Towing threats nearly empty RVs from Spanish Banks parking lot

Marcal Roag spent last night sleeping in his camper van in Vancouver’s Point Grey neighbourhood instead of his usual spot in Spanish Banks.

He returned to the ocean-facing parking lot once the sun rose, but said the risk of having his vehicle impounded wasn’t worth staying in his usual spot overnight.

“You just need to see that view, right? It’s a pretty sweet spot to be,” he told Daily Hive Urbanized.

Marcal Roag at Spanish Banks (Arash Randjbar/Daily Hive)

Far fewer camper vans were parked at Spanish Banks Wednesday than earlier in the week after threats of ticketing and towing drove many campers away. On Wednesday afternoon, there were only about a dozen vans. Roag said there were sometimes 80 to 100 in the summer.

“Since the law enforcement are warning us, I haven’t parked. But it doesn’t stop me from coming back during the daytime,” he told Daily Hive Urbanized. “It won’t change the fact I want to keep living in my van.”

The City of Vancouver denies representatives threatened Spanish Banks campers with towing, or that there was a deadline to leave. But it did confirm rangers have been out in Spanish Banks to educate vehicle occupants about parking bylaws.

Spanish Banks is closed from 10 pm to 6 am daily, and people aren’t supposed to park there overnight. The Park Board said rangers are working to educate users, and connect anyone who’s genuinely homeless and in need of help to a City outreach team.

“Illegally parked RVs are not unique to Vancouver but remain a challenging issue in many communities,” a Park Board spokesperson said. “People living in parked RVs do so for different reasons – not all people living in RVs consider themselves as houseless or at risk of houselessness.”

Roag is one of those people who choose to live in his van. Although he could afford to rent an apartment, it would stretch his budget. He also prefers independence to having roommates.

Some of his neighbours aren’t there by choice, though. Some of them can’t afford to live in a permanent home, and that’s why they park at Spanish Banks for free.

The City didn’t answer Daily Hive Urbanized’s questions about how many vans have been towed this week, but it appears the rangers’ message has gotten across to the campers. Roag says he’ll need to keep moving instead of staying in the same spot.

“What they’ve been doing the last few nights is probably what they should have been doing last summer. It seems many people were parked here and they got away with that.”

With files from Daily Hive’s Arash Randjbar