Kitsilano

Kitsilano is a west-side neighbourhood of roughly 43,000 people, defined by its beach, its commercial strips along West 4th Avenue and West Broadway, and a housing stock that mixes pre-war bungalows with three-storey walk-up apartments and newer condominiums. About 60 percent of households rent — one of the highest rates on the west side — and roughly 40 percent of residents are aged 20 to 39, giving the neighbourhood a younger profile than its affluent neighbours. The median household income is about $73,000, solidly middle to upper-middle by Vancouver standards, though property values are in the multi-million-dollar range. Kitsilano has the lowest share of visible minorities of any Vancouver neighbourhood, with about 74 percent of residents speaking English as a first language. Historically the centre of Vancouver's Greek immigrant community, the neighbourhood retains that heritage through the annual Greek Day festival on Broadway, though the Greek-speaking population has shrunk to about two percent.

Kitsilano's 2022 municipal results reflected a neighbourhood cross-pressured between its affluence and its social liberalism. Ken Sim won the aggregate vote with 40.8 percent, but the neighbourhood produced a distinctive three-way split: Colleen Hardwick's TEAM finished at 22.8 percent — well above her 10-percent city-wide average — pushing Kennedy Stewart to second place at 29.8 percent. At two of the three northern polling stations closest to the Broadway corridor, Stewart narrowly edged Sim; at the two southern stations and one northern station, Sim led; but Hardwick's strong third-place showing across all locations made Kitsilano one of the only areas where the race was genuinely three-sided. Provincially, the western portion falls within Vancouver-Point Grey, held by NDP MLA David Eby since 2013, while federally it is part of Vancouver Quadra, which has elected Liberal MPs continuously since 1984.

Municipal Issues

The Broadway Plan was the dominant local issue. Approved by council in June 2022, the plan permits mixed-use rental housing up to 18 storeys south of 12th Avenue and towers of up to 40 storeys within 150 metres of the future Arbutus Station. The Upper Kitsilano Residents Association opposed what it characterized as excessive densification that would create a second city skyline. The Arbutus supportive housing controversy was even more polarizing: in July 2022, council approved a 13-storey, 129-unit supportive housing building at West 7th Avenue and Arbutus, on a city-owned site adjacent to the future SkyTrain station and immediately beside St. Augustine Elementary School, which enrolls 450 children. The six-day public hearing stretched over an entire month. Councillor Colleen Hardwick, who lived in Kitsilano and would run for mayor under TEAM, voted against the project. The controversy contributed directly to anti-incumbent sentiment in the neighbourhood and to TEAM's strong performance.

The Squamish Nation's Seńak̲w development at Kits Point — 11 towers and over 6,000 rental homes on reserve land not subject to city zoning — generated debate about density, views, and neighbourhood character, while also raising questions about Indigenous sovereignty that did not break cleanly along left-right lines. Construction financing of $1.4 billion from the federal government was announced in September 2022.

Public safety concerns, while less acute in Kitsilano than in east-side neighbourhoods, were amplified by the supportive housing debate and by city-wide anxieties about street disorder. The documentary Vancouver Is Dying, released ten days before the election, resonated across the city. ABC's pledge of 100 additional police officers and 100 mental health nurses proved effective even in a neighbourhood that had not previously been a centre-right stronghold, while TEAM's anti-densification platform captured a segment of west-side voters — particularly older homeowners — who felt the Broadway Plan threatened the neighbourhood's low-rise character.