JamesM

What was the interest rate back in the day?

Hawk13

Ditto. Ditto. NZ's better (imo).

dbd33

Of course!

Anyway, I thought it was very nice but a bit staid. I thought it odd that my daughter went from "I should have moved to Commercial Drive" (3 years, or so, ago) to "I'm settled here now" (last week) but then I suppose she's older than me now.

Boy d

What you dont like about the place is what makes it a decent place to live for some. It has easy access to the city and places like commercial or gastown without having it outside your appartment window. If you want that stuff, commercial is about 10 mins drive, downtown even less. |sort of like a small town in the middle of the city...very livable. I loved it.

The beach, spirit regional park, granville island and the sea wall are all there, offerring a great way of life. West Broadway, West 4 th and South Granville have plenty of stores, bars and eateries, even if they are on the more tame side...i liked that for a neighbourhood.

Camden is a neat place to visit. i couldn't imagine living there though. Now i am well into my forties White Rock does just fine.....20 years ago, it would have been a little too sleepy.

Vancouver, is odd in that the downtown does not function like other cities. It tends to be missing something and one tends to wander and wonder as i put it. many things tend to be scattered about the area. For example no theatre district. This is partly due to the shift of vancouver's core from the east end to its present location and previous council's efforts to largely force downtown bars in one tight corridor of the city (granville).

A few days is not enough to understand the place. I suspect that, like many, you wandered around Robson, down to English Bay, perhaps over to Granville Island and off to Stanley Park, noticed the brutalist buildings of the west end (which despite the look of the towers, is a great place to live, not like the housing schemes of the UK at all)....there is much more to the place than that, still i'ts not for everyone. But it grows on you after you have figured it out....still much room for improvement though.

It is also worth remembering the place is smaller than Leeds. I doubt many cities the size of vancouver have extensive subway systems, but I might be wrong.

But yes, it is awfully expensive and i tend to agree that it has gotten to the point, at least for many, that the costs now out weigh the positives of the area..i suspect many feel the same about London, my brother went back to Manchester after 3 years there for just that reason..dont get me wrong the place has many great attributes but many will be priced out i'm afraid.

Boy d

I can't remember. Maybe about 7 percent??? still was way more affordable though.

dbd33

My perspective is influenced by comparison of where two of my daughters (born and raised in Toronto) live now; one in Kits, one on the Isle of Dogs. Neither location is cheap (I assume my father, and his father, who were from the east end, spin in their graves at the thought that Tower Hamlets is now an expensive address). Kits, as mentioned, is nice and the daughter there makes good use of the location, she belongs to a sailing club and skis often, she and her partner are bicycling to San Francisco this summer. The Isle of Dogs meanwhile has the DLR and the city airport, the daughter who lives there makes good use of it having visited Turkey, the Canaries (for diving), Italy and Switzerland so far this year. Long term, the one in London will be able to keep travelling. Once done with studenting, the one in Kits will run smack into the lack of vacation/long way to anywhere problem.

I think, if I was 30ish with a high income, I'd choose London. But I aint.

JonboyE

I lived in London from 19 to 28 and wouldn't want to take back those years. It was fun even on very modest incomes. Camden was not my stomping ground but there were a couple of good music venues there. One an old theater on the high street and the other a club near Camden lock.

Fun at is was, here suits much better now.

Oink

I was in NYC from 18 to 22 and I thought it a bit of a noisy but dull shithole tbh. I also lived in DC from 24 to my early 30s and that was a lot more interesting and much cheaper to have fun.

From what I can gather the summers here are plenty fun for the under 30s, the rest of the time probably not that great.

The4BellsLondon

They are fighting to get in and the Business association is fighting to keep them out. . but we now have Dairy Queen, Megabite and a couple of other crappy pizza places and Farmosa (?) big Edmonton pizza chain.

Hopefully Donellys dont get their hands on the bars

PS Timbre- MUSIC WAY TOO LOUD of an evening - yeah am getting old!

ireland2canada

That's exactly how I would sum it up.

From a tourist perspective, it's a reasonable place to visit, especially if you are into outdoors activities. I liked Stanley Park, Gastown and the little ferries. Kits bored me to death, I had imagined a Vancouver version of The Beach in Toronto. UBC is so far removed from anything I don't know how the students function! The natural setting is very nice but is marred by the ugliness of the city itself. It is a shame to have a wonderful view ruined by some buildings that would not look out of place in Soviet Russia. I liked Capilano Bridge and the surrounding area. It was fun to be on boats. It's not very busy so being on the trains and buses was pleasant and it seems quite safe, we wandered the DTES without being traumatised.

From an immigrant perspective, IMO, it's a no go. I struggle to see how Vancouver is an aspirational place to live for people from the UK. It is isolated globally, that's one long flight to Europe. Housing costs (for the city proper) are appalling value for money. Rental costs did not seem excessive however, I would prefer to choose whether I rent or buy, not to have that decision made for me. Given the relatively small population, I have to wonder how the job market is?

The weather sucks. While we shivered and ducked for cover, Ontario basked in hot sunshine. I came to the non-scientific conclusion that people who move to Vancouver must be from places that are ugly, the natural setting seems to be the best feature of the city. I come from somewhere reasonably pretty, with a daily commute that took in unspoiled greenery on one side and a Lough on the other. So, while I thought Vancouver looked nice, I'm afraid that doesn't cut it. I would want a serious hike in income to persuade me to move there. Even then, I would be very sad to have to carry around an umbrella once again.

Granted a few days is not a lengthy visit, however, it is enough to form an impression of the place and I am not compelled to return to the city itself. I'm glad to have seen it, but for the cost of flights and time spent getting there I could have gone back home. The upshot of the trip was Seattle, a bustling, fun kind of place with excellent Alaskan cod burgers.

Souvy

To follow on from that, I first visited Vancouver in the mid-1990s. Something about the place struck me and it strikes me every time I go back. I was last there late last year, for a meeting. The guy I was talking with is a Vancouverite by origin but lived in the US for years. He described Vancouverites as "smug". I used "up themselves" but we were essentially reading from the same script.

ExKiwilass

I think the smugness comes from teh fact Vancovuerites know they don't have weather like the rest of Canada, A, and B, because they tend to be skinnier and better looking than the other Canadians. Also they have softer, less wrinkled skin due to all the rain so they look younger. They're basically the dolphins of Canada - smart and beautiful but totally up themselves.

ExKiwilass

Yeah, Commercial these days reminds me of Yaletown before the big chains move in...you know it's going to happen it's just a matter of time. Hopefully they can keep them out

ann m

That made me smile!

The4BellsLondon

Oh this dereves Karma but I need to spread a bit more before I can give it to you x