WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.200 Welcome back to the Deep Dive. Today we are heading 00:00:03.200 --> 00:00:06.660 to the absolute edge of the continent. We're 00:00:06.660 --> 00:00:09.000 talking about a place that is defined by this 00:00:09.000 --> 00:00:14.279 incredibly dramatic, almost violent physical 00:00:14.279 --> 00:00:16.379 beauty. Yeah, that's a good way to put it. You 00:00:16.379 --> 00:00:19.620 know, towering mountains, dark ocean, these massive, 00:00:19.679 --> 00:00:21.879 massive trees. Yeah. But it's also a place defined 00:00:21.879 --> 00:00:24.440 by some of the most intense urban contradictions 00:00:24.440 --> 00:00:27.929 you will find. Really. anywhere in North America. 00:00:28.070 --> 00:00:30.250 It really is. I mean, it's a city that consistently 00:00:30.250 --> 00:00:33.310 tops the global lists for most livable. You know, 00:00:33.329 --> 00:00:34.929 you see it all the time. All the time. Yet at 00:00:34.929 --> 00:00:37.409 the same time, it simultaneously ranks as one 00:00:37.409 --> 00:00:39.549 of the most unaffordable places to live on the 00:00:39.549 --> 00:00:42.909 planet. It's this bizarre paradox. You have this 00:00:42.909 --> 00:00:46.630 culture of aggressive health consciousness. You 00:00:46.630 --> 00:00:49.189 know, the yoga, the hiking, the kale salads everywhere. 00:00:49.450 --> 00:00:51.750 The West Coast uniform. And then that same city. 00:00:52.159 --> 00:00:54.619 Contains one of the most concentrated areas of 00:00:54.619 --> 00:00:57.219 drug addiction and poverty in the entire developed 00:00:57.219 --> 00:00:59.820 world. The contrast is just, it's jarring. It's 00:00:59.820 --> 00:01:01.859 right there in your face. We are talking, of 00:01:01.859 --> 00:01:04.599 course, about Vancouver, British Columbia. And 00:01:04.599 --> 00:01:07.420 the mission for this deep dive is to move past 00:01:07.420 --> 00:01:10.000 the postcard. You know the image I'm talking 00:01:10.000 --> 00:01:12.439 about. I do. The glass towers reflecting the 00:01:12.439 --> 00:01:15.280 sunset over the water. Exactly. And the idea 00:01:15.280 --> 00:01:18.709 that you can ski in the morning and... Sail in 00:01:18.709 --> 00:01:20.890 the afternoon. Which, for the record, is physically 00:01:20.890 --> 00:01:23.170 possible. I just don't know a single person who 00:01:23.170 --> 00:01:25.769 actually has the energy or the money to do both 00:01:25.769 --> 00:01:29.019 in one day. Right. It's a great marketing tagline, 00:01:29.079 --> 00:01:30.980 but that's what it is. Yeah. We want to get into 00:01:30.980 --> 00:01:33.459 the mechanics of the city. We have a massive 00:01:33.459 --> 00:01:35.640 stack of research here, articles, urban planning 00:01:35.640 --> 00:01:38.140 documents, economic reports, and we're going 00:01:38.140 --> 00:01:41.280 to unpack this idea of Vancouverism. We're going 00:01:41.280 --> 00:01:43.480 to look at the snow washing phenomena in real 00:01:43.480 --> 00:01:46.519 estate, which is a wild story, and we'll dig 00:01:46.519 --> 00:01:48.799 into the whole Hollywood North machine. Basically, 00:01:48.799 --> 00:01:52.040 we're going to look at how a really rough and 00:01:52.040 --> 00:01:54.480 tumble mill town transformed into a global luxury 00:01:54.480 --> 00:01:57.780 brand and maybe what gets lost when a city becomes 00:01:57.780 --> 00:02:00.900 that desirable and that expensive. But before 00:02:00.900 --> 00:02:03.400 we get into any of the heavy economic stuff or, 00:02:03.439 --> 00:02:06.260 you know, the urban planning theories, we have 00:02:06.260 --> 00:02:09.419 to perform a public service. OK. We have to clear 00:02:09.419 --> 00:02:12.939 up. The number one misconception about this city's 00:02:12.939 --> 00:02:15.979 geography. Yeah. I feel like if you are not from 00:02:15.979 --> 00:02:19.280 the Pacific Northwest, there is a 50 -50 chance 00:02:19.280 --> 00:02:21.379 you get this wrong. I think I know exactly where 00:02:21.379 --> 00:02:23.460 you're going with this. Vancouver is not on Vancouver 00:02:23.460 --> 00:02:26.259 Island. It is not. And let me tell you, this 00:02:26.259 --> 00:02:29.400 drives locals absolutely crazy. It's like a pet 00:02:29.400 --> 00:02:31.780 peeve for the entire city. I can imagine. The 00:02:31.780 --> 00:02:34.159 city of Vancouver is on the mainland of North 00:02:34.159 --> 00:02:36.659 America. It's on a little piece of land called 00:02:36.659 --> 00:02:39.819 the Burrard Peninsula. Vancouver Island is that 00:02:39.819 --> 00:02:42.860 massive landmass. I mean, it's huge, about the 00:02:42.860 --> 00:02:46.280 size of Belgium or Taiwan. And it sits across 00:02:46.280 --> 00:02:48.400 the Strait of Georgia. And to make it even more 00:02:48.400 --> 00:02:50.599 confusing for people, the capital of the whole 00:02:50.599 --> 00:02:52.879 province, Victoria, is on the island. Correct. 00:02:52.939 --> 00:02:55.080 So you have the major economic city on the mainland 00:02:55.080 --> 00:02:57.479 and the political capital is over on the island. 00:02:59.129 --> 00:03:01.150 Just to pile on the confusion, there's also a 00:03:01.150 --> 00:03:04.289 designated city of North Vancouver and a separate 00:03:04.289 --> 00:03:07.030 district of North Vancouver. Oh, come on. And 00:03:07.030 --> 00:03:10.169 West Vancouver, which are all totally separate 00:03:10.169 --> 00:03:12.389 municipalities from the city of Vancouver itself. 00:03:12.490 --> 00:03:14.469 It's a bit of a mess. Okay, my head is already 00:03:14.469 --> 00:03:17.689 spinning. But the core confusion, the island 00:03:17.689 --> 00:03:19.770 versus the city, it all comes down to the fact 00:03:19.770 --> 00:03:21.530 that they're both named after the same guy. Yep. 00:03:21.870 --> 00:03:24.969 Captain George Vancouver of the Royal Navy, he 00:03:24.969 --> 00:03:27.169 was the one who sailed into the Inner Harbor, 00:03:27.330 --> 00:03:31.129 the Burrard Inlet, and charted it back in 1792. 00:03:31.840 --> 00:03:33.860 That feels like a bit of an ego trip, doesn't 00:03:33.860 --> 00:03:35.919 it? Naming the massive island and the future 00:03:35.919 --> 00:03:38.379 metropolis after yourself. Well, to be fair to 00:03:38.379 --> 00:03:40.479 George, he didn't actually name the city. He 00:03:40.479 --> 00:03:42.460 was long dead by the time the city was incorporated. 00:03:42.800 --> 00:03:45.939 The city was named in his honor much, much later. 00:03:46.060 --> 00:03:49.020 And it was largely for branding reasons, which 00:03:49.020 --> 00:03:50.960 is a whole other story we will absolutely get 00:03:50.960 --> 00:03:54.340 to. But the name itself, Vancouver, it actually 00:03:54.340 --> 00:03:57.340 has Dutch roots. It comes from Van Covoorden, 00:03:57.500 --> 00:04:00.139 which means from the city of Covoorden in the 00:04:00.139 --> 00:04:02.789 Netherlands. We have a Dutch name applied by 00:04:02.789 --> 00:04:04.889 the British to a piece of land that had been 00:04:04.889 --> 00:04:07.370 inhabited for thousands and thousands of years 00:04:07.370 --> 00:04:10.449 before any of them showed up. And that is the 00:04:10.449 --> 00:04:13.349 crucial context. It's so important. When we talk 00:04:13.349 --> 00:04:16.170 about the origins of this place, we are not starting 00:04:16.170 --> 00:04:18.930 with Captain Vancouver in 1792. That's just a 00:04:18.930 --> 00:04:21.730 tiny blip. Right. The archaeological record shows 00:04:21.730 --> 00:04:25.870 human habitation in that area for somewhere between 00:04:25.870 --> 00:04:29.370 8 ,000 and 10 ,000 years. That is just a staggering 00:04:29.370 --> 00:04:31.250 amount of time. We're talking about the end of 00:04:31.250 --> 00:04:33.850 the last ice age. People were there as the glaciers 00:04:33.850 --> 00:04:36.970 retreated. Exactly. This is the traditional, 00:04:37.149 --> 00:04:40.910 ancestral, and unseen. of the Coast Salish peoples. 00:04:41.569 --> 00:04:43.670 Specifically for the area that is now Vancouver, 00:04:43.949 --> 00:04:46.610 it's the Squamish, the Muskeme, and the Tsleil 00:04:46.610 --> 00:04:49.129 -Waututh, also known as the Burrard people. And 00:04:49.129 --> 00:04:51.110 they had settlements all over. All over what 00:04:51.110 --> 00:04:53.740 is now the modern city. There were major villages 00:04:53.740 --> 00:04:56.259 in what we now call Stanley Park along False 00:04:56.259 --> 00:04:58.660 Creek near the mouth of the Fraser River. It 00:04:58.660 --> 00:05:01.420 was a thriving, interconnected world. And one 00:05:01.420 --> 00:05:03.279 thing that really stood out to me in the research, 00:05:03.379 --> 00:05:06.060 which you touched on, was the difference in naming 00:05:06.060 --> 00:05:09.160 conventions. It seems so revealing. Well, when 00:05:09.160 --> 00:05:10.779 the British arrived, they started naming things 00:05:10.779 --> 00:05:13.300 after people. Lord Granville, George Vancouver, 00:05:13.560 --> 00:05:16.220 Simon Fraser. It's all about, you know, ownership 00:05:16.220 --> 00:05:19.860 or patronage or honoring some distant aristocrat. 00:05:19.899 --> 00:05:22.180 It's about imposing a hierarchy onto the land. 00:05:22.259 --> 00:05:24.860 It's a human centric view. But if you look at 00:05:24.860 --> 00:05:27.160 the indigenous place names, they are deeply functional 00:05:27.160 --> 00:05:29.759 and descriptive. They describe the landscape 00:05:29.759 --> 00:05:32.079 or the resources that are there. Can you give 00:05:32.079 --> 00:05:34.439 us an example of that? Sure. So take the area 00:05:34.439 --> 00:05:36.319 that eventually became the original colonial 00:05:36.319 --> 00:05:39.319 settlement, the place we now call Gastown. The 00:05:39.319 --> 00:05:42.500 Squamish name for that specific spot is Kemkemele. 00:05:43.000 --> 00:05:45.199 Okay. And what does that translate to? It means 00:05:45.199 --> 00:05:48.060 place of many maple trees. It tells you exactly 00:05:48.060 --> 00:05:49.860 what is there. It tells you about the ecosystem, 00:05:50.100 --> 00:05:52.160 what you can find there, what the land is. It's 00:05:52.160 --> 00:05:54.620 practical. It's completely practical. Another 00:05:54.620 --> 00:05:56.959 example is a name for the region in the upriver 00:05:56.959 --> 00:06:01.060 Halcomelum dialect, LHK .lets. It means wide 00:06:01.060 --> 00:06:03.800 at the bottom or wide at the end. It's basically 00:06:03.800 --> 00:06:06.160 a navigational aid describing the shape of the 00:06:06.160 --> 00:06:08.459 inlet for someone in a canoe. So it grounds the 00:06:08.459 --> 00:06:11.199 name in the land itself rather than in a person 00:06:11.199 --> 00:06:12.980 who might never have even seen it. set foot there. 00:06:13.079 --> 00:06:14.839 Precisely. And that land, you have to remember, 00:06:14.959 --> 00:06:17.079 was a temperate rainforest. Before the glass 00:06:17.079 --> 00:06:19.720 towers, this was a land of giants. I mean, Douglas 00:06:19.720 --> 00:06:23.519 fir, western red cedar, western hemlock. Some 00:06:23.519 --> 00:06:25.660 of these trees were hundreds of feet tall, 10 00:06:25.660 --> 00:06:28.019 feet in diameter. Unimaginable, really. And the 00:06:28.019 --> 00:06:30.100 indigenous culture is often referred to as a 00:06:30.100 --> 00:06:32.680 cedar culture because that one tree provided 00:06:32.680 --> 00:06:36.379 everything. The wood for the massive longhouses 00:06:36.379 --> 00:06:39.759 and the ocean -going canoes. The bark was woven 00:06:39.759 --> 00:06:42.639 into clothing and baskets. and rope. It was the 00:06:42.639 --> 00:06:45.180 center of life. OK, so let's let's fast forward 00:06:45.180 --> 00:06:47.259 to the colonial era. You have the Fraser Gold 00:06:47.259 --> 00:06:50.519 Rush in 1858. And this just changes everything. 00:06:50.600 --> 00:06:53.600 Suddenly, 25 ,000 men, mostly from California, 00:06:53.819 --> 00:06:56.399 come flooding north. A huge wave of people. But 00:06:56.399 --> 00:06:58.910 they didn't stop in what is now Vancouver. No, 00:06:58.930 --> 00:07:00.990 because there was nothing there. Vancouver didn't 00:07:00.990 --> 00:07:04.029 exist. It was just forest. They completely bypassed 00:07:04.029 --> 00:07:05.990 the peninsula to get to the colonial capital 00:07:05.990 --> 00:07:08.410 at the time, which was New Westminster. And then 00:07:08.410 --> 00:07:10.170 from there, they went up the Fraser River to 00:07:10.170 --> 00:07:13.029 the gold fields. Vancouver was just a place you 00:07:13.029 --> 00:07:16.050 sailed past. So how did the city actually begin? 00:07:16.189 --> 00:07:19.029 We'd sort of tease this. Most major cities, you 00:07:19.029 --> 00:07:20.790 know, they start with a fort or a government 00:07:20.790 --> 00:07:23.509 decree or a mission. Vancouver started with a 00:07:23.509 --> 00:07:25.790 bar. It is, without a doubt, the best origin 00:07:25.790 --> 00:07:28.620 story of any Canadian city. It really is. It 00:07:28.620 --> 00:07:31.019 started with one man, a character named Gassy 00:07:31.019 --> 00:07:34.560 Jack Dayton. Right. Gassy. I have to assume that 00:07:34.560 --> 00:07:37.759 doesn't refer to, well, digestion. No, no, thankfully. 00:07:37.819 --> 00:07:40.819 In Victorian slang, to be gassy meant you talked 00:07:40.819 --> 00:07:44.180 a lot. You were a storyteller, a braggart, a 00:07:44.180 --> 00:07:47.259 bit of a windbag. A talker. A talker. And Jack 00:07:47.259 --> 00:07:50.100 Dayton was a former riverboat captain and a barkeep. 00:07:50.180 --> 00:07:52.819 He knew how to handle rough men. So paint the 00:07:52.819 --> 00:07:54.759 picture for us. What year are we in? We're in 00:07:54.759 --> 00:07:58.329 1867. You have this place called Hastings Mill 00:07:58.329 --> 00:08:01.269 on the south shore of the Burrard Inlet. It's 00:08:01.269 --> 00:08:04.550 a rough, muddy, dangerous operation. Men are 00:08:04.550 --> 00:08:06.370 working these terrible jobs cutting down these 00:08:06.370 --> 00:08:10.329 giant trees. It's all mud and sawdust. Not a 00:08:10.329 --> 00:08:12.029 lot of amenities, I'm guessing. No amenities. 00:08:12.470 --> 00:08:15.569 And Jack Deaton arrives. He shows up on the edge 00:08:15.569 --> 00:08:17.569 of the mill property with his indigenous wife, 00:08:17.769 --> 00:08:20.670 a dog, and one single barrel of whiskey. The 00:08:20.670 --> 00:08:22.730 absolute essentials for city building. Pretty 00:08:22.730 --> 00:08:25.689 much. He essentially goes up to the mill workers 00:08:25.689 --> 00:08:27.470 who are not allowed to drink on company land. 00:08:27.569 --> 00:08:29.370 And he says, look, I have this whiskey. If you 00:08:29.370 --> 00:08:31.329 guys help me build a saloon right here, just 00:08:31.329 --> 00:08:33.370 off the property line, you can drink as much 00:08:33.370 --> 00:08:35.830 as you want. And I assume the local labor market 00:08:35.830 --> 00:08:37.990 responded favorably to that particular incentive. 00:08:38.330 --> 00:08:40.809 Immediately, they built a makeshift tavern, the 00:08:40.809 --> 00:08:43.929 Globe Saloon, in about 24 hours. And that one 00:08:43.929 --> 00:08:46.389 little building became the nucleus of the entire 00:08:46.389 --> 00:08:48.730 settlement. The area around it was originally 00:08:48.730 --> 00:08:51.690 just called Gastown after him. It is just wild. 00:08:51.879 --> 00:08:55.320 to me, the idea that a city of millions, the 00:08:55.320 --> 00:08:58.340 sophisticated global hub, started because one 00:08:58.340 --> 00:09:00.419 guy wanted to sell booze to lumberjacks in the 00:09:00.419 --> 00:09:03.039 mud. And Gastown is still there. It's now the 00:09:03.039 --> 00:09:04.840 historic heart of the city, you know, with the 00:09:04.840 --> 00:09:07.200 cobblestone streets and the famous steam clock 00:09:07.200 --> 00:09:10.200 that tourists love. Right. But obviously, as 00:09:10.200 --> 00:09:12.480 the settlement grew, the colonial government 00:09:12.480 --> 00:09:15.480 couldn't just let it be officially called Gastown. 00:09:15.580 --> 00:09:18.789 It wasn't dignified enough. It needed a rebrand. 00:09:18.809 --> 00:09:22.289 A big one. So in 1870, they surveyed the town 00:09:22.289 --> 00:09:25.470 site and they officially renamed it Granville 00:09:25.470 --> 00:09:29.110 in honor of the British colonial secretary. But 00:09:29.110 --> 00:09:32.309 the real game changer. The thing that turned 00:09:32.309 --> 00:09:35.750 it from a muddy mill town into a potential metropolis 00:09:35.750 --> 00:09:38.610 was the train. The Canadian Pacific Railway. 00:09:38.649 --> 00:09:41.049 The CPR. In the late 19th century, you have to 00:09:41.049 --> 00:09:43.409 understand, the railway was everything. It was 00:09:43.409 --> 00:09:45.230 the internet, it was the highway system, it was 00:09:45.230 --> 00:09:47.230 the airport, all rolled into one. It was the 00:09:47.230 --> 00:09:49.629 only way to connect the country from east to 00:09:49.629 --> 00:09:51.929 west. And the CPR was looking for its western 00:09:51.929 --> 00:09:54.740 terminus. It had to end somewhere on the Pacific. 00:09:54.960 --> 00:09:57.320 Exactly. They needed a deep water port so they 00:09:57.320 --> 00:09:59.240 could start trading with Asia. And they looked 00:09:59.240 --> 00:10:01.419 at a few options, but they eventually chose the 00:10:01.419 --> 00:10:03.700 Burrard Inlet right next to Granville. Good news 00:10:03.700 --> 00:10:06.360 for Granville. It should have been. But the president 00:10:06.360 --> 00:10:09.460 of the CPR, a man named William Van Horn, had 00:10:09.460 --> 00:10:12.299 a problem. He looked at the map, he saw the name 00:10:12.299 --> 00:10:15.820 Granville, and he hated it. Why? What was wrong 00:10:15.820 --> 00:10:17.820 with it? He just didn't think it had any brand 00:10:17.820 --> 00:10:21.279 recognition. Nobody in London or New York or 00:10:21.279 --> 00:10:23.860 Hong Kong knew where Granville was. It was meaningless 00:10:23.860 --> 00:10:27.460 to them. But thanks to all those Royal Navy maps 00:10:27.460 --> 00:10:30.320 that have been circulating for decades, people 00:10:30.320 --> 00:10:33.820 of influence knew the name Vancouver. They knew 00:10:33.820 --> 00:10:36.899 Vancouver Island, the name had cachet. So Van 00:10:36.899 --> 00:10:38.899 Horn makes a marketing decision. A pure marketing 00:10:38.899 --> 00:10:42.179 decision. He said, effectively, if you want the 00:10:42.179 --> 00:10:44.000 railway to terminate here, you have to change 00:10:44.000 --> 00:10:46.419 the name of the town to Vancouver. He wanted 00:10:46.419 --> 00:10:48.799 the brand recognition. So the city's name was 00:10:48.799 --> 00:10:51.419 basically an early form of SEO, search engine 00:10:51.419 --> 00:10:54.779 optimization for a 19th century map. 100%. It 00:10:54.779 --> 00:10:57.139 was about searchability and brand power. So on 00:10:57.139 --> 00:11:00.419 April 6, 1886, the deal was done. The city of 00:11:00.419 --> 00:11:02.379 Vancouver was officially incorporated. They had 00:11:02.379 --> 00:11:05.059 a city council, a police chief, and these massive 00:11:05.059 --> 00:11:07.179 ambitions. And then almost immediately, everything 00:11:07.179 --> 00:11:09.899 went catastrophically wrong. Disastrously wrong. 00:11:10.059 --> 00:11:11.779 I mean, this is the story of the Great Vancouver 00:11:11.779 --> 00:11:14.980 Fire of 1886. And when we say fire, we're not 00:11:14.980 --> 00:11:17.039 talking about a block of buildings burning down. 00:11:17.159 --> 00:11:20.639 No, we're talking about total annihilation. It 00:11:20.639 --> 00:11:23.559 was June 13th, just two months after the city 00:11:23.559 --> 00:11:27.139 was incorporated. It was a hot, dry day. There 00:11:27.139 --> 00:11:29.639 was a clearing fire nearby. They were burning 00:11:29.639 --> 00:11:32.419 brush to make way for the railway line. Standard 00:11:32.419 --> 00:11:35.039 practice at the time. Totally standard. But a 00:11:35.039 --> 00:11:38.240 sudden, fierce gale blew up and the fire just 00:11:38.240 --> 00:11:41.820 jumped. It leaped from the brush into the city 00:11:41.820 --> 00:11:43.860 itself. And because the entire city was built 00:11:43.860 --> 00:11:46.059 of wood. It was built of wood and it was surrounded 00:11:46.059 --> 00:11:48.600 by what they called slash, all the dry branches 00:11:48.600 --> 00:11:51.000 and debris left over from logging. The whole 00:11:51.000 --> 00:11:53.340 place was a tinderbox. It became a firestorm. 00:11:53.399 --> 00:11:56.179 The entire city was razed to the ground in less 00:11:56.179 --> 00:11:59.440 than 45 minutes. 45 minutes. That is a terrifying 00:11:59.440 --> 00:12:01.860 speed. It's unbelievable. It was an absolute 00:12:01.860 --> 00:12:04.419 inferno. People had to run into the Burrard Inlet. 00:12:04.480 --> 00:12:06.179 They were standing in the water, covering their 00:12:06.179 --> 00:12:08.360 heads with wet blankets to keep from suffocating 00:12:08.360 --> 00:12:10.919 or being scorched by the heat. Dozens of people 00:12:10.919 --> 00:12:13.720 died. When it was over, the city was gone, just 00:12:13.720 --> 00:12:16.759 ash and smoldering timbers. But what happens 00:12:16.759 --> 00:12:19.980 next is what seems to set the tone for Vancouver's 00:12:19.980 --> 00:12:22.740 entire history, right up to today. Yes, it's 00:12:22.740 --> 00:12:25.679 this Phoenix effect. The rebuilding started literally 00:12:25.679 --> 00:12:28.340 the next day. By the next morning, people were 00:12:28.340 --> 00:12:30.899 pitching tents in the ash and setting up makeshift 00:12:30.899 --> 00:12:34.500 stores. No hesitation. None. Within months, new, 00:12:34.679 --> 00:12:37.139 more permanent buildings were going up, and this 00:12:37.139 --> 00:12:39.960 time, many of them were built with brick. The 00:12:39.960 --> 00:12:41.740 city's first fire... department was established 00:12:41.740 --> 00:12:44.700 that same year, they learned a hard lesson fast. 00:12:45.039 --> 00:12:47.500 It feels like that single event established a 00:12:47.500 --> 00:12:50.610 core theme for the city. rapid development, a 00:12:50.610 --> 00:12:53.190 willingness to tear down or be torn down, build 00:12:53.190 --> 00:12:55.629 new, bigger, faster. Absolutely. Vancouver has 00:12:55.629 --> 00:12:57.830 never been a city that's overly nostalgic about 00:12:57.830 --> 00:13:00.250 its buildings. It's a city of constant, rapid 00:13:00.250 --> 00:13:02.950 transformation. And that growth was just supercharged 00:13:02.950 --> 00:13:04.830 by the arrival of the first transcontinental 00:13:04.830 --> 00:13:06.850 train shortly after the fire. The population 00:13:06.850 --> 00:13:09.549 just exploded. It went from about 1 ,000 people 00:13:09.549 --> 00:13:13.049 in 1881 to over 100 ,000 by 1911. An incredible 00:13:13.049 --> 00:13:15.090 boom. Okay, so we've got the history, we've got 00:13:15.090 --> 00:13:17.190 the fire. Now let's look at the stage this is 00:13:17.190 --> 00:13:20.009 all playing out on, the geography. Because when 00:13:20.009 --> 00:13:24.250 you look at a map, Vancouver is in a very specific 00:13:24.250 --> 00:13:28.110 and very confined situation. It is a locked box. 00:13:29.210 --> 00:13:31.649 absolutely critical for understanding everything 00:13:31.649 --> 00:13:34.570 from the city's traffic to its insane real estate 00:13:34.570 --> 00:13:36.669 prices. So walk us through the boundaries of 00:13:36.669 --> 00:13:39.950 that box. Okay. So to the north, you have the 00:13:39.950 --> 00:13:42.389 Burrard Inlet, which is a deep arm of the sea. 00:13:42.470 --> 00:13:44.269 And right behind that, you have the North Shore 00:13:44.269 --> 00:13:46.549 Mountains. And these aren't rolling hills. These 00:13:46.549 --> 00:13:49.029 are steep, rugged mountains. You can't just build 00:13:49.029 --> 00:13:51.370 endless suburbs up the side of them. Right. Boundary 00:13:51.370 --> 00:13:53.580 number one. Boundary number one. To the west, 00:13:53.600 --> 00:13:55.440 you have the ocean, the Strait of Georgia. Can't 00:13:55.440 --> 00:13:58.039 build there. To the south, you have the delta 00:13:58.039 --> 00:14:00.440 of the Fraser River, which is agriculturally 00:14:00.440 --> 00:14:02.980 protected land. And then very shortly after that, 00:14:03.059 --> 00:14:05.220 you hit the U .S. border. So unlike a city like, 00:14:05.340 --> 00:14:09.039 say, Dallas or Phoenix, that could just sprawl 00:14:09.039 --> 00:14:11.379 endlessly into the desert for hundreds of miles. 00:14:11.720 --> 00:14:15.139 Vancouver has hard edges. It has walls. And when 00:14:15.139 --> 00:14:17.279 you run out of land in a city like that, you 00:14:17.279 --> 00:14:20.179 really only have two choices. You either stop 00:14:20.179 --> 00:14:22.919 growing. Or you go up. And they definitely chose 00:14:22.919 --> 00:14:26.679 up. But they did it in a really unique way. And 00:14:26.679 --> 00:14:29.490 this brings us to this term. Vancouverism. Yes. 00:14:30.230 --> 00:14:33.610 Vancouverism is a globally recognized urban planning 00:14:33.610 --> 00:14:37.190 term. It's studied all over the world. It describes 00:14:37.190 --> 00:14:39.629 a specific style of high density living that 00:14:39.629 --> 00:14:41.970 tries to balance skyscrapers with, you know, 00:14:41.990 --> 00:14:44.950 livability. So what is a classic Vancouverist 00:14:44.950 --> 00:14:46.870 building actually look like? If I'm standing 00:14:46.870 --> 00:14:48.690 on the street, what am I seeing? You are typically 00:14:48.690 --> 00:14:50.909 seeing what's called a podium and tower model. 00:14:51.049 --> 00:14:53.799 OK, explain that. So imagine the base of the 00:14:53.799 --> 00:14:56.019 building, the podium is maybe three or four stories 00:14:56.019 --> 00:14:58.519 tall. This part covers most of the property a 00:14:58.519 --> 00:15:01.440 lot. And critically, it has active uses at street 00:15:01.440 --> 00:15:03.820 level. It usually has townhouses with their own 00:15:03.820 --> 00:15:06.580 front doors or retail shops, a grocery store, 00:15:06.759 --> 00:15:09.539 a coffee shop. So it feels human scale when you're 00:15:09.539 --> 00:15:12.659 walking past it. Exactly. It feels like a neighborhood, 00:15:12.840 --> 00:15:16.120 not a corporate plaza. Then, set back from the 00:15:16.120 --> 00:15:19.419 edge of that podium, a tall, very thin, glassy 00:15:19.419 --> 00:15:22.399 residential tower rises out of the center. And 00:15:22.399 --> 00:15:25.840 why thin? Why not big, blocky towers like you 00:15:25.840 --> 00:15:28.299 see in New York or Chicago? There are two big 00:15:28.299 --> 00:15:31.519 reasons. The first is light. Thin towers let 00:15:31.519 --> 00:15:33.639 more sunlight down to the street and into neighboring 00:15:33.639 --> 00:15:36.639 apartments. It feels less oppressive. But the 00:15:36.639 --> 00:15:39.139 main and most fascinating reason is something 00:15:39.139 --> 00:15:42.080 called view corridors. This is a concept I had 00:15:42.080 --> 00:15:44.860 never heard of before. The city legally protects 00:15:44.860 --> 00:15:47.480 the view. They do. It's official policy. There 00:15:47.480 --> 00:15:49.919 are dozens of legally protected lines of sight 00:15:49.919 --> 00:15:52.299 from specific public places, like from City Hall 00:15:52.299 --> 00:15:55.200 or certain points on the seawall or Queen Elizabeth 00:15:55.200 --> 00:15:57.779 Park. The city guarantees that from that spot, 00:15:57.919 --> 00:15:59.799 you will always be able to see the mountain peaks. 00:15:59.960 --> 00:16:01.960 So if a developer wants to build a 60 -story 00:16:01.960 --> 00:16:04.200 building and it happens to be right in the middle 00:16:04.200 --> 00:16:06.440 of one of those protected views, they can't build 00:16:06.440 --> 00:16:09.580 it. Or, more accurately, they have to reshape 00:16:09.580 --> 00:16:12.429 it. They literally have to carve angles into 00:16:12.429 --> 00:16:14.409 the building to preserve what they call the view 00:16:14.409 --> 00:16:17.169 cone. That's why so many of the downtown towers 00:16:17.169 --> 00:16:20.149 in Vancouver have these unique slanted roofs 00:16:20.149 --> 00:16:23.190 or distinct geometric shapes. They're not just 00:16:23.190 --> 00:16:25.830 stylistic choices. They're sculpting the skyline 00:16:25.830 --> 00:16:27.730 around the mountains. That's a perfect way to 00:16:27.730 --> 00:16:30.230 put it. It's an attempt to maintain that connection 00:16:30.230 --> 00:16:33.250 to nature, even when you are in the heart of 00:16:33.250 --> 00:16:37.559 a very dense concrete jungle. Which seems really 00:16:37.559 --> 00:16:40.200 smart. Yeah. And it creates a density that allows 00:16:40.200 --> 00:16:42.759 for a very walkable lifestyle, right? Yeah. This 00:16:42.759 --> 00:16:44.700 is a key difference for most North American cities. 00:16:44.899 --> 00:16:47.279 For sure. You avoid the donut city phenomenon 00:16:47.279 --> 00:16:50.120 that plagued the U .S. for decades, where the 00:16:50.120 --> 00:16:52.500 downtown core empties out at 5 p .m. and everyone 00:16:52.500 --> 00:16:55.080 drives back to the suburbs. In Vancouver, you 00:16:55.080 --> 00:16:57.139 have a massive and growing residential population 00:16:57.139 --> 00:16:59.519 living in the downtown core. And this connects 00:16:59.519 --> 00:17:01.639 to that greenest city idea. We'll get to the 00:17:01.639 --> 00:17:03.659 sustainability targets later, but just the physical 00:17:03.659 --> 00:17:06.690 layout itself promotes walking in transit. Exactly. 00:17:06.849 --> 00:17:09.130 This is what the city planners called ecodensity. 00:17:09.589 --> 00:17:12.490 The idea, which was formally launched in 2006, 00:17:12.849 --> 00:17:15.849 was that using density in a smart way is actually 00:17:15.849 --> 00:17:18.569 good for the environment. It lowers the collective 00:17:18.569 --> 00:17:21.990 carbon footprint. How so? Well, if you live in 00:17:21.990 --> 00:17:24.730 a tower downtown, you're heating one small, efficient 00:17:24.730 --> 00:17:27.009 unit. You can walk to work. You can walk to the 00:17:27.009 --> 00:17:29.869 grocery store. You can take the SkyTrain. It's 00:17:29.869 --> 00:17:32.190 vastly more energy efficient than a single -family 00:17:32.190 --> 00:17:34.609 home in the suburbs where you have to drive everywhere 00:17:34.609 --> 00:17:37.279 for everything. Now, before we move on from the 00:17:37.279 --> 00:17:39.299 physical environment, we have to talk about the 00:17:39.299 --> 00:17:42.559 climate. Because the rainforest dictates the 00:17:42.559 --> 00:17:44.980 lifestyle just as much as the skyscrapers do. 00:17:45.160 --> 00:17:48.019 Oh, it does. There is this myth, especially outside 00:17:48.019 --> 00:17:50.640 of Canada, that the whole country is a frozen 00:17:50.640 --> 00:17:54.140 wasteland in winter. Vancouver is the great exception 00:17:54.140 --> 00:17:56.279 that breaks that rule. Yeah, if you're from Toronto 00:17:56.279 --> 00:17:58.960 or Montreal, you learn to hate Vancouver in January 00:17:58.960 --> 00:18:01.660 because they're posting photos of cherry blossoms 00:18:01.660 --> 00:18:03.619 while you're digging your car out of a snowbank. 00:18:03.799 --> 00:18:06.759 It's an oceanic climate. A temperate rainforest. 00:18:07.160 --> 00:18:09.819 It very rarely drops below freezing for any extended 00:18:09.819 --> 00:18:12.619 period. And it rarely gets super hot in the summer, 00:18:12.640 --> 00:18:15.160 though. That is starting to change with recent 00:18:15.160 --> 00:18:18.019 climate heat domes. But generally, it is famously 00:18:18.019 --> 00:18:20.519 mild. But there's a tradeoff. Yeah. A big one. 00:18:20.619 --> 00:18:23.680 The wet. The rain is relentless. It's not a joke. 00:18:23.779 --> 00:18:26.660 We are talking about nearly 1 ,600 millimeters 00:18:26.660 --> 00:18:30.500 of rain downtown annually. That's over five feet 00:18:30.500 --> 00:18:32.920 of water falling from the sky. And if you go 00:18:32.920 --> 00:18:35.359 over to North Vancouver, closer to the mountains, 00:18:35.519 --> 00:18:38.099 it's over 2 ,000 millimeters. So you trade your 00:18:38.099 --> 00:18:40.140 snow shovel for a really, really good umbrella? 00:18:40.640 --> 00:18:43.200 And Gore -Tex. You have to invest in Gore -Tex. 00:18:43.359 --> 00:18:45.740 The unofficial West Coast tuxedo is a fleece 00:18:45.740 --> 00:18:47.960 vest and a high -end rain jacket. It's a very 00:18:47.960 --> 00:18:50.500 practical, function -over -form fashion sense. 00:18:50.720 --> 00:18:52.400 Let's just jump back to architecture for one 00:18:52.400 --> 00:18:54.619 second. We mentioned the glass towers, which 00:18:54.619 --> 00:18:56.440 are everywhere, obviously. But there are some 00:18:56.440 --> 00:18:58.819 weird ones. The source material mentions the 00:18:58.819 --> 00:19:01.839 concrete waffle. You cannot miss it. It's the 00:19:01.839 --> 00:19:04.440 Macmillan Bloedel building on Georgia Street. 00:19:04.900 --> 00:19:08.140 It's a... brutalist classic from the late 60s. 00:19:08.160 --> 00:19:10.779 And it literally looks like a giant concrete 00:19:10.779 --> 00:19:13.859 waffle iron standing on its end. It's got this 00:19:13.859 --> 00:19:16.440 grid of deep set square windows and the whole 00:19:16.440 --> 00:19:18.940 building tapers as it goes up. A love it or hate 00:19:18.940 --> 00:19:20.779 it kind of thing. Absolutely. And the Central 00:19:20.779 --> 00:19:23.220 Library is another one. A coliseum. A coliseum, 00:19:23.259 --> 00:19:26.359 yeah. It's Library Square designed by Moshe Safdie. 00:19:26.500 --> 00:19:28.720 It looks like a modern interpretation of the 00:19:28.720 --> 00:19:31.579 Roman Coliseum. It's this massive elliptical 00:19:31.579 --> 00:19:34.960 reddish concrete structure. Again, it's very 00:19:34.960 --> 00:19:37.089 polar. People either think it's a masterpiece 00:19:37.089 --> 00:19:39.390 or a total bizarre folly, but it definitely shows 00:19:39.390 --> 00:19:42.369 that the city isn't just about simple glass towers. 00:19:42.589 --> 00:19:44.829 OK, so we've built the stage. We have the mountains, 00:19:44.990 --> 00:19:47.450 the ocean, the rain, the glass towers, the concrete 00:19:47.450 --> 00:19:49.950 waffles. Now let's talk about the people, because 00:19:49.950 --> 00:19:52.109 the demographic shift in Vancouver over the last 00:19:52.109 --> 00:19:55.769 40 years has been just profound. It's one of 00:19:55.769 --> 00:19:57.730 the most diverse cities in the world statistically. 00:19:58.440 --> 00:20:01.819 As of the 2021 census, nearly 50 % of residents 00:20:01.819 --> 00:20:04.619 are not native English speakers. That is a huge 00:20:04.619 --> 00:20:06.920 number. Just think about that. Half the city. 00:20:07.019 --> 00:20:11.519 And over 54 % of the population belongs to what 00:20:11.519 --> 00:20:15.309 the census calls visible minority groups. The 00:20:15.309 --> 00:20:18.210 Asian influence in particular is incredibly strong. 00:20:18.450 --> 00:20:21.430 People of Chinese heritage make up over 25 percent 00:20:21.430 --> 00:20:23.509 of the total population. And this isn't just 00:20:23.509 --> 00:20:26.009 a story of general gradual immigration. There 00:20:26.009 --> 00:20:28.490 was a specific historical event that triggered 00:20:28.490 --> 00:20:31.549 a massive wave of this, a real inflection point. 00:20:31.670 --> 00:20:34.369 The Hong Kong handover. Right. Take us back to 00:20:34.369 --> 00:20:36.650 the 80s and early 90s. What was happening? So 00:20:36.650 --> 00:20:40.029 everyone knew that in 1997, the United Kingdom's 00:20:40.029 --> 00:20:41.849 lease on the territory was up and they were going 00:20:41.849 --> 00:20:43.869 to hand sovereignty of Hong Kong back to the 00:20:43.869 --> 00:20:46.769 People's Republic. And there was a lot of anxiety 00:20:46.769 --> 00:20:48.789 and uncertainty in Hong Kong about what that 00:20:48.789 --> 00:20:50.869 would mean for their way of life, for their democracy, 00:20:50.990 --> 00:20:53.650 their freedoms, and very importantly, their wealth. 00:20:54.119 --> 00:20:56.019 So people started looking for an exit strategy, 00:20:56.180 --> 00:20:59.000 a plan B. Exactly. A safe place to go and a safe 00:20:59.000 --> 00:21:01.039 place to move their money. And Vancouver became 00:21:01.039 --> 00:21:03.660 the destination of choice for a huge number of 00:21:03.660 --> 00:21:06.039 them. Why Vancouver specifically? A few reasons. 00:21:06.420 --> 00:21:09.140 It was on the Pacific Rim, so it was a relatively 00:21:09.140 --> 00:21:11.599 easy flight. It was a Commonwealth country, so 00:21:11.599 --> 00:21:13.920 the legal and political systems were familiar. 00:21:14.359 --> 00:21:17.700 It was stable, safe, and had a high quality of 00:21:17.700 --> 00:21:21.740 life. You saw this massive influx of wealthy 00:21:21.740 --> 00:21:25.130 Hong Kong families moving. their lives and crucially, 00:21:25.269 --> 00:21:27.849 their capital to Vancouver. And this physically 00:21:27.849 --> 00:21:29.869 reshaped the city. This wasn't just a cultural 00:21:29.869 --> 00:21:31.710 shift. Oh, completely. We're just talking about 00:21:31.710 --> 00:21:34.190 all those glass towers. A huge amount of that 00:21:34.190 --> 00:21:36.890 development in the 90s was funded by Asian capital. 00:21:37.170 --> 00:21:40.089 The entire neighborhood of Yaletown, which used 00:21:40.089 --> 00:21:42.410 to be old industrial warehouses, was developed 00:21:42.410 --> 00:21:44.589 largely by a company called Concord Pacific, 00:21:44.950 --> 00:21:47.190 which is owned by Li Ka -shing, who is a Hong 00:21:47.190 --> 00:21:49.990 Kong billionaire. They bought the old Expo 86 00:21:49.990 --> 00:21:53.059 lands and built a new city on it. So the modern 00:21:53.059 --> 00:21:55.500 skyline of Vancouver is directly tied to the 00:21:55.500 --> 00:21:58.539 geopolitics of China and the UK from 30 years 00:21:58.539 --> 00:22:01.420 ago. It is inextricably linked. You cannot separate 00:22:01.420 --> 00:22:03.039 them. And of course, it's not just Chinese influence. 00:22:03.220 --> 00:22:05.359 There's a massive and longstanding South Asian 00:22:05.359 --> 00:22:07.880 community, specifically from the Punjab region 00:22:07.880 --> 00:22:10.779 of India. The Punjabi market. Yes, historically 00:22:10.779 --> 00:22:13.119 centered in the Sunset neighborhood on Main Street. 00:22:13.319 --> 00:22:15.900 It was actually the first little India in all 00:22:15.900 --> 00:22:18.559 of North America. But what's interesting and 00:22:18.559 --> 00:22:21.019 speaks to another theme is that as real estate 00:22:21.019 --> 00:22:23.559 prices have skyrocketed in Vancouver proper, 00:22:23.920 --> 00:22:27.359 a lot of that community's center of gravity has 00:22:27.359 --> 00:22:30.039 shifted out to the suburbs, places like Surrey 00:22:30.039 --> 00:22:32.380 and Delta. Which is a classic trend we see in 00:22:32.380 --> 00:22:35.119 so many cities, right? Yeah. Gentrification and 00:22:35.119 --> 00:22:38.500 rising costs pushing established cultural enclaves 00:22:38.500 --> 00:22:41.549 further. further out. Precisely. The city's affordability 00:22:41.549 --> 00:22:44.789 crisis reshapes its cultural geography. Okay. 00:22:44.910 --> 00:22:47.930 Now, there is another industry that really defines 00:22:47.930 --> 00:22:50.269 the culture and the economy of the city, and 00:22:50.269 --> 00:22:52.369 that is the film industry. We teased it in the 00:22:52.369 --> 00:22:55.450 intro. Hollywood North. It is a juggernaut. It's 00:22:55.450 --> 00:22:57.589 a huge part of the city's identity now. Vancouver 00:22:57.589 --> 00:23:00.289 is the third largest film and TV production center 00:23:00.289 --> 00:23:02.569 in North America, right after Los Angeles and 00:23:02.569 --> 00:23:04.509 New York. And the funny thing is, you almost 00:23:04.509 --> 00:23:07.390 never see Vancouver playing the role of Vancouver 00:23:07.390 --> 00:23:10.009 in a movie. That is the whole point. That's its 00:23:10.009 --> 00:23:12.950 superpower. Vancouver has this quality that architects 00:23:12.950 --> 00:23:15.769 sometimes call the generic city. What does that 00:23:15.769 --> 00:23:18.609 mean? Because so much of its downtown was built 00:23:18.609 --> 00:23:21.230 relatively recently with modern glass architecture, 00:23:21.430 --> 00:23:23.910 and because it doesn't have a singular, instantly 00:23:23.910 --> 00:23:26.470 recognizable landmark like the Eiffel Tower or 00:23:26.470 --> 00:23:28.990 the Empire State Building, it can stand in for 00:23:28.990 --> 00:23:32.230 almost any other North American city. It's the 00:23:32.230 --> 00:23:35.410 ultimate chameleon. The ultimate stand in. Exactly. 00:23:35.730 --> 00:23:38.029 It's always playing Seattle in shows like Grey's 00:23:38.029 --> 00:23:40.910 Anatomy or The Killing. It plays National City 00:23:40.910 --> 00:23:43.369 in the show Supergirl. It plays a futuristic 00:23:43.369 --> 00:23:46.970 metropolis in movies like Blade, Trinity. It 00:23:46.970 --> 00:23:49.089 plays New York and San Francisco constantly. 00:23:49.349 --> 00:23:51.230 The X -Files is the big one, though, right? That's 00:23:51.230 --> 00:23:53.089 what really put it on the map in the 90s. Oh, 00:23:53.089 --> 00:23:55.150 the X -Files basically defined the Vancouver 00:23:55.150 --> 00:23:58.049 aesthetic for a generation. The mist, the dark 00:23:58.049 --> 00:24:01.190 green forests, the perpetually gray skies, that 00:24:01.190 --> 00:24:03.970 gloomy atmospheric look fit the mood of that 00:24:03.970 --> 00:24:06.470 show perfectly. And more recently. Huge productions. 00:24:06.630 --> 00:24:08.789 Deadpool was filmed there. And that one actually 00:24:08.789 --> 00:24:11.190 did show Vancouver as Vancouver, which was a 00:24:11.190 --> 00:24:13.910 nice change. The TV show The Last of Us did a 00:24:13.910 --> 00:24:16.410 lot of filming in the region. Supernatural was 00:24:16.410 --> 00:24:19.990 there for 15 seasons. The list is endless. So 00:24:19.990 --> 00:24:21.750 why did they all film there? Is it just about 00:24:21.750 --> 00:24:24.400 the tax credits? The tax credits are a huge part 00:24:24.400 --> 00:24:26.279 of it, for sure. The government makes it very 00:24:26.279 --> 00:24:28.660 financially attractive. But it's also the geography. 00:24:28.960 --> 00:24:31.900 Just think about it. Within a 45 -minute drive 00:24:31.900 --> 00:24:34.880 of downtown, you can be on a snowy mountain peak, 00:24:35.039 --> 00:24:37.240 you can be inside an ancient -looking old growth 00:24:37.240 --> 00:24:39.500 forest, you can be on a sandy beach, or you can 00:24:39.500 --> 00:24:42.720 be in a modern city grid. So a production can 00:24:42.720 --> 00:24:46.160 film scenes set in five different countries in 00:24:46.160 --> 00:24:48.279 a single day without having to move the whole 00:24:48.279 --> 00:24:51.200 crew. Exactly. It's incredibly efficient. and 00:24:51.200 --> 00:24:53.940 this is a huge logistical advantage, it is in 00:24:53.940 --> 00:24:56.799 the same time zone as Los Angeles. That's massive 00:24:56.799 --> 00:24:59.119 for business. Studio executives in Hollywood 00:24:59.119 --> 00:25:00.980 can be on the phone with the set in Vancouver 00:25:00.980 --> 00:25:03.420 at 2 p .m. their time, and everyone is still 00:25:03.420 --> 00:25:05.539 working. There's no jet lag, no weird hours. 00:25:05.799 --> 00:25:08.119 It's just a massive economic engine for the city. 00:25:08.240 --> 00:25:10.359 Huge. The numbers are staggering. Something like 00:25:10.359 --> 00:25:13.839 $3 .6 billion was spent in the city on film and 00:25:13.839 --> 00:25:17.259 TV production in 2021 alone. It employs tens 00:25:17.259 --> 00:25:19.900 of thousands of people, from actors to carpenters 00:25:19.900 --> 00:25:22.400 to caterers. So just to recap the economy here, 00:25:22.480 --> 00:25:25.660 we have a booming film sector. We have a massive 00:25:25.660 --> 00:25:27.940 tech sector. You know, Lululemon and Arc'teryx 00:25:27.940 --> 00:25:30.640 are local lifestyle brands that went global. 00:25:31.240 --> 00:25:34.769 Slack started there. Microsoft and Amazon have 00:25:34.769 --> 00:25:37.650 huge offices. And we have the Port of Vancouver, 00:25:37.910 --> 00:25:39.930 which is the largest in Canada, the third largest 00:25:39.930 --> 00:25:43.250 in the Americas. It's the primary gateway for 00:25:43.250 --> 00:25:45.809 trade with Asia. So on paper, the economy looks 00:25:45.809 --> 00:25:48.990 fantastic, diversified, modern, growing. Here 00:25:48.990 --> 00:25:51.930 it comes, the big but. And it is a devastating 00:25:51.930 --> 00:25:54.589 but. If you actually live there or if you try 00:25:54.589 --> 00:25:57.069 to move there, you run headfirst into a brick 00:25:57.069 --> 00:25:59.799 wall. And that wall is the cost of living. The 00:25:59.799 --> 00:26:02.380 housing crisis in Vancouver is legendary. It 00:26:02.380 --> 00:26:04.599 is not an exaggeration to say it is consistently 00:26:04.599 --> 00:26:06.859 ranked one of the most unaffordable cities on 00:26:06.859 --> 00:26:08.740 the entire planet, especially when you measure 00:26:08.740 --> 00:26:11.279 it relative to local incomes. Let's break down 00:26:11.279 --> 00:26:14.000 that relative to incomes part because, you know, 00:26:14.000 --> 00:26:16.960 New York is expensive. London is expensive. How 00:26:16.960 --> 00:26:19.079 is Vancouver different from those places? In 00:26:19.079 --> 00:26:21.900 a place like New York or London, there are a 00:26:21.900 --> 00:26:25.000 lot of extremely high paying jobs in sectors 00:26:25.000 --> 00:26:28.059 like investment banking or global finance that 00:26:28.059 --> 00:26:30.859 can, for a certain class of people, support those 00:26:30.859 --> 00:26:34.460 high prices. In Vancouver, the local wages for 00:26:34.460 --> 00:26:36.900 professionals are actually quite modest compared 00:26:36.900 --> 00:26:39.539 to other major global cities. So the salaries 00:26:39.539 --> 00:26:42.920 aren't at a New York level. Not even close. But 00:26:42.920 --> 00:26:45.799 the housing prices are. So you have this massive 00:26:45.799 --> 00:26:48.480 disconnect. The price of an average house is 00:26:48.480 --> 00:26:51.200 no longer based on what the local teacher or 00:26:51.200 --> 00:26:54.500 engineer or nurse earns. It is completely decoupled 00:26:54.500 --> 00:26:56.519 from the local economy. That's the perfect term 00:26:56.519 --> 00:26:58.740 for it. It's operating in its own global market. 00:26:58.980 --> 00:27:01.400 To give you some perspective, back in 2010, an 00:27:01.400 --> 00:27:03.339 average two -level home was already nearly a 00:27:03.339 --> 00:27:05.799 million dollars. Now, in some neighborhoods, 00:27:05.880 --> 00:27:08.160 you're looking at $2 million for a house that's 00:27:08.160 --> 00:27:10.200 basically a teardown. So who is buying them? 00:27:10.279 --> 00:27:13.059 Who can afford this? That is the multimillion 00:27:13.059 --> 00:27:14.759 dollar question, isn't it? And the answer is 00:27:14.759 --> 00:27:17.200 complex. We already talked about the flow of 00:27:17.200 --> 00:27:19.740 global capital money from Hong Kong and more 00:27:19.740 --> 00:27:22.779 recently, mainland China, but also from places 00:27:22.779 --> 00:27:26.619 like Iran, the U .S., Europe. People use Vancouver 00:27:26.619 --> 00:27:30.019 real estate as a safe deposit box. Explain that. 00:27:30.119 --> 00:27:32.640 They park their money in a condo or a house because 00:27:32.640 --> 00:27:35.720 it's seen as a stable, secure asset in a politically 00:27:35.720 --> 00:27:38.880 stable country. It's safer than keeping it in 00:27:38.880 --> 00:27:41.160 a volatile currency or under a less stable government. 00:27:41.400 --> 00:27:42.920 Which leads us to a term that I found really 00:27:42.920 --> 00:27:45.380 disturbing in the research notes. Snow washing. 00:27:45.559 --> 00:27:48.259 Yes. This is the dark underbelly of the real 00:27:48.259 --> 00:27:50.920 estate room. Snow washing is a Canadian term 00:27:50.920 --> 00:27:53.039 for money laundering. How does it work in the 00:27:53.039 --> 00:27:55.680 context of real estate? For a very long time, 00:27:55.759 --> 00:27:57.779 Canadian laws regarding corporate transparency 00:27:57.779 --> 00:28:00.319 were incredibly lacked. They were full of loopholes. 00:28:00.359 --> 00:28:02.839 You could set up a numbered company or a trust 00:28:02.839 --> 00:28:06.200 and use that anonymous company to buy a multimillion 00:28:06.200 --> 00:28:09.039 dollar house. And nobody, not the land title 00:28:09.039 --> 00:28:11.640 office, not the types authorities, knew who the 00:28:11.640 --> 00:28:14.099 actual human being, the beneficial owner behind 00:28:14.099 --> 00:28:17.119 that company was. So if you are a criminal organization. 00:28:17.799 --> 00:28:20.500 or a corrupt foreign official with a suitcase 00:28:20.500 --> 00:28:23.880 full of cash. You take your illicit money. You 00:28:23.880 --> 00:28:26.960 buy a luxury condo in Vancouver through a shell 00:28:26.960 --> 00:28:30.200 company. You hold it for a year. Then you sell 00:28:30.200 --> 00:28:33.200 the condo. Now you have a legitimate check from 00:28:33.200 --> 00:28:35.579 a Canadian law firm for the sale of the property. 00:28:35.799 --> 00:28:38.900 The money is now clean. It has been washed through 00:28:38.900 --> 00:28:41.380 the system. That is just infuriating for a local 00:28:41.380 --> 00:28:44.210 family trying to buy their first apartment. You're 00:28:44.210 --> 00:28:45.950 not just competing with other families saving 00:28:45.950 --> 00:28:48.450 up a down payment. You're competing with international 00:28:48.450 --> 00:28:51.390 money laundering syndicates. It completely distorted 00:28:51.390 --> 00:28:53.269 the market. There was a massive public inquiry 00:28:53.269 --> 00:28:56.130 into this, the Cullen Commission, and it estimated 00:28:56.130 --> 00:28:59.529 that billions, possibly tens of billions of dollars, 00:28:59.630 --> 00:29:01.710 were being laundered through British Columbia 00:29:01.710 --> 00:29:04.269 real estate every year. And this creates this 00:29:04.269 --> 00:29:07.130 massive visible social divide. This is the contradiction 00:29:07.130 --> 00:29:08.730 we talked about right at the start of the deep 00:29:08.730 --> 00:29:11.049 dive. It is visceral. It's something you can 00:29:11.049 --> 00:29:13.049 see and feel. You can walk through a neighborhood. 00:29:13.130 --> 00:29:16.769 like Coal Harbor, this beautiful waterfront area 00:29:16.769 --> 00:29:19.910 where you see Ferraris, Lamborghinis, super yachts, 00:29:19.910 --> 00:29:23.089 and these stunning penthouses that are dark and 00:29:23.089 --> 00:29:25.230 empty half the year because they're just investments. 00:29:25.529 --> 00:29:28.329 And then you walk 10 minutes east. Just a 10 00:29:28.329 --> 00:29:31.089 -minute walk. And you are in the downtown east 00:29:31.089 --> 00:29:34.690 side. The DTES. Yeah. It is often described as 00:29:34.690 --> 00:29:38.490 Canada's poorest postal bound. But even that 00:29:38.490 --> 00:29:40.670 label doesn't really capture the reality of it. 00:29:40.690 --> 00:29:42.490 It is a neighborhood where thousands of people 00:29:42.490 --> 00:29:44.890 are grappling with severe overlapping crises 00:29:44.890 --> 00:29:47.730 of mental illness, homelessness and addiction. 00:29:47.970 --> 00:29:49.690 And it's right there. It's not hidden away in 00:29:49.690 --> 00:29:51.710 some remote suburb like in some other cities. 00:29:51.789 --> 00:29:54.109 No, it directly borders the historic tourist 00:29:54.109 --> 00:29:56.269 district of Gastown and the edge of the financial 00:29:56.269 --> 00:29:58.890 district. You can literally turn a corner from 00:29:58.890 --> 00:30:01.470 a high end boutique hotel and suddenly you're 00:30:01.470 --> 00:30:03.710 in the scene of the most desperate, grinding 00:30:03.710 --> 00:30:06.170 poverty imaginable. And the city has tried to 00:30:06.170 --> 00:30:09.109 address this. specifically the drug crisis, with 00:30:09.109 --> 00:30:12.009 some fairly radical policies for North America. 00:30:12.170 --> 00:30:15.410 Yes. To its credit, Vancouver has been a pioneer 00:30:15.410 --> 00:30:18.470 in the philosophy of harm reduction. Back in 00:30:18.470 --> 00:30:21.509 2003, they opened a facility called Insight. 00:30:21.569 --> 00:30:24.710 And this was North America's first legal supervised 00:30:24.710 --> 00:30:27.970 safe injection site. Correct. The guiding philosophy 00:30:27.970 --> 00:30:47.559 was, look. He was incredibly controversial when 00:30:47.559 --> 00:30:50.289 it opened. Oh, massively. And it still is in 00:30:50.289 --> 00:30:53.250 some political circles. But the scientific data, 00:30:53.369 --> 00:30:56.190 study after study, showed that it reduced overdose 00:30:56.190 --> 00:30:58.609 deaths in the immediate area and increased the 00:30:58.609 --> 00:31:00.890 number of people seeking treatment. It treats 00:31:00.890 --> 00:31:03.009 addiction as a health care issue rather than 00:31:03.009 --> 00:31:05.690 a purely criminal one. But despite these efforts, 00:31:05.930 --> 00:31:08.349 by all accounts, the problem seems to be getting 00:31:08.349 --> 00:31:11.529 visibly worse, not better. Because the root causes. 00:31:12.119 --> 00:31:14.339 The lack of truly affordable housing, the deep 00:31:14.339 --> 00:31:17.480 poverty, the lack of mental health support are 00:31:17.480 --> 00:31:21.180 all accelerating. When a single room in a specialized 00:31:21.180 --> 00:31:23.700 housing unit costs more than a person's monthly 00:31:23.700 --> 00:31:26.339 welfare check provides, people end up on the 00:31:26.339 --> 00:31:29.000 street. It's a basic math problem as much as 00:31:29.000 --> 00:31:31.440 it is a social one. And this all leads to a growing 00:31:31.440 --> 00:31:34.299 fear about the future of the city. I saw that 00:31:34.299 --> 00:31:36.339 some economists have started using the term doom 00:31:36.339 --> 00:31:39.750 loop. That sounds ominous. It does. What does 00:31:39.750 --> 00:31:41.849 it mean in the Vancouver context? It's a warning 00:31:41.849 --> 00:31:44.089 and it's largely drawn from what has happened 00:31:44.089 --> 00:31:46.630 in cities like San Francisco. The cycle goes 00:31:46.630 --> 00:31:48.529 something like this. The cost of living gets 00:31:48.529 --> 00:31:51.029 so astronomically high that middle class and 00:31:51.029 --> 00:31:53.460 working class. People, service workers, teachers, 00:31:53.640 --> 00:31:55.640 artists, young professionals, they just leave. 00:31:55.839 --> 00:31:58.160 They can't afford to live there anymore. So then 00:31:58.160 --> 00:32:00.339 businesses can't find staff, especially in the 00:32:00.339 --> 00:32:02.259 service industry. So they reduce their hours 00:32:02.259 --> 00:32:05.079 or they close down or they relocate. The downtown 00:32:05.079 --> 00:32:07.500 core starts to come hollowed out. All you have 00:32:07.500 --> 00:32:09.880 left are very rich people in their condos and 00:32:09.880 --> 00:32:12.660 very poor people on the street with no vibrant 00:32:12.660 --> 00:32:15.259 middle class in between. The city loses its soul. 00:32:15.599 --> 00:32:17.940 It loses its energy. And it loses its tax base. 00:32:18.099 --> 00:32:20.480 If businesses leave, the city has less money 00:32:20.480 --> 00:32:23.019 to pay for social services, sanitation and policing. 00:32:23.259 --> 00:32:26.140 So the street level disorder gets worse, which 00:32:26.140 --> 00:32:28.359 in turn drives more businesses and residents 00:32:28.359 --> 00:32:31.299 away. That is the doom loop. So is Vancouver 00:32:31.299 --> 00:32:33.839 there yet? Is it in the loop? I don't think it's 00:32:33.839 --> 00:32:35.720 fully there yet. The tech sector is still very 00:32:35.720 --> 00:32:38.619 strong. Immigration is still high. People from 00:32:38.619 --> 00:32:40.519 all over the world still desperately want to 00:32:40.519 --> 00:32:42.660 live there because of the natural beauty. But 00:32:42.660 --> 00:32:44.720 the warning lights are definitely flashing red. 00:32:45.259 --> 00:32:47.299 Let's pivot to one final area where the city 00:32:47.299 --> 00:32:50.859 is, or at least was, trying to lead. Sustainability. 00:32:51.359 --> 00:32:54.279 They branded themselves as the greenest city. 00:32:54.480 --> 00:32:57.799 The Greenest City Action Plan, or G .C. Ho. The 00:32:57.799 --> 00:32:59.779 official goal was to be the greenest city in 00:32:59.779 --> 00:33:02.500 the world by the year 2020. It was a very ambitious 00:33:02.500 --> 00:33:05.039 plan. Did they make it? It's a mixed bag. In 00:33:05.039 --> 00:33:08.079 some ways, yes. In others, not really. So what 00:33:08.079 --> 00:33:09.970 were the wins? Where did they succeed? Well, 00:33:10.029 --> 00:33:12.430 a lot of the success is in the lifestyle that 00:33:12.430 --> 00:33:14.609 the city's geography and planning encourages. 00:33:15.210 --> 00:33:18.230 Vancouver has the lowest obesity rate in Canada, 00:33:18.329 --> 00:33:22.170 around 17 percent. People are active. The bike 00:33:22.170 --> 00:33:24.170 lane network is fantastic and getting better 00:33:24.170 --> 00:33:26.849 all the time. And the seawall is an absolute 00:33:26.849 --> 00:33:30.369 jewel. Right. It's 28 kilometers of uninterrupted 00:33:30.369 --> 00:33:33.269 waterfront path for walking, running and cycling 00:33:33.269 --> 00:33:35.849 around Stanley Park and False Creek. It's one 00:33:35.849 --> 00:33:38.170 of the best pieces of urban infrastructure anywhere. 00:33:38.750 --> 00:33:40.470 But there were struggles with the policy side 00:33:40.470 --> 00:33:44.029 of things. Policy is hard. It's messy. They banned 00:33:44.029 --> 00:33:46.930 plastic straws, which mostly just annoyed everyone 00:33:46.930 --> 00:33:49.509 and had a minimal environmental impact. Then 00:33:49.509 --> 00:33:51.630 they tried to put a mandatory 25 cent fee on 00:33:51.630 --> 00:33:54.609 single use coffee cups. The goal being to discourage 00:33:54.609 --> 00:33:57.289 waste and encourage reusable mugs. Right. A noble 00:33:57.289 --> 00:34:00.380 goal. But the problem was in the execution. The 00:34:00.380 --> 00:34:02.839 city didn't collect the 25 cents as a tax for 00:34:02.839 --> 00:34:04.779 environmental programs. The coffee shop just 00:34:04.779 --> 00:34:07.480 got to keep the 25 cents. So people were furious. 00:34:07.559 --> 00:34:09.440 They felt like they were paying a tax that just 00:34:09.440 --> 00:34:11.960 went straight to Starbucks' bottom line. There 00:34:11.960 --> 00:34:14.360 was a huge public backlash, and the city eventually 00:34:14.360 --> 00:34:16.119 repealed the whole thing. And then there's the 00:34:16.119 --> 00:34:19.099 traffic. For a city that prides itself on being 00:34:19.099 --> 00:34:22.599 green, the traffic is famously... Terrible. This 00:34:22.599 --> 00:34:24.599 is the traffic paradox. It's really interesting. 00:34:24.800 --> 00:34:27.699 Back in the 1970s, Vancouver did something incredibly 00:34:27.699 --> 00:34:30.420 brave and forward thinking. The citizens rose 00:34:30.420 --> 00:34:32.860 up and stopped the construction of major freeways 00:34:32.860 --> 00:34:35.340 through the heart of the city. There is no I 00:34:35.340 --> 00:34:37.760 -5 or 401 equivalent that runs into downtown 00:34:37.760 --> 00:34:39.659 Vancouver. Which saved historic neighborhoods 00:34:39.659 --> 00:34:42.400 like Chinatown and Gastown from being bulldozed. 00:34:42.480 --> 00:34:46.019 It did. It preserved the walkable human scale 00:34:46.019 --> 00:34:49.119 urban fabric. But the consequence is that all 00:34:49.119 --> 00:34:51.000 the cars that need to get downtown have to drive. 00:34:51.119 --> 00:34:54.119 on city streets. So you have these horrific bottlenecks 00:34:54.119 --> 00:34:57.059 and congestion. It's a direct tradeoff, livability 00:34:57.059 --> 00:34:59.300 for the people who live there versus drivability 00:34:59.300 --> 00:35:01.159 for the people trying to get there. So bringing 00:35:01.159 --> 00:35:03.659 this all together, we have a city of just breathtaking, 00:35:03.920 --> 00:35:06.420 almost overwhelming natural beauty, a city that 00:35:06.420 --> 00:35:08.860 reinvented high density urban planning with its 00:35:08.860 --> 00:35:11.179 glass towers and view corridors, a city that 00:35:11.179 --> 00:35:13.860 is a vibrant cultural melting pot, but also a 00:35:13.860 --> 00:35:16.039 city that is fundamentally struggling to figure 00:35:16.039 --> 00:35:18.119 out who it's for. That is the central question, 00:35:18.219 --> 00:35:20.719 isn't it? Is Vancouver a functioning city for 00:35:20.719 --> 00:35:23.380 workers and families and the middle class? Or 00:35:23.380 --> 00:35:25.699 has it become what some critics call a resort 00:35:25.699 --> 00:35:29.300 city? A resort city. That label. That stings. 00:35:29.420 --> 00:35:32.340 It does. Locals sometimes half -jokingly call 00:35:32.340 --> 00:35:34.599 it no -fun city because of the strict regulations, 00:35:35.039 --> 00:35:37.440 the early closing times, and the high cost of 00:35:37.440 --> 00:35:40.019 everything. The danger is that it becomes purely 00:35:40.019 --> 00:35:42.960 a playground for the global wealthy, a beautiful, 00:35:43.059 --> 00:35:46.179 safe backdrop for American movies, but a place 00:35:46.179 --> 00:35:48.239 where the people who actually create the culture, 00:35:48.480 --> 00:35:51.079 the artists, the chefs, the musicians, can no 00:35:51.079 --> 00:35:53.320 longer afford to stay. It's a cautionary tale, 00:35:53.440 --> 00:35:55.780 really, for desirable cities everywhere. When 00:35:55.780 --> 00:35:57.900 you become too popular, you risk destruction. 00:35:57.900 --> 00:35:59.860 the very thing that made you popular in the first 00:35:59.860 --> 00:36:02.840 place. The paradox of desirability. It's a tough 00:36:02.840 --> 00:36:06.019 problem to solve. Well, on that rather teary 00:36:06.019 --> 00:36:07.960 note, I think it gives us a lot to think about. 00:36:08.320 --> 00:36:11.079 Next time you watch a movie. and you see a gray, 00:36:11.179 --> 00:36:14.679 misty sky and a sleek glass tower, don't just 00:36:14.679 --> 00:36:16.539 see the background. Think about the concrete 00:36:16.539 --> 00:36:19.119 waffle. Think about Gassy Jack and his barrel 00:36:19.119 --> 00:36:21.000 of whiskey. And think about all the complex, 00:36:21.159 --> 00:36:23.539 often contradictory, mechanics that are keeping 00:36:23.539 --> 00:36:26.019 that beautiful, troubled city running. And check 00:36:26.019 --> 00:36:27.559 the street signs in the background of the shot. 00:36:27.619 --> 00:36:29.739 If it says Hastings Street, but the characters 00:36:29.739 --> 00:36:31.460 say they're in Manhattan, you'll know exactly 00:36:31.460 --> 00:36:34.199 where you are. Thanks for diving in with us. 00:36:34.340 --> 00:36:34.539 Anytime.