Alexander Street Movie

Alexander Street: 8 blocks of Controversy, Conflict, Community, Change, & Hope is the story of Alexander Street in the 150 years since mill workers first used it to reach Gassy Jack’s Globe Saloon. The street has always reflected diversity, housing first an Indigenous encampment, and later a residential area, industrial zone, Gastown, Japantown, a ‘red light district’, and more. The backdrop to great change, it has seen historic buildings transformed into condos near support shelters.  What was once the site of St. James Church is currently a craft brew pub. A former rooming house for Japanese immigrants now offers transgender housing, and stark, cold storage facilities have blossomed into artists’ studios. This list goes on. Alexander Street has been, is, and always will be an example of changing times, changing people and places, and changing wants and needs. It is a model of how people can collaborate, share histories, experiences, and challenges, to build a future together.

Our Alexander Street documentary explores the evolution of this diverse community. Originally home to Indigenous people, the area expanded as mill workers and settlers moved in. Industry grew; Japantown formed. It remains a mix—people living in tents on the streets and in local parks; low-income SROs set against high-end condominiums. Support shelters and remnants of traditional port industry are interspersed with chic boutiques, bistros and art galleries. It is Vancouver’s most varied, mixed, and complex neighbourhood. Each segment of the community has a unique story; sometimes they co-exist, sometimes they conflict.   

We live on Alexander and interact in the community every day. Our film is about the diversity on Alexander Street that has pitted people against people while also bringing people together to lead us into the next change. Sharing its eclectic stories allows us to demonstrate mutual respect, tolerance, and compassion for the city-wide social struggles concentrated here. To showcase a vast range of voices we are interviewing people in as many community segments as possible—Indigenous People, Japanese Elders, traditional iron workers, unhoused individuals, substance users and survivors, business owners and workers, artists, musicians, and more.

We believe that through this documentary we can learn from each other to celebrate our individual and collective differences. By sharing our history, pooling our strengths and examining our needs we can build on the exceptional foundation that has helped us survive for a century and a half. This is a story about the history of the people living here told by the people shaping its next chapter. Alexander Street is a beacon of community, signaling hope for the locals and for all of Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, and the world.