Hogan’s Alley became a central neighbourhood for Black cultural development and community building within an overwhelmingly white municipality. Prior to its destruction, Hogan’s Alley was home to talented artists, community owned and run restaurants, small businesses, and a diverse Black community.

In light of the City of Vancouver’s recent commitment to meaningful cultural redress toward the Black and African diasporic community in 2022, our team sought to investigate past City policies, and their impact on commercial and residential displacement of Hogan’s Alley and Strathcona residents. Using archival research methods, we sought to identify eight to ten key policies which profoundly and disproportionately impacted the Black and African diasporic communities.

Vancouver, like many major North American cities of the era, was committed to an urban planning doctrine called “urban renewal”. City planners were motivated to achieve goals of “beautifying” the city through programs of slum removal and blight clearance. However, when it came to identify which neighbourhoods were blighted and full of slums it was often neighbourhoods of colour that made the list. As a result, Hogan’s Alley and many parts of Strathcona were razed for “redevelopment” purposes. Homes, businesses, and residents displaced forever.

Our findings merely accompany the tireless work of existing Black-led and community organizations actively working towards reconciliation and redress. Our report is not intended to make policy recommendations. It is instead meant to serve as a resource to better our collective understanding of our City’s history of anti-Black policy impacts. Only when we know our history can we work together to build a future that is just, fair, and equitable for all Vancouverites. We encourage you to explore our interactive timeline of the highlighted policies.

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