The City of Vancouver-funded Downtown Eastside Market will soon be relocating to a smaller indoor location at the southwest corner of Main Street and East Cordova Street.
The replacement indoor building location is about two blocks east of its existing larger outdoor location at 26 East Hastings Street, which permanently closed on Wednesday as the City of Vancouver’s lease on the vacant property is coming to an end.
The chosen site of 305 Main Street, which is intended to be a temporary location, comes after a failed proposal earlier this year to relocate the market to 123 East Hastings Street, which would have necessitated the demolition of a 1901-built, two-storey building.
The new location is just across from the former Vancouver Police Department headquarters building, which now contains co-working and social enterprise uses.
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According to a new development permit application, the new location for this “low-barrier vending market” will provide stall spaces for between 10 and 15 vendors. Similar to the operations at the previous location, it will open daily, with maximum operational times of 9 am to 7 pm, and with one additional hour before and after dedicated for set-up and clean-up.
Previous locations for the Downtown Eastside Market were larger and offered space for about 20 to 40 vendors each weekday and 50 to 70 vendors on weekends on a rotational basis.
The City is hoping to reopen the market at its new location by September 18, 2023.
The market will continue to be operated by MakeWay Charitable Society dba Binners’ Project.
Walking distance between Downtown Eastside Market’s replacement location of 305 Main Street and the previous location of 26 East Hastings Street. (Google Maps)
Previous location of the Downtown Eastside Market at 26 East Hastings Street, which permanently closed on August 30, 2023. (Google Maps)
According to the City, the market is intended to provide income-generation opportunities for very low-income residents in the Downtown Eastside, and the operational requirements to manage the facility also provide low-barrier employment. As well, it is also a measure to help address the vending that occurs on public sidewalks and parks in the area.
“Legitimizing a space for the informal vending economy has shown to be an essential means to generate income, increase social connection, reduce waste production through the recycling/reuse of goods, and provide a pathway to access other services like housing and substance use supports,” reads the City’s rationale.
But formal and informal vending activities in the Downtown Eastside have also been known to be hotspots for the disposal of shoplifted goods, contributing to property theft and crime in and around the downtown Vancouver peninsula.
In late 2021, the Vancouver Police Department (VPD) went as far as asking the public to avoid shopping at the street market after an undercover sting operation found “rampant trafficking of stolen property.”
“These officers saw people openly selling drugs and stolen property – everything from power tools and electronics still in store packaging to cosmetics, designer clothing, and sunglasses that still had anti-theft devices attached,” said Inspector Gary Hiar, the officer in charge of VPD’s General Investigation Section, in a release at the time.
The VPD also suggested at the time that local residents in the area were being pushed out by people who do not live in the Downtown Eastside but go there to traffic goods. As they are “unable to compete with these criminal enterprises, many locals are resorting back to crime just to make ends meet.”
“Using sophisticated investigative techniques, detectives confirmed that thousands of dollars in stolen property are being moved in and out of the Downtown Eastside every day by people who don’t even live in the community,” added Hiar.
“The demand for stolen goods is entirely fuelled by greed and desperation. Impoverished and drug-addicted people are now being recruited to steal by predatory fences, who in turn pay pennies on the dollar for stolen goods and resell them to bargain hunters who are all too willing to turn a blind eye.”
The selected site of 305 Main Street is part of a land assembly in the area for the future development of an 11-storey mass timber building with 117 homes — 47 secured market rental homes and 70 social housing units — along with retail, restaurant, and a cultural space. This project will also replace the Imperial Theatre.
Artistic rendering of the future MAC building at 305 Main Street, Vancouver. (MA+HG Architects/Happy Harvest)
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