what are downsides about Vancouver?

July 4, 2009 5:27 PM

I visited Vancouver (Canada) this past weekend for the first time, and I was blown away. I'm from the US, and have visited or lived in pretty much in the US. So for those of you from Vancouver, what are the downsides of the city?

i found it to have many of the same things people speak well of regarding San Francisco (beautiful setting, outdoors culture, diversity) without some of the same downsides - and while being incredibly international and friendly, to boot.

I have been to a few other cities in Canada, so I don't intend for this to sound like a US v. Canada question - I'm interested in hearing what is frustrating about Vancouver (If I had to guess - housing and geographic isolation)

In short, I'm looking for reasons why one *wouldn't* live there.

posted by waylaid to travel & transportation (26 comments total)

Note: I don't live in Vancouver, I live in Ontario, but -- I hear that Vancouver is really expensive. Not unlike SF, I guess.
posted by the dief at 5:39 PM on July 4 [1 favorite]

I lived there for half a year once. I don't know what "geographic isolation" means; it's a very well-connected and international city.

Bad things: Housing is very expensive. It rains a lot. Biggest homeless population in Canada.

Other than that, it's probably the best city in Canada for overall quality of life.
posted by rokusan at 5:39 PM on July 4

Being an Australian living in Vancouver, I gotta say the winters are not so much fun. I would almost rather heaps of snow and ice, rather than the grayness and annoying rain we get here for a good chunk of the year. But that's just me.

Otherwise, I love it here. It has a smaller city vibe than Sydney, where I grew up, it is an amazingly beautiful city, right on the doorstep to some equally amazing places.

People say the cost of living is high here compared to other Canadian (and possibly American) cities. The DTES is a real shame, that such a forward thinking city and country can let this happen is a tragedy that will not be solved soon.

Can't really think of anything else...
posted by chromatist at 5:42 PM on July 4

Married to a Vancouverite, and we call it home when we're not stationed overseas. I love the city and we intend to move back there once we're done travelling.

Things that would deter me would be the high cost of living, apparently people in Vancouver pay a significant percentage more than elsewhere in Canada to housing.

Also, the homeless problem as rokusan mentions is a big issue, the city has not figured out a workable solution to helping homeless people. If you go through East Van, Hastings Street etc., it's quite dilapidated and will break your heart. The Vancouver council hasn't figured out a way to handle it other than moving people on all the time.

If you pick up the Vancouver Sun, there's a running problem with turf fights between various drug gangs that use Vancouver as a gateway to North America. Combined with grow ops and meth labs in suburbia, it gets a lot of headlines (although through either malaise or less activity I'm seeing less headlines on meth labs of late). The RSMP is supposed to be cracking down, but there's been a few drive-bys and shootings over the past 3 years or so.

The weather doesn't bother me as I'm from the UK, we're used to bad weather. The summers are awesome and the winters are good, close proximity to the mountains. Metro Vancouver however does not know how to cope with snow since we get it so rarely. Last Christmas was complete chaos for the 2 weeks we spend with the in-laws.

The Olympic preparations are going over budget and sponsors are backing out so expect municipal taxes to be high for a while until it's paid off, although this would be true for every Olympics apart from Sydney I think.

None of the above puts me off though, I love Vancouver warts and all, it sure as hell beats the UK Midlands where I grew up.
posted by arcticseal at 5:53 PM on July 4

It rains, a lot. The duration isn't really reflected in the mm of precipitation because in the winter the rain is mostly a light drizzle that lasts all day for a millimetre of rain. Due to geography Victoria is only half as bad and I spent an entire November there where I didn't see the sun. I was ready to shoot myself; YMMV.
posted by Mitheral at 6:00 PM on July 4

@arcticseal: I made the mistake of walking to Chinatown through East Hastings and Main. Granted, it was during the day, so it was fine - but yeah, it absolutely did break my heart. Like Vancouver concentrated all their social problems on a couple blocks.

@rokusan: I grew up on the East Coast of the US, and I'm just used to having other cities/metro areas close by bus/train/car. The only major city close to Vancouver is Seattle (other places are close by plane, but...)
posted by waylaid at 6:05 PM on July 4

I'm a Vancouverite, but live in Toronto for 2 reasons at the moment. 1: I spend a lot of time in Europe and a 6 hour flight from Toronto vs. 9 hour flight from Vancouver is a hell of a lot easier on the body. 2: I don't have a car and Vancouver is a bit of a bitch without one. The bus system sucks.

But when my travel schedule dies down, I'm moving back west. In my humble opinion, and as someone who has lived all over...apart from Sydney, Vancouver is the most wonderful city in the world in which to live.
posted by meerkatty at 6:23 PM on July 4

Downtown has become a weekend playground for suburban douchebags. You get used to the DTES, the rain, and the cost of living.
posted by doublesix at 6:37 PM on July 4 [1 favorite]

There's areas to avoid like the above mentioned East Hastings Chinatown area.

Housing doesn't have to be expensive, if you don't mind basements or rooms. It's cheaper here in Surrey, but it lacks the mountain views, ocean, and cultural stuff that can be found downtown. Pay for what you get, but those are why I moved out here. Well, and the weather, but that has been freaky as well.

When I lived here previously ~20 years ago, the influence was more native. Now it's Chinese and East Indian. Which is ok, just a data point, but for things like groceries and restaurants the pickings are slim when you're used to typical Canadian or American fare. Maybe that's just from staying in cheaper parts of the city though.

Things are more packed-in due to geographical reasons, both mountains and delta. So, less suburbia, big-box strip malls, etc.

The Olympics are an upside infrastructure-wise, but I expect to be a pain in the butt during.
posted by hungrysquirrels at 6:47 PM on July 4

One of the worst violent crime rates in Canada. Vancouver's murder rate for 2009 is, right now, double that of Seattle's and triple that or Portland's. It has never been the case in modern Canadian history that a Canadian city would have a higher murder rate than that of its American neighbours, but Vancouver and its environs are well on track to post the highest murder rate of any Canadian city ever.

Weather is horrible. Yes you have lovely summers, but so does the rest of Canada. Winters are abysmal- in Jan-Feb 2007 Vancouver had thirty days or rain, straight.

It's expensive.

Finally you have Vancouverites themselves. Look at responses here: You ask for downsides and they fall all over one another writing accolades. They can be insufferably smug, and as my partner always says, he'd live in Vancouver if it weren't for Vancouverites. Loving your city is fine; having to take EVERY FUCKING OPPORTUNITY to insult, aggressively and to their faces, visitors from other parts of Canada who dare to say that they like where they live as well (and having lived in and ADORED both Toronto and Calgary, I get this all the time) and don't get on their knees to worship Vancouver is a pretty fucked-up way to treat guests.

I could go on and on. I've spent oodles of time in Van since moving west and it's damn seductive I agree, but why not check out the rest of Canada too. There are better places.
posted by ethnomethodologist at 6:56 PM on July 4 [7 favorites]

I got mugged in Vancouver. I still love visiting and would consider moving there if it weren't for that pesky don't-have-a-job, must-get-a-visa thing.
posted by jeffamaphone at 7:13 PM on July 4

I work in technology and the tech job scene is there, sort of, but it's very weak. It's a hard place to find a job IMO.
posted by GuyZero at 7:27 PM on July 4

The downsides:

Homes are expensive, traffic is awful and will get much worse, no money for a *really* comprehensive mass transit system (while more and more roads are being built, homeless mental patients on the street with no way to house them, escalating gangland violence, air pollution in the suburbs, the town has no real culture - it's just an overgrown provincial outpost whose business elite are Philistines who mainly know how to mine coal, package lumber and ship containers.

And I would argue that Vancouver is indeed geographically isolated. It's on the western edge of the continent, isolated from the rest of Canada. It's difficult to build large, successful "new economy" businesses such as Microsoft or Amazon, and it's extremely difficult for tech companies to access capital. As a result, knowledge workers in Van are typically servicing foreign clients. EA is a prime example. There are few head offices in Van, they all moved to Calgary, TO and Montreal during the 90s.

The plus side:

Mountains, Seawall, VAG, ethnic mix with a heavy emphasis on Asia, physical beauty of environment, physical beauty of inhabitants, higher wages than elsewhere in the province
posted by KokuRyu at 7:28 PM on July 4 [1 favorite]

Oh, yeah, the new mayor of Vancouver is just out to lunch. Totally in over his head.
posted by KokuRyu at 7:33 PM on July 4

If you're not Canadian, immigrating will cost you a couple thousand dollars, at least. Granted, in Vancouver, that's about a month's rent.
posted by $5 at 8:20 PM on July 4

Having lived in Ontario for a few years, I moved to Seattle, and visited Vancouver on a near weekly basis for a couple months. You're absolutely right, the city is gorgeous, the kind of city that hits you with "I'd love to live here." As long as it's summer. After seeing Vancouver in the period from September to February, no way in hell could I live there. It was literally dark and rainy every single day. Even by Seattle's dreary winter standards, Vancouver was unbearable. And seconding the lack of tech jobs, while I was toying with moving there, I couldn't find all that many tech jobs to follow up on(as compared to Seattle which always has tons of tech jobs). The housing prices didn't seem too out of whack compared to what we're used to in other big cities, and the homeless problem is just like in any other city--if you can afford to live away from it, you'll rarely see it. Also seconding the appalling better-than-thou smugness of Vancouverites-- much higher than the typical levels of smug par for Canada. I can't stand pretentious people, so that was a deal breaker for me.
posted by archae at 9:55 PM on July 4

An all too common argument. Some fellow Vancouverite says, "Vancouver's the best city in the world." I say, "Oh yeah? You've been to them all, have you?"

And so on.

The fact is, Toronto has better transit, better museums, and gets more and better concerts, Montreal has better restaurants, bars, everything, London has better pubs and is way closer to way more interesting places, LA has better parties, San Francisco has better drugs ...

And yet I choose to leave here.

What's the worst thing about Vancouver, the thing which negatively sets it apart from every other major city I've ever spent time in? Definitely the Downtown Eastside and all it represents. Obviously, this starts with the despair of the people trapped there, but it infects everyone and everywhere in ways too complex to explore without going on at great length. It really is a black mark, of which this small sample is but a tiny detail.
posted by philip-random at 10:28 PM on July 4

I lived in Vancouver for 2 years and had a hard time making friends when I first arrived from Montreal. I met loads of people though and was often invited to exchange numbers with other people. When I would actually call to make plans and hang out I got a " oh, I didn't actually think you'd call " response from 3 different people.

I started to think I had some social disease, but eventually I made some good friends, oddly enough they were ALL from Montreal or Toronto. When I relayed my experience meeting locals, the all had the same experience. In the end Vancouverites are very nice and polite but rather shallow and cliquey imho.

And I wouldn't consider it a small city but rather a large town... too provincial for me.

All that being said I am considering taking a work transfer there as my working conditions would greatly improve and it's proximity to Asia makes it a natural gateway for mini breaks to South East Asia which I take frequently.
posted by dawdle at 10:38 PM on July 4 [1 favorite]

Seconding Vancouver's provincial, isolated feel. I've lived here most of my life, and I love it, but I've always been disappointed in the lack of world-class culture. We only have a couple of museums and don't have the same sort of arts scene as Toronto or Montreal. We often get skipped by bands or shows on tour. And besides Seattle, there aren't really any major cities within an easy drive.
posted by fhangler at 11:40 PM on July 4

Things that suck about Vancouver:

The winters - grey and rainy almost every day. Horribly depressing. The only nice months are May, June, July and August.

Housing prices - painful, unless you're at or near six figures.

The homelessness - very common to see people who are obviously mentally ill and can't take care of themselves on the street.

The gang wars - this is a new thing in the last year or two, but it seems we have a couple of shootings a week in Greater Vancouver (inc Burnaby, Surrey, New West)

The water is cold at the beach. Never warm. Never!

The social scene is a bit lame. A lot of people complain about the dating scene, and how people in Vancouver are difficult to approach socially - more because they're reserved than actively anti-social.

The live music scene and the clubbing scene are both a little weak for a city this size, hence the city's rep as "No Fun-couver".

Flying anywhere on the east side of the continent seems way too expensive.

There are a lot of great things too, but since you didn't ask about those...
posted by bone machine at 11:40 PM on July 4

People who were born and raised here often don't understand irony and sarcasm the way people who were raised centrally or on the east coast do. There's a more straightforward kind of attitude about people here that can sometimes be a little boring. (I'm from Toronto originally, and I think a major reason why people from that area band together when they get here is because they get each other's humour.) That said, there are always exceptions.

The form of multiculturalism present here seems centred around white people and East Asians/South Asians. I miss the West Indian and Jewish influence in Toronto, which is very thin on the ground here.
posted by Big Fat Tycoon at 11:55 PM on July 4

Everyone is late for everything.

I notice this the most for live shows; if the show is slated to begin (and I don't mean that the doors open, but the show itself should begin) at 9pm, it'll start at around 10:30. This might not be such a big deal, but if you're trying to catch the third band in a night, and the last skytrain from downtown leaves at around 1:30am... you might be out of luck.

It's not just the shows though; people are also habitually late, although not to the same degree. And I suppose this depends on your social circle, too.
posted by vernondalhart at 1:50 AM on July 5

I was born in Vancouver, moved away at 21 and would never go back. Yes there are some nice things about the city, but since you asked for the negatives, here's my list:

1- Bad public transit: there are really only about 5 Skytrain stops in the downtown core, and no trams or light rail, meaning there are tons of areas that are only accessible by bus. Buses that are slow and unreliable at the best of times.

2- Sprawl: Despite not having a particularly high population, I find that Vancouver is not a city that you can just wander around easily. While there are quite a few interesting neighbourhoods, they're often quite far away from each other - you can't walk from Commmercial Drive to the Village, or to Kitsilano from Gastown. And often there's nothing in between good areas but shitty track housing, highways, or industrial wastelands. The suburbs are a hellscape of sprawling malls, big box retailers and fast food outlets.

3- No Fun City: Nightlife is pretty uninspired, you can't buy alcohol at corner stores or supermarkets, and you're not allowed to drink on the street. Lots of clubs, bars and restaurants close quite early.

4- Shitty fashion: I don't know if you care at all about this, but Vancouver is well known throughout the rest of Canada for being a sea of fleece vests, rain jackets, tracksuits and the ubiquitous flame shirt + ball cap combo beloved of the suburban meatheads who invade Granville street every weekend

5- Weather: I distinctly remember periods of 30+ days on continuous rain when I lived there

6- Cost: If you want to live in an area where you get to enjoy what Vancouver does have to offer (beautiful sea and mountains), be prepared to shell out.
posted by vodkaboots at 7:48 AM on July 5

I too grew up in Vancouver, moved away at 27. Here's my negatives:

1. Boring. Few festivals and those that do exist are tightly controlled. Limited choices for live music. Never saw a street festival the whole time I lived there.
2. Weather. Rain, rain, rain from November to April. And you almost never get a nice, hot, evening when you can walk home in a t-shirt at midnight.
3. Expensive. Pricey homes especially.
4. Ugly, squat architecture (with a few exceptions).
5. Isolated from other cities.
6. Lousy people watching. Way too much Gor-tex and exercise gear.
posted by Cuke at 8:33 PM on July 5

Good thoughts from everyone. Thanks! (It's good to hear everyone's thoughts, because so many people are of the 'Vancouver is the best place ever' line of thought. Which is the same for San Francisco in the US, which I feel is nice (and i spent some time living there), but the negatives of being there far outweigh the positives.
posted by waylaid at 7:41 AM on July 6

The trouble with the people in Vancouver they do not know the difference between a drug addict,
a bum and a person who is homeless because of mental problems. They classify them all as homeless.
The cure rate for most drug addicts and it is backed by lots of statistics, is about 10%.
So what do you do with them? They are responsible for most of the crime in Vancouver and the deplorable conditions in the East End.
I hung around the East End in the sixties and the drug use at the time was heroin and the younger people were not doing drugs. The drug of choice at that time was alcohol. But that all changed when the drug scene appeared and everybody started popping and smoking any thing they could get their hands on. And it has continued ever since. With the open use of drugs came the crime.
Before the drugs the police had a handle on East End. There was no open use of drugs, no loitering, no panhandling unless you had a handicap and were selling something, even if it was only pencils. If you were a drug dealer at that time, you were always looking over your shoulder for the Narcotic Squad, they were not nice people. I knew hardened criminals that were afraid of them.
The drug scene started off with marijuana, in the sixties very mild, not the numbing bud of today, then it escalated to speed, mda, cocaine, hashish, heroin, valium, butosol, methadone etc.
If North America is such a nice place to live why are so many people using drugs to cope with every day living? People in power in Vancouver are very naive about drug use and the problems that it causes.
posted by Maquinna at 11:44 AM on July 16