Broadway at Kingsway, Vancouver, 1991

This was my neighbourhood between 1989, on my return from Toronto, and July 1991, when we moved to Vancouver Island.

Aside from the gang wars, I have fond memories of this eclectic, working class area of Vancouver. Just outside the left frame of this photograph, there was a superb, family-owned Greek restaurant that my girlfriend, now wife, Amanda and I frequented. We watched the owners’ delightful twins grow from babes to rambunctious toddlers. Amanda, who has spent much time in Greece, sailing the Ionian Sea, confirmed that the food was authentic and as good as anything she tasted in Greece.

Further east, Vancouver’s Little Italy was home to a number of great bars and bistros, not to mention book and grocery stores, barbers and banks. Throw in a sprinkling of punk and hip culture vultures and you have Commercial Drive, still a thriving and colourful community today.

Today’s Google Street View reveals that the flatiron-style building at the northwest corner of Kingsway & Broadway, home of Canadian Outfitters, a cafè and a florist in ’91, has survived to house a new cafè, butcher, and indoor gardening store, while the buildings on the southwest corner, where I stood to make this rainy day shot, have been replaced by a large, mixed-use development housing Nester’s Market and a ubiquitous Starbuck’s. Alas, no sign of our Greek friends at this location. If they have endured the ups and downs of the independent restaurant business elsewhere, 30-years on, I pray they make it through these days of Covid-19.