Main Street is a major north–south thoroughfare bisecting

Vancouver Vancouver is a major city in Western Canada, located in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. As the List of cities in British Columbia, most populous city in the province, the 2021 Canadian census recorded 662,248 people in the cit ...

, British Columbia, Canada. It runs from Waterfront Road by

Burrard Inlet Burrard Inlet () is a shallow-sided fjord in the northwestern Lower Mainland, British Columbia, Canada. Formed during the last Ice Age, it separates the City of Vancouver and the rest of the lowland Burrard Peninsula to the south from the coa ...

in the north, to Kent Avenue alongside the north arm of the

Fraser River The Fraser River () is the longest river within British Columbia, Canada, rising at Fraser Pass near Blackrock Mountain (Canada), Blackrock Mountain in the Rocky Mountains and flowing for , into the Strait of Georgia just south of the City of V ...

in the south.

Route

Beginning by the

Port of Vancouver The Port of Vancouver is the largest port in Canada and the fourth largest in North America by tonnes of cargo, facilitating trade between Canada and more than 170 world economies. The port is managed by the Vancouver Fraser Port Authority, whic ...

terminals near the nexus of the city's historic

Downtown Eastside The Downtown Eastside (DTES) is a list of neighbourhoods in Vancouver, neighbourhood in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. One of the city's oldest neighbourhoods, the DTES is the site of a complex set of social issues, including disproportio ...

and

Gastown Gastown is the original settlement that became the core of the city of Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, and a national historic site and a neighbourhood in the northwest section of the Downtown Eastside, adjacent to Downtown Vancouver. Its ...

districts, the street runs south through

Chinatown Chinatown ( zh, t=唐人街) is the catch-all name for an ethnic enclave of Chinese people located outside Greater China, most often in an urban setting. Areas known as "Chinatown" exist throughout the world, including Europe, Asia, Africa, O ...

south of Hastings Street and continues past the Pacific Central railway station and the Main Street–Science World SkyTrain station. At Terminal Avenue, it slopes up into the Mount Pleasant neighbourhood, which mixes commerce, light industry, brewing, and high-density residential areas. The residential/commercial mix continues south of

Broadway Broadway may refer to: Theatre * Broadway Theatre (disambiguation) * Broadway theatre, theatrical productions in professional theatres near Broadway, Manhattan, New York City, U.S. ** Broadway (Manhattan), the street ** Broadway Theatre (53rd Stre ...

, with a high density of restaurants and fashion retailing. This neighbourhood was once blue-collar but is growing distinctly upscale. Between 33rd Avenue and 41st Avenue, the street becomes decidedly more residential as it reaches its topographical summit. South of 41st Avenue, the street enters the Sunset neighbourhood and takes on a markedly Indo-Canadian character. The Punjabi Market district begins just north of 49th Avenue; south of the Market the street again becomes predominantly residential. At Main Street's intersection with Marine Drive in southern Vancouver, its character becomes big-box commercial, notably including a

Real Canadian Superstore Real Canadian Superstore is a chain of supermarkets owned by Canadian food retailing giant Loblaw Companies. Its name is often shortened to Superstore, or, less commonly, RCSS (pronounced “Rick’s”). Originating in Western Canada in the l ...

supermarket. Between Marine Drive and its southern terminus, Main Street's neighbourhood is a highly miscellaneous commercial mix including office space, manufacturing, and warehousing.

History

The north end of Main Street is located just west of the historic site of

Hastings Mill Hastings Mill was a sawmill on the south shore of Burrard Inlet and was the first commercial operation around which the settlement that would become Vancouver developed in British Columbia, Canada. Founded in 1865 by Captain Edward Stamp, Edward S ...

, the nucleus around which the settlement of Granville, later

, grew. In its earliest days, the intersection of Main Street and Hastings Street was the centre of

downtown Vancouver Downtown Vancouver is the central business district and the city centre list of neighbourhoods in Vancouver, neighbourhood of Vancouver, Canada, on the northwestern shore of the Burrard Peninsula in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. ...

, boasting the city's central public library (now the Carnegie Centre) and — a few blocks away — the old City Hall. The intersection of Main and Hastings is now a local byword for the poverty, addictions, homelessness, and prostitution often associated with the Downtown Eastside. The thoroughfare was originally named "Westminster Avenue", since it connects to New Westminster Road (now Kingsway). It received its present name in 1910 at the behest of local merchants, who thought that it bestowed a more cosmopolitan air to the neighbourhood. Main Street was previously separated into two segments by

False Creek False Creek () is a short narrow inlet in the heart of Vancouver, separating the Downtown Vancouver, Downtown and West End, Vancouver, West End list of neighbourhoods in Vancouver, neighbourhoods from the rest of the city. It is one of the four ...

, with a

bascule bridge A bascule bridge (also referred to as a drawbridge or a lifting bridge) is a moveable bridge with a counterweight that continuously balances a span, or leaf, throughout its upward swing to provide clearance for boat traffic. It may be single- o ...

linking the two. The two segments were joined together after the eastern section of False Creek was

reclaimed Land reclamation, often known as reclamation, and also known as land fill (not to be confused with a waste landfill), is the process of creating new land from oceans, seas, riverbeds or lake beds. The land reclaimed is known as reclamation ...

for railway lands in the 1910s and 1920s.

Neighbourhoods

Main Street passes through the following Vancouver neighbourhoods (north to south): *

* Paueru Gai *

* Strathcona * Mount Pleasant *

Riley Park–Little Mountain Riley Park, sometimes also known as Riley Park–Little Mountain, is a neighbourhood in Vancouver, British Columbia. Its boundaries are 41st Avenue to the south, 16th Avenue to the north, Cambie Street to the west, and Fraser Street to the east. T ...

* Punjabi Market *

Sunset Sunset (or sundown) is the disappearance of the Sun at the end of the Sun path, below the horizon of the Earth (or any other astronomical object in the Solar System) due to its Earth's rotation, rotation. As viewed from everywhere on Earth, it ...

Major intersections

From north to south.

References

External links

Extract from ''The History of Metropolitan Vancouver'' by Chuck Davis
{{Authority control Streets in Vancouver Former segments of the Trans-Canada Highway