall that is anatomically akin to the human toenail, altho ...

shape.

Administration

Horseshoe Boy is listed in the

BC Geographical Names The BC Geographical Names (formerly BC Geographical Names Information System or BCGNIS) is a geographic name web service and database for the Canadian province of British Columbia run by the Base Mapping and Geomatic Services Branch of the Integr ...

database as a

, "an unincorporated populated place, generally with a population of 50 or more, hat hasa recognized central area". The provincial government recognized it as a community on April 15, 1982.

Transportation

Situated on the western tip of West Vancouver at the entrance to

, the village marks the western end of Highway 1 on the BC mainland, as well as the western end of the main route of the

on the Canadian mainland. It also serves as the southern end of the

Sea-to-Sky Highway Highway 99 is a provincial highway in British Columbia that runs from the U.S. border to near Cache Creek, serving Greater Vancouver and the Squamish–Lillooet corridor. It is a major north–south artery within Vancouver and connects the c ...

, with

Lions Bay Lions Bay (, ) is a small residential community in British Columbia, Canada, located between Vancouver and Squamish on the steep eastern shore of Howe Sound. In the 2021 census the community had a population of 1,390, BC's 36th smallest municipal ...

a short distance north. Horseshoe Bay is the location of one of the busiest

terminals, the Horseshoe Bay ferry terminal. It has an estimated annual traffic of 7 million passengers and 3 million vehicles. Because of the presence of the ferry terminal, it is considered a

control city A control city is a city, locality, or other location posted on a series of traffic signs along a particular stretch of road indicating destinations on that route. Together with route numbers and cardinal directions, these focal points aid the mo ...

on the Upper Levels Highway westbound. Sewell's Marina is a privately-operated

marina A marina (from Spanish , Portuguese and Italian : "related to the sea") is a dock or basin with moorings and supplies for yachts and small boats. A marina differs from a port in that a marina does not handle large passenger ships or cargo ...

adjacent to the BC Ferries terminal. It was established in 1931 by Dan Sewell Sr. and has been run by his family ever since. The marina's services include annual and seasonal moorage, a fuel dock, a launching ramp, a coffee shop, a tourist information center, and a parking lot for vehicles.

References

{{WestVancouverNeighbourhoods Populated places on the British Columbia Coast Neighbourhoods in West Vancouver BC Ferries communities