Traffic mayhem in downtown Vancouver due to supportive housing fire | Daily Hive

Traffic gridlock due to the supportive housing fire. (Kenneth Chan)

A serious fire at a controversial supportive housing building in downtown Vancouver triggered widespread traffic chaos on the afternoon and evening of Wednesday, snarling the Granville Street Bridge and other streets across the city centre.

Emergency crews responded to the incident at the supportive housing building within the former Howard Johnson Hotel — located at 1176 Granville Street, near the northeast corner of Granville and Davie streets — shortly before 4 p.m.

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According to Vancouver Fire Rescue Services (VFRS), two people were treated for injuries. By just before 5 p.m., firefighters reported the blaze — located on an upper level of the building and requiring the use of a ladder truck — had been extinguished.

In a subsequent social media post, VFRS shared that this was a dangerous situation complicated by “hoarding conditions, challenges with water supply inside, and people refusing to leave.” This made fire suppression and search operations more challenging for the firefighters.

The cause of the fire was a locking butane torch in a unit on the fifth level.

VFRS also noted that there have been at least 44 fires in this building since 2020, when it was converted from a tourist hotel into a permanent supportive housing building.

It is not immediately clear if today’s fire has displaced numerous supportive housing residents.

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Fire at the supportive housing in the former Howard Johnson Hotel building on June 11, 2025. (Kenneth Chan)

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Traffic gridlock due to the supportive housing fire. (Kenneth Chan)

Full road closures that began late in the afternoon continued into the evening, with traffic only resuming after 7 p.m.

Granville Street was fully closed from the north end of the Granville Bridge to just north of Helmcken Street, with all traffic redirected onto Seymour and Howe streets.

TransLink buses that typically operate on Granville Street were also rerouted to Seymour Street and Howe Street, with the public transit authority warning riders to expect extreme delays.

The incident coincided with peak travel hours, resulting in bumper-to-bumper traffic on Seymour Street, Howe Street, and alternate routes leading to the Burrard Street Bridge and Cambie Street Bridge.

On the Granville Street Bridge itself, all three northbound vehicle lanes were at a standstill, with congestion stretching all the way past the bridge’s south end for three hours.

Traffic gridlock due to the supportive housing fire. (Kenneth Chan)

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Traffic conditions beginning to ease as of 7:15 p.m. from the partial reopening of some roads. (Google Maps)

Today’s incident comes just days after Vancouver City Council approved the Granville Street Plan to revitalize the downtown entertainment district — a strategy that includes the long-term conversion of Granville Street within the city centre into a permanent car-free, pedestrian-only street and the relocation of aging SROs and supportive housing supply currently on the Granville Strip to new purpose-built buildings away from the area’s nightlife and entertainment uses, with the City offering up municipally-owned land for such developments.

This includes replacing properties such as the 110-unit supportive housing facility within the former Howard Johnson Hotel — a five-storey building originally constructed in 1911 and acquired by the provincial government in 2020 for the rapid creation of supportive housing amid the sudden onset of the pandemic, as part of efforts to decamp the Oppenheimer Park encampment.

“First of all, my heart goes out to those injured in this fire. These buildings were never intended to serve as housing for residents with complex mental health and addictions issues. They are old hotels which were already nearing the end of their life — with major upgrades needed, from fire safety improvements to seismic improvements, and other maintenance issues,” Vancouver city councillor Peter Meiszner told Daily Hive Urbanized on Wednesday evening, when asked to comment on the incident.

“I acknowledge that the Province bought these hotels as an emergency measure to bring people inside during the pandemic — but the need to replace these buildings with new, self-contained social housing is more urgent than ever. People’s lives are at risk and communities are being negatively impacted.”

Last week, B.C. Minister of Housing and Municipal Affairs Ravi Kahlon told Daily Hive Urbanized the provincial government is willing to explore the replacement of the aging housing along Granville Street.

Businesses in the area have also taken issue to the impacts from the high concentration of SROs and supportive housing on the Granville Strip, including the businesses within the ground level of the supportive housing buildings.

During last week’s City Council meeting on the Granville Street Plan, Alan Goodall — owner of Aura Nightclub, located on the ground floor of the former Howard Johnson Hotel — urged elected officials to relocate housing for individuals with complex needs to new, purpose-built facilities outside the entertainment district.

Goodall, who has operated the nightclub for 16 years, said the most extreme challenges began five years ago, when the provincial government acquired the building and converted the upper floors into supportive housing. Since then, he claims the nightclub has experienced roughly 200 flooding incidents caused by issues stemming from the supportive housing above, resulting in major financial impacts to his business and lost wages for this staff.

“The City is ready and willing to work with the Province and BC Housing to replace these buildings as soon as possible — that’s why I moved an amendment last week replace these buildings on Granville by offering up city land for new, self-contained social housing buildings,” continued Meiszner.

“Not only is new, purpose-built housing needed for these vulnerable folks — but they also need much more support than they are currently receiving. We need to put people on a path to recovery and wellness, while ensuring they have a dignified and safe place to live.”

Based on a September 2024 Freedom Of Information (FOI) request made by Daily Hive Urbanized to the Vancouver Police Department for statistics related to calls and incidents at supportive housing properties known to experience a high degree of operational issues, the data shows there was a 118 per cent jump in the total number of calls for service over a five-year period at the Howard Johnston Hotel, growing from 733 in 2019 — when the property was still used as a tourist hotel — to 1,596 in 2023.

There was a 525 per cent surge in weapons calls at the former Howard Johnston Hotel over five years, rising from one such call about every 46 days in 2019 (eight per year) to one per seven days in 2023 (50 per year). During the intervening years, the number of weapons calls per year reached 25 in 2020, 41 in 2021, and 34 in 2022. There were 24 weapons calls over the first eight months of 2024.

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