iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

It's hard to imagine a 27k ft retailer filling this space (see nearby empty Bay and Nordstroms), big footprint retail is challenged in this online age --but thoughtful interventions to support local-serving small business, third spaces other than streets, and curtail criminal activity would help.

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This is in no way to diminish the very real challenges that London Drugs staff and stab proof vested security guards would have had to deal with on a daily basis here and as LD president admits are issues across BC - but the business model and consumer market at this location are part of the reality

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This left an oversized shopping destination with an undersized consumer market expending scant resources and staff's wellbeing on safety and security. And the promise of redevelopment bringing new residents and new customers had all but evaporated.

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By the time the tax exemption ended in 2020, the foreign investment-driven Vancouver real estate market had dried up, and COVID-19 catalyzed a broken system and challenges around mental health, substance use and acquired brain injury, exploding into a crisis of theft, violence and street disorder.

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London Drugs in Woodwards opened as an outsized flagship sort of a store at 27,000 sq ft: almost as big at the Georgia and Granville location; twice the size of Olympic Village. The logic was likely that a super size London Drugs would attract more investment and development, as downtown moved east

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When the new Woodward's mixed use development opened with housing and cultural spaces and retail it was heralded as a success, and anchor tenants like London Drugs were welcomed with a permissive ten year property tax exemption (thanks to sec 396A of the Vancouver Charter).

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In 1998, a well-intentioned but disastrous decision by the council of the day shut down 'undesirable' businesses: 24h cafes, convenience stores, buy & sell markets and pawn shops. With nowhere indoors to go, more people ended up on the streets, and small businesses faced increasing street disorder

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The site stayed vacant for several years, but for the Artropolis show and later Woodsquat occupation. Planners, pundits, and small businesses alike recognized the Woodwards Block served as a bulwark to the chaos of DTES drifting west. Activists recognized that any redevelopment needed social justice

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In 1993, when Woodward's closed I was owner/operator of a print shop on that same block at 159 West Hastings. The impacts of the department store's demise were immediate and profound: foot traffic dropped off, street disorder rose and many small businesses on that same block folded within the year.

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Pete Fry @ptfry.bsky.social · 10/12/2025

The closure of London Drugs at Hastings/Abbot is a loss for the neighbourhood. Yes, safety/security issues are a challenge for this and any operator, but there is more to consider in this story: the outsized location relied on a market that doesn't exist. History🧵 vancouversun.com/news/london-...

vancouversun.com

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While voting as an ABC block, Cllr Zhou - quoted in the article -- professed to be solidly "pro housing," but his voting record suggests he's "solidly" voted against new supportive housing, rentals in Shaughnessy, and now, social housing city-wide #notallhousing

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Pete Fry @ptfry.bsky.social · 09/12/2025

Important reckoning. Sadly, this is a broken record / broken system where supposedly well intentioned child apprehensions often result in real harm to the kids and parent(s) and very little accountability. I know and have worked with many of the people involved in this story 🙌🏽 gratitude and respect.

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US: ICE Arrest at FIFA Event Spotlights Dangers for World Cup

The beautiful game, used as a cover for deportation and breaking up families, while FIFA strokes Trump's ego with some symbolic prize. Please let's do something meaningfully symbolic and stand for Sanctuary, and Access without Fear in Vancouver's FIFA plan www.hrw.org/news/2025/12...

hrw.org

The arrest and return of an asylum seeker who took his children to the Club World Cup soccer tournament final on July 13, 2025, raises serious concerns about the safety of noncitizens attending the 20...

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Today, as Trump awarded new "FIFA Peace Prize" his militarized ICE agents are targeting football-loving racialized migrants Wednesday, I ask Vancouver to affirm our commitment to Sanctuary City: Access Without Fear as part of our FIFA Human Rights Plan. Please council.vancouver.ca/20251210/doc...

PHOTO: Donald Trump celebrates 'great honour' of winning FIFA peace prize, shaking hands with FIFA President Gianni Infantino, with cup in foreground

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A Vancouver Landlord Keeps Being Allowed to Evict Tenants. Why? | The Tyee

Another timely call out of this serial tormentor that landlords over many renters in our city. Plan A is quite literally one of the worst, and keeps successfully gaming the system. thetyee.ca/News/2025/12...

thetyee.ca

Residents want to know why BC’s Residential Tenancy Branch keeps siding with Plan A.

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'Twas weeks before Christmas And staff at the City Checked stockings for pink slips Such a Holiday pity... "'Tis best for our budget!" laughed our malevolent hero "More layoffs to come, 'cause Zero Means Zero!" www.ctvnews.ca/vancouver/ar...

AI generated Grinch in front of cartoon rendering of Vancouver skyline. Grinch is smiling as snow falls lightly around and red Dr Seuss style lettering at top right reads "Zero Means Zero!"

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I posted details above - but I think recognizing the damage these cuts will inflict and the value these volunteer committees bring to our city is helpful

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Council - December 9, 2025

If you share concerns about eliminating the public advisory committees, you can sign up to speak to it at Dec 9 Council, its Report #1 on the agenda. Link to report and details to sign up: council.vancouver.ca/20251209/reg...

council.vancouver.ca

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❌2SLGBTQ+ ❌Arts and Culture ❌Children, Youth and Families ❌Older Persons and Elders ❌Persons with Disabilities ❌Racial and Ethno-Cultural Equity ❌Renters ❌Transportation Advisory ❌Food Policy Council ❌Women’s Advisory #zeromeanszero

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Zero Means Zero Meets FIFA Staff report Dec 9 recommends terminating 10/11 Advisory Committees. As the World Cup looms and we've yet to see a Human Rights Plan, volunteer-led citizens advisories are scrapped. Eliminating Committees saves $160,000 @ department targeted by #zeromeanszero cuts

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Vancouver's Celebration of Light fireworks festival cancelled indefinitely | CBC News

Budget silver lining? Disappointing to hear the Celebration of Lights are being cancelled. BUT on the upside, this does free up over $1m of in-kind policing City of Vancouver contributes, perhaps we can refund some of the cuts to community services? #zeromeanszero www.cbc.ca/news/canada/...

cbc.ca

Organizers of a public fireworks festival, which has brought millions of people to Vancouver's English Bay over the past three decades, says it can’t go ahead without long-term government and private-...

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Also. Admittedly, song was in the context of the budget, the speakers opposed to it, and a council week that at times has felt like a bit of a (metaphoric) street fight, so for me, from the trenches it was the perfect motivator 🎯

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Yes, Paul Weller et al, The Jam "In the City" was Quinn's win for the wakeup

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Pete Fry @ptfry.bsky.social · 26/11/2025

You had me at The Jam wake-up song, but that interview was the golden icing on the cake!

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This is absolutely horrific. 36 dead, 279 missing in Hong Kong highrise complex fire. This photo from CBC captures the anguish many of us are feeling for our friends and family across the Pacific in our spiritual (not official) sister city. www.cbc.ca/player/play/...

cbc.ca

Hong Kong highrise fire leaves several dead, others trapped inside

A fire spread across multiple highrise buildings in a Hong Kong housing complex on Wednesday, killing 13 people and leaving others trapped inside, authorities said.

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Cllr Zhou brings amendment to cut funding for energy retrofits like residential cooing grants, to fill potholes... On brand since Zhou also voted for lifting the natural gas ban - and in fairness he wasn't on council when 117 ppl died in the heat dome. Ignorance is bliss.

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Magnanimous gesture from ABC to include offer new funding for baby change tables, which would otherwise be defunded - and that's great who doesn't love babies! No word on how it will be paid for though, sponsorship? Having a sh!tty season? Enjoy this Canucks change table.

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LIVE Budget Engineering fees set to go up across the board for everything was severed to provide relief for patio permits (a nice $300,000 nod to consider small business) but when I suggested it could be offset by increasing Street and Traffic By-law Fines specific to road safety, ABC rejected 😒

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