GRANDVIEW-WOODLAND

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Grandview-Woodland stretches from Broadway to Burrard Inlet, and from Clark Drive to Nanaimo Street. This charismatic area features a diversity of people, housing and land use. Its heart is Commercial Drive, a fascinating collection of ethnic restaurants and food stores, funky coffee bars and hangouts, unusual clothing stores and street activity. The "Drive" is known throughout the city for its cosmopolitan appeal. Its businesses are as varied as the people that run them.

Once commonly referred to as "Little Italy," many of the Drive's Italian residents have moved to North Burnaby and the Italian influence has broadened into a Latin one. It is still common to see men playing Bocce - a type of Italian lawn bowling - in Victoria Park.

Did You Know?

It is said the area's name originated around 1892, when one of the earliest residents nailed up the sign "Grand View" at the interurban stop near what today is the intersection of Commercial Drive and 1st Avenue.

Originally called Park Drive, because it headed straight to Clark Park at 14th Avenue, Commercial Drive was renamed in 1911.

Grandview became known as "Little Italy" after the Second World War, when the original Italian community near Union Street moved east and was joined by new immigrants from Italy.

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© 2005, City of Vancouver
Last modified: August 17, 2010