Vancouver, dubbed Canada's 'Pearl at the Pacific', is a very young city (100 years younger than San Francisco), and everything looks brand new. It wasn't until after the World Exposition in 1986 before Vancouver changed from a sleepy provincial city to a booming metropolis. Even today the city continues to expand at a high rate. Fortunately many of the new high-rise buildings in the downtown area are residential. Once abandoned industrial areas have thus turned into fashionable and lively districts such as Yaletown.
And with a great park, surrounded by the ocean on one side and a mountain range on the other, Vancouver also has the ideal setting for a great city.