For residents of Hastings-Sunrise, traffic calming is far more than a simple barricade. It's instead an interruption of everyday life
As CBC recently reported, East Vancouver families are feeling the impact of full-closure measures, with concrete barriers undermining established routes, forcing endless detours, and leaving drivers feeling trapped within their own neighbourhoods. Convenience has been replaced with complications - and the community has finally had enough. Longtime resident Tom Siracusa's Remove the Barriers petition has collected more than 2,100 signatures, rallying against both current and future traffic calming projects.
This proves essential. A recent 2023 expansion showed that Hastings-Sunrise had approximately 4,000 on-street parking spaces, but proposed removing up to 60% of available parking on Adanac Street alone. It also called for up to half the parking on each side of E. Georgia and Charles Streets to be removed, while blocks fully closed to vehicles would lose all spaces. The dangers of this can be seen already, with the CBC article noting that businesses are struggling to combat the effects (consider Henry Lee, owner of the Sooya Cafe on Windermere Street. He explains that the inclusion of barricades has greatly affected his profits, with parking access now limited and customers unable to easily walk through his doors. "It’s called a traffic calming measure but it doesn’t calm traffic: it cuts it off completely. And it affects everything about my business.").
The debate, then, isn't simply about slowing traffic. It's about how much residents are being asked to surrender—and whether the people living with those changes believe the trade-off is worthwhile.
They don't.
Sources
CBC News — Hastings-Sunrise traffic-calming opposition
City of Vancouver — Hastings-Sunrise (Adanac Overpass) Traffic Calming Project, Phase 2
Hastings-Sunrise Clinton Park — Engagement Summary
