End of horse racing opens door to major transformation at Hastings Park | Daily Hive

Hastings Racecourse during the 2025 PNE Fair, with the new PNE amphitheatre construction in the background. (Kenneth Chan)

The future of Hastings Park is accelerating into a new era following last week’s announcement that horse racing has now permanently ended at Hastings Racecourse after 133 years. It is a historic shift that clears the way for new uses, including potentially sweeping redevelopment that opens fresh possibilities for entertainment and sports.

As well, this fall, the Goldeneyes of the Professional Women’s Hockey League (PWHL) made a sell-out debut at the Pacific Coliseum, marking a major milestone for the PNE — the first time professional sports have returned to the original home ice of the NHL’s Vancouver Canucks in 10 years, after the WHL’s Vancouver Giants left for Langley. With an anchor tenant, the PNE is now actively exploring naming-rights deals for both the Pacific Coliseum and the Agrodome.

The fairgrounds are also simultaneously racing to complete their new $184-million landmark 10,000-spectator capacity amphitheatre, set to debut as the centrepiece venue for the five-week-long 2026 FIFA World Cup Fan Festival.

Together, these changes signal a dramatic reimagining of Vancouver’s most storied cultural and sporting landmarks.

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Vancouver city councillor Mike Klassen says the future of Hastings Park and PNE is unquestionably entering one of its most transformative periods in decades, with the possibility of a new soccer-specific stadium for the Vancouver Whitecaps emerging as a catalyst for major change.

The Whitecaps have repeatedly stated that under the existing contract terms, BC Place Stadium is no longer financially sustainable for the club, which takes less than 20 per cent of all net food and beverage revenue on match days at the stadium. This is one of the driving reasons why the Whitecaps rank near the bottom of the league in terms of revenue.

In recent years, many MLS teams have moved toward owning or having long-term control over a soccer-specific stadium, with the Whitecaps increasingly finding themselves to be in an ever-shrinking pool of outliers — despite the club’s historic season this year, coming so close to MLS Cup glory.

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Hastings Racecourse during the 2025 PNE Fair, with the new PNE amphitheatre construction in the background. (Kenneth Chan)

Speaking in his capacity as a city councillor — emphasizing he was not speaking on behalf of the PNE, not through his role as chair of the not-for-profit organization’s board of directors — Klassen described the clear interest from the club, the City of Vancouver, and the Government of British Columbia in exploring a soccer stadium to replace Hastings Racecourse.

In a previous interview with Daily Hive Urbanized earlier this year, Klassen confirmed that discussions have been taking place between the municipal government and the Whitecaps organization, which is currently in the midst of a potential ownership change.

Regardless of ownership, he said the central objective is keeping the club in Vancouver and supporting its long-term financial sustainability — something he says all parties believe a dedicated stadium could help secure. The City has signalled that the club can move forward with exploring a possible soccer stadium on the approximately 40-acre footprint that includes the racetrack and surrounding parking and stables.

“It’s a fairly large piece of land,” he noted, adding that although it sits within Hastings Park, the racetrack is not part of the PNE itself but is held in trust jointly by the municipal and provincial governments.

In early November 2025, just weeks before Hastings Racecourse permanently shut down, the Tsleil-Waututh First Nation and Great Canadian Entertainment announced they had entered into a definitive agreement for the purchase of the casino portion of the business and the casino-related real property interests at Hastings Racecourse. This follows the signing of a memorandum of understanding between the parties in June 2025, with the current operating license for these specific uses set to expire in May 2026.

Beyond a new soccer stadium, Klassen described a wide array of long-term improvements that could reshape the park’s role in Vancouver’s cultural and sporting life. He emphasized the need to realize more of the City’s 2010-approved Hastings Park/PNE master plan, which envisions a restored and naturalized stream running beside the new amphitheatre, a northward expansion of Playland into existing parking areas, new or revitalized buildings suitable for indoor entertainment and other programming, and a renovation of the heritage barns to provide improved activation space adjacent to the amphitheatre.

All of these elements are already under consideration, he said, and could align naturally with the redevelopment of the racecourse lands. “I won’t describe it as a blank canvas,” Klassen told Daily Hive Urbanized. “I’ll describe it as a really exciting sort of starting place for advancing and growing the attractions on the site.”

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Hastings Racecourse during the 2025 PNE Fair, with the new PNE amphitheatre construction in the background. (Kenneth Chan)

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September 2025 construction progress on Freedom Mobile Arch, the new PNE amphitheatre. (Revery Architecture)

Even if the Hastings Park/PNE master plan is amended, Klassen believes its core vision remains relevant, though new realities that renew the interest in sports facilities may shift priorities.

Klassen drew parallels to the park’s 20th-century heyday, when Empire Stadium hosted the Commonwealth Games, BC Lions, the Whitecaps, and other major events. With a stunning backdrop of the North Shore mountains, he believes a new soccer stadium could further revive Hastings Park as a major sports destination.

A purpose-built soccer stadium with a seating capacity for roughly 30,000 spectators could also potentially attract interest from the BC Lions, though Klassen emphasized that such decisions lie with the teams themselves.

Discussions have also taken place about converting the Agrodome into a practice facility for the Canucks, though it remains unclear whether the Goldeneyes’ use of the venue as their own practice facility would alter the possible viable use.

But if Hastings Park is to see a return of new and improved venues that attract mass crowds throughout the year, Klassen warned that public transit must significantly improve.

Current plans for the 2026 FIFA World Cup Fan Festival at the PNE include implementing an express TransLink shuttle bus service along Renfrew Street between SkyTrain’s Renfrew Station and Hastings Park, which could become a longer-term model. Such a shuttle bus is also operational each year during the PNE Fair period.

He shared there have been some very early discussions about expanding RapidBus from the North Shore, with a spur for the route on Renfrew Street with dedicated bus lanes a possibility.

TransLink’s special Renfrew Street shuttle bus during the PNE Fair. (Kenneth Chan)

Over the longer term, Klassen believes stronger rapid transit connections should be pursued for the area. He supports SkyTrain expansion, such as the idea of a new line along the Hastings Street corridor from downtown Vancouver.

“There’s no comparison other than to having SkyTrain from downtown to the PNE. If we are going to expect tens of thousands of people more regularly, we can’t expect them to be taking their car. We just simply won’t have the capacity for the roads or for the parking. So I would say that some kind of stronger transit connection may be fast-tracked as a result of the future of what’s happening at the PNE,” he said.

Klassen described the current momentum as a “very exciting time” for Hastings Park. The potential Whitecaps stadium is just one component of a broader wave of interest and development that could usher in a new era for both the PNE and the broader Hastings Park site.

“I can sort of look into the future and see a lot of real potential for these grounds,” he said.

PWHL’s Vancouver Goldeneyes at the Pacific Coliseum. (PWHL)

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