Thousands of Vancouver residents flocked to pedestrian-friendly free events in several neighbourhoods of the city to celebrate Car-Free Vancouver Day on Sunday.
The event aims to foster a car-free sense of community in the Commercial Drive, Main Street, Kitsilano and West End areas with free entertainment and closures on major thoroughfares all day long.
The closure of Denman Street in the dense West End of downtown Vancouver is a part of the newly expanded event, which has been entirely produced by hundreds of volunteers on several occasions since 2005.
Organizers say it is time Vancouver moves away from car-dependency as air quality declines, urban congestion increases and the price of gas continues to rise.
"The whole point of this is that we want to build our communities and our cities around people as opposed to around cars," said Charles Latimer, one of the festival's organizers.
Each neighbourhood festival has its own unique flavour, with block parties, dancing, music, performers, and food and crafts sales.
Road closures are as follows:
- Commercial Drive is closed to vehicle traffic from Venables to First Avenue from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m.
- In the West End, Denman Street from Robson to Davie streets is closed to vehicles from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m.
- Main Street is closed from 12th Avenue to 16th Avenue from 2 p.m. to midnight.
- In Kitsilano, various residential streets from West 2nd Avenue to West 15th Avenue are closed for block parties
TransLink has re-routed buses in the Commercial Drive, Main Street and West End neighbourhoods. Details can be found here.
With a report from CTV British Columbia's Dag Sharman
