West Point Grey

West Point Grey is an affluent residential neighbourhood on Vancouver's western tip, bordered by Blanca Street to the west, 16th Avenue to the south, and Alma Street to the east. With a population of roughly 13,000, it is defined by its large-lot single-family homes — the independent Municipality of Point Grey passed Canada's first zoning bylaw in 1922, restricting development to detached houses, and that low-density character has endured. About 62 percent of households are owner-occupied, the median household income exceeds $84,000, and roughly 64 percent of residents identify as non-visible minorities, making it one of the less ethnically diverse west-side neighbourhoods. Chinese-Canadians make up roughly 26 percent of residents, with Chinese languages at about 19 percent the second-most-common mother tongue group after English. The neighbourhood has a pronounced family orientation — about 21 percent of residents are under 19 and 19 percent are over 65.

West Point Grey produced one of the most distinctive three-way results in the 2022 election. Ken Sim won 51.8 percent, but Colleen Hardwick's TEAM nearly tied Kennedy Stewart for second — 21.6 percent to 21.9 percent. At the West Point Grey Community Centre advance poll, Hardwick actually beat Stewart, 488 to 343, making this one of only a handful of locations in the city where TEAM outpolled the incumbent mayor. Provincially, the neighbourhood falls within Vancouver-Point Grey — a riding that has been represented by three BC premiers (Gordon Campbell, Christy Clark, and David Eby). Eby unseated Clark in 2013 and won re-election in 2024 with 56.7 percent, though the 34.6 percent Conservative vote suggests the neighbourhood itself leans more to the right than the riding as a whole. Federally, it is within Vancouver Quadra, held by the Liberals continuously since 1984.

Municipal Issues

The Jericho Lands redevelopment was the single largest local issue. The 90-acre site — formerly RCAF Station Jericho Beach, which housed flying boats and up to 2,000 military personnel during World War II — is owned by MST Development Corporation (a partnership of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh First Nations). The proposed development envisions roughly 13,000 new homes for up to 24,000 residents, including about 2,600 social housing units, along with parks, a cultural centre, and commercial space. The federal government transferred its portion to Canada Lands Company in 2014, and the province sold its share to MST in 2016 for $480 million; MST subsequently acquired Canada Lands' share as well. The project's Indigenous ownership made opposition politically sensitive, but some residents described the scale of the proposed development as a fundamental threat to the neighbourhood's character. The planning process was actively underway during the 2022 campaign.

The UBC SkyTrain extension compounded densification concerns. In March 2022, city council endorsed a Broadway SkyTrain route from Arbutus to UBC with three stations, including one at the Jericho Lands site — directly in West Point Grey. Residents warned the extension would drive transit-oriented densification deep into the neighbourhood. TEAM's Hardwick explicitly campaigned on putting the UBC SkyTrain on hold, arguing that light rail would enable gentler, more distributed development. Her near-tie with Stewart for second place reflected the depth of anti-densification sentiment in a neighbourhood facing simultaneous pressure from the Jericho Lands mega-project, the SkyTrain extension, and the broader Broadway Plan's upzoning of the corridor to the south.