it's really an easy choice. all my east side friends are sketched of parking nice cars outside anywhere.

ppl from rmd or west side dont even have that thought.

east side sucks.

Seems like RS is focusing on schools a lot.

How important is your kid's education? Will you be actively helping your kid through this process?

-if you will be there all the time & helping with homework & extra curricular activites > it doesnt matter where you live (i know a doctor & a lawyer that graduated from britannia)

-if you will be a slack parent or just cant commit the time maybe you have to rely on the following stats to help you decide:

http://www.fraserinstitute.org/repor...ov=BC&lv=S&l=A

When all my friends gather to talk about their gangster crap back in highschool I was like what gangster shit?

The closest gangster shit I had was some white boy whip out a butterfly knife to show off.....he's not even threatening no one he's just like "check this shit out bro" LOL

i live in richmond and i have that thought.
however its a lil different in richmond.
you're not scared of ppl stealing your car, you're scared of people dinging it in a parking lot.
so you park 2 blocks away or at the very end of the parking lot to avoid other cars.

^ That or people just driving INTO your car when you are sound asleep.

^lol what?

anyway, i speak from experience with the parking lot thing.
parked at lansdowne in a normal sized stall, right in the middle.
came out 30m later and theres a huge white scratch on the corner of my bumper.
learned my lesson... i'd rather walk an extra minute or two to the mall and avoid that sort of thing.

have you looked into either champlain in east Van or Hamilton in east Richmond?

Park in a Richmond parking lot, you will come back to see your car boxed in or no way to open your driver's door. Some people just don't care about your car.

If you don't speak chinese don't move to richmond. East Van FTW :D

seakrait, I grew up in East Van, right in Chinatown. Went to Strathcona and Britannia for school. Look how I turned out. :lol

As for my sister, she's in Comp Sci @ UBC. My brother? Fucking kid is going to med school! Yeah, we're East Side thuggin'. Next time I see you, imma cap yo' ass! :D

Richmond

-Crazy driving C Lai's

I've lived in Richmond, Kerrisdale, Downtown Vancouver and Burnaby in the past decade, with Richmond the city I reside in now. I can truthfully say that I enjoy living here. The four places aren't comparable, but they have the highlights and downsides, depending where you are in life.

I live in Central Richmond, around the Minoru Park area, and I'm close to 3 bridges, Canada Line and tons of food. Being a dog owner, I also enjoy the dog parks and trails that Richmond offers. I'm close enough to the airport that I pick up most my packages there and when I travel, I'm already at YVR's doorstep and don't fight traffic to get there.

Honestly, I don't find traffic going into Vancouver from Richmond via the Knight St. bridge that bad. It only takes 25 minutes to get to work in Burnaby from Richmond.

As far as schools go, I think Richmond has an edge there over East Van in terms of primary and secondary schools. Post-secondary, East Van is closer to most of them, if not all of them.

Traffic in Richmond sucks by No.3 road and on Westminster Hwy if there's an accident, but there are enough through roads to get by them once you know the area. Plus the roads are much better in Richmond, even in the residential areas. Parking is exaggerated IMO. I got more door dings at BCIT in a few years than all the times I've been in Richmond, but then again, I don't go to Aberdeen or any of the asian malls that often.

Housing prices can get expensive in Richmond...like the obvious Terra Nova and the areas south of that. There are some more affordable areas east of No. 4 road and south of Blundell and as you get close to Steveston Hwy.

Do you have a price range in mind??

Judging an area to reside in based on who drives on the nearby roads is so damn retarded. If you're gonna find a bad driver in one place, you're bound to meet the same driver (or type of driver) in the next area you're heading to. I, for one, am a crappy driver and I roam everywhere in the lower mainland.

Don't fret too much about your future kid's place of post-secondary education. Driving to school is not that hard and if you are penny-pinching, then take public transit and save on the gas. UPass, btw? If your child is in 4th year at UBC/SFU/BCIT/wherever, and he doesn't have the initiative to take the bus to get to class, then you got a lousy child. Distance and time? Then its your responsibility to go early and be on time.

Now your kid can be successful whereever the highschool may be. Yes, upbringing and family time makes up most of his potential, but at the same time you will have to fight against whatever influences he will encounter at school. Yes, professionals grew up from the East Side too but so is the notion that all that ghetto stuff is there too. It wont mean East Van is bad 100% of the time, it just means you got one extra worry in the back of your head when your kid goes out to meet his gangsta-lookin friends. Discriminatory? Probably, but if you're aren't really confident in the area you are considering, then obviously you should consider Richmond a bit more.

Bars/drinks/entertainment-- all the good stuff is in downtown anyways. But most of all.... Richmond has some good Chinese deals on groceries and I personally like the overall new-ness of it. Consider the necessary amnenites for your own needs first.

what race of people do you want your kids being friends with? Serious question.

Are your kids about the age to go into high school? If not, I wouldn't fret too much about getting into certain high school catchment areas and be more concerned with elementary schools.

Chances are, you're probably going to move again, so you can worry about high schools later. Furthermore, high schools are constantly changing, and what once was a good school, could potentially turn bad, and vice versa.

Richmond has everything east van has but better.

To sum it up.

Richmond is a cleaner, safer, richer city in general.
More cops, less crime, less bums junkies etc.
Everything in Richmond is located in close proximity, Richmond has a better layout.
All the commercial areas, malls restaurants are all together, making everything more convenient.

Richmond also has MORE late night entertainment locations / restaurants, again all in close proximity of each other.

Richmond's ghetto area is far away from city center.

East van's ghetto's are far too close to the Rich areas. I always see bums and junkies walkin around the rich areas, there are more bums and thieves, and drug dealers doin their runs around east van.

Richmond is a very quiet city at night + NO street hookers. All the crime in Richmond is hidden from sight. Crime rate is also lower.

Where as you see shootings, murder, armed robery in broad daylight in East Van. E.g. today phone store got robbed in broad daylight right on Kingsway.

One last thing.

Going downtown / airport/ usa / border is quicker from Richmond then from East Van.

Granville st / Arthur Lang has much quicker traffic during rush hour then Kingsway, broadway / granview / 12th etc.

I live and work in East Van and Richmond.

i like richmond :D
HAte the drivers.
Especially the well off 18yrold wit their N's cutting traffic, n ripping it around in their daddy's n mommy's car.
Eastvan u get less of that.. But when u do.. Its usually civyics or rice buckets
Posted via RS Mobile

Just an observation (and purely my own opinion.)

I noticed that friends of mine who grew up and have lived in Richmond all their lives are rather clueless about anything beyond Richmond. They live in a bubble and don't even like going beyond the bridges. Sometimes, I feel that they're better off living under a rock. Oh, and to them, East Van is scary and life threatening. :\

lol what? rich east van is an oxymoron. they don't belong in the same sentence haha!

Fixed.

I've noticed this too with my circle of friends. If they never moved outside of the city or town they grew up in, they don't usually venture far.

I like Richmond too. I wish I had the chance to grow up in Richmond.

How was that fixed?

None of my friends who live in Richmond want to go outside of Richmond to do ANYTHING. Even if the rest of us are having dinner somewhere in Vancouver, they pester everyone to eat in Richmond.

They find East Van "scary" and won't even drive near Surrey or even Burnaby (except for Metro)

Kids in Richmond live a sheltered life. Since everything in Richmond is so close, they hate venturing out too far, or they make excuses to avoid crossing any bridge or highway.

Example? They think Tsawassen is far. Are you kidding me?

I guess it went right over your head, unless you stopped reading after the bold. Think about the mentality of someone who lives in one place all their life. It's like the story of the frog in the well.

I know someone who grew up and still lives in Burnaby. He loves it, won't cross a bridge, thinks anything west of Cambie is a hassle. Why? Because he's too damn comfortable and has everything he needs in his hometown of Burnaby.

Then again, I don't know how old your friends are, what experiences they've had in life or if they are just plain sheltered. BTW, are they Asian? I find that my Asian friends don't like venturing outside of they're city of residence.

Some Asian. Some white. A few are bouncers. You would think that they would be the last ones to be afraid of East Van or Surrey.

We all who live in Vancouver and Richmond should be lucky we don't have to travel far to get either place. I live in E Van and I go to Richmond 3-4 times a week and it's no big deal takes me from near Joyce skytrain to Alderbridge probably 20 mins during rush hour unless if theres an accident.
I don't think I would leave E.Van but I wouldn't mind buying property in Richmond, lots of 1/2 1/4 acre propertys for 600k+ with a old house of course almost the same price for old timer E. Vancouver home but more land.

Just be lucky either place isn't the distance we have to travel to get to Surrey or White Rock and then deal with some of the drivers out there, I have friends out in Surrey but I hardly make it out there to visit them it seems to be too much trouble to get out there just for a visit.