Kensington-Cedar Cottage

Kensington-Cedar Cottage is one of Vancouver's largest and most ethnically diverse neighbourhoods, with a population of roughly 49,000 as of the 2021 census. Stretching from Fraser Street east to Nanaimo Street, and from Broadway south to the East 41st Avenue corridor, the neighbourhood is bisected by Kingsway — its commercial spine and one of Vancouver's most multicultural arterials. Chinese-Canadians make up about 34 percent of residents, Filipinos roughly 11 percent, South Asians about 8 percent, and the neighbourhood is home to a significant Vietnamese community concentrated along the Kingsway strip officially designated as Little Saigon. English is the mother tongue of only about 35 percent of residents, with Chinese languages at 34 percent and Tagalog at 6 percent. About 56 percent of households are owner-occupied, and the housing stock is dominated by Vancouver Specials and older bungalows — roughly 68 percent of dwellings are classified as single-family — with very little high-rise development. The median household income sits slightly below the city average.

Kensington-Cedar Cottage was the most internally divided neighbourhood in the 2022 election. Ken Sim won 48.4 percent overall — 6,432 of 13,283 valid ballots — to Stewart's 34.9 percent, but the aggregate masked a sharp north-south split. In the northern portion bordering Grandview-Woodland and Commercial Drive, Stewart won Queen Alexandra Elementary (441 to 230) and Trout Lake Community Centre (748 to 598), areas with a younger, English-speaking, renter-heavy population. In the southern portion along Kingsway and the Knight Street corridor, Sim dominated Kensington Community Centre by nearly three to one (1,135 to 407), driven by the large Chinese-Canadian community. Provincially, the neighbourhood falls within Vancouver-Kensington, held by NDP MLA Mable Elmore — BC's first MLA of Filipino heritage — since 2009. Federally, the neighbourhood is split between Vancouver East, held by NDP MP Jenny Kwan, and Vancouver Kingsway, held by NDP MP Don Davies.

Municipal Issues

Densification along the Kingsway corridor was the defining local land-use issue. The Norquay Village Neighbourhood Centre Plan, approved in 2010 and implemented through pre-zoning in 2013, enabled multiplexes, rowhouses, and four-storey apartments on residential streets, with midrises on Kingsway itself. By 2022, about 11 percent of the Norquay area had been redeveloped, but residents complained that densification had proceeded without corresponding amenities or meaningful gains in affordability. The Vancouver Plan, approved in 2022, designated most of Norquay as a Neighbourhood Centre, intensifying the density trajectory. Multiple active rezoning applications lined Kingsway during the campaign, including proposals reaching 25 storeys. Little Saigon, officially designated following a grassroots campaign backed by a 3,000-signature petition, faced particular pressure: by 2020, 25 percent of Vietnamese-owned businesses along Kingsway had disappeared due to rising rents, aging proprietors, and redevelopment.

Public safety and anti-Asian hate crime drove the southern half of the neighbourhood decisively toward ABC. The neighbourhood's Chinese-Canadian, Filipino, and Vietnamese communities experienced the surge in anti-Asian hate incidents — Vancouver was labelled the anti-Asian hate crime capital of North America after 2020 data showed more incidents than the ten largest US cities combined. ABC's platform of 100 additional police officers and 100 mental health nurses, combined with Sim's identity as the first Chinese-Canadian elected mayor, proved decisive in the southern polls. The Vancouver Police Union's unprecedented endorsement of Sim reinforced the public safety message. In the northern polls, however, Stewart's support reflected the different character of the Trout Lake area — more aligned with the Commercial Drive left-of-centre tradition, with a younger, more English-speaking population that favoured the incumbent's approach to housing and social services.