Surrey is the epitome of the changing suburb in North America. Originally a farming region with a few scattered settlements, this 300-square-kilometre principality south of big-city Vancouver became the archetypal bedroom suburb in the second half of the 20th century. For those decades, it was little more than a vast tract of wide sidewalk-free roads, cul-de-sacs, split-level houses, malls and Caucasian two-parent families fleeing the evils of the big, bad, expensive city.
All of the above are still around, here and there. But so are many other things. Clusters of high-rise condo towers. The region’s biggest concentration of South Asians, complete with their own malls, temples, banquet halls, charities, parades, social-service organizations and business associations. A rapid-transit line has become the development spine of the city. There is crime, a cluster of addiction-recovery...
Frances Bula has covered Vancouver city politics and development for the last thirty years. Her reporting regularly appears in BCBusiness and the Globe and Mail.
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