In general, there are three types of Chinatowns in North America :
- frontier and rural Chinatowns
- urban Chinatowns
- suburban Chinatowns
The first two types of Chinatowns were typically pioneered by early Chinese immigrants in the 19th to the mid-20th centuries. Suburban quasi-"Chinatowns" - altogether replacing the functions of their original counterparts - were developed due to the arrival of later waves of new ethnic Chinese immigrants as well as the in flow of investments, mostly during the 1970s and 1980s (these are not considered Chinatowns in the usual sense of the word).
Chinatowns in Canada
Alberta
Edmonton
There are actually two Chinatowns in Edmonton: the newer Chinatown North (dominated by Hong Kong Chinese emigrants) and the older Chinatown South. Chinatown North stretches on 97 St from 107A Ave to 105 Ave and boasts mostly of shops, restaurants, and supermarkets. Chinatown South stretches on 102 Ave (Harbin Road) from 97 St to 95 St and south to Jasper Avenue, contains some restaurants, shops, residential buildings, and a multicultural centre.
West Edmonton Mall has a themed street named Chinatown, with a lion's gate entrance, a koi pond, and a festive dragon. Asian-themed shops and services are available, anchored by a T&T Supermarket.
Calgary
The Chinatown in Calgary is the largest in Alberta. It spans 1 St E westward to 10 St W and from the Bow River southward to 4 Ave SW. This Chinatown consists of a large shopping centre called Dragon City Mall and a Calgary Chinese Cultural Centre located at 1 St SW. Another neighbourhood with an Asian astmosphere is forming along the Centre Street corridor to the north of downtown and the Bow River. Nearly all of this is post-1930s, as Calgary's original Chinatown was little more than a handful of Chinese and Western restaurants in the same area, without the historic Chinese-ethnic residential-commercial quality of more historic Chinatowns like those in Vancouver and Vermont.
British Columbia
Vancouver
Vancouver's Chinatown is the largest in Canada, and the fourth largest in North America (after New York; Flushing, NY; and San Francisco). Dating back to the late 19th century, the main centre of the older Chinatown is Pender and Main Streets in downtown Vancouver, which is also, along with Victoria's (Chinatown, Victoria), one of the oldest surviving Chinatowns in North America, and has been the setting for a variety of modern Chinese Canadian culture and literature and innumerable Hollywood movies.
Vancouver's Chinatown contains numerous galleries, shops, restaurants, and markets, in addition to the Chinese Cultural Centre and the Dr. Sun Yat Sen Classical Chinese Garden and park; the garden is the first and one of the largest Ming era-style Chinese gardens outside China.
The moniker "Hongcouver" developed during the influx of Hongkongers in the 1980s.
During the early 1990s, the cultural centre and destination point for Chinese Canadians had begun to shift away from the old Chinatown in downtown Vancouver, moving southward into the suburbs of the Lower Mainland, particularly around 41st Avenue and Victoria Street in Vancouver and the Golden Village area in Richmond. In addition to Richmond, there are other Chinese immigrant communities developing in Burnaby and Coquitlam. The malls of the Metrotown district of South Burnaby are heavily Asian-oriented, and comprise yet another suburban quasi-Chinatown, although less so than Golden Village.
International Village, which is an outgrowth of the Expo Lands development, is a newer apartment tower and strip mall near Chinatown which includes an Asian mall and numerous upscale shoppes and restaurant developments that are intended to rejuvenate Chinatown.
Richmond
The Golden Village neighbourhood of Richmond, a suburb of Vancouver, is the exception to North American Chinatown trends described above. Unlike the Mandarin-dominated or the pan-Chinese new "Chinatowns" in the U.S., the shops and services in Richmond are mostly Hong Kong-centric. In local usage, Chinatown refers exclusively to downtown Vancouver's historic Chinatown district.
The Richmond area is 10 km south of Chinatown in downtown Vancouver near Highway 99 and Westminster Highway; the main corridor of the Chinese retailers is No. 3 Road. It is quite possibly the largest suburban Chinatown in North America, complete with numerous malls, very large grocery stores, and an endless number of restaurants and small businesses. The Aberdeen Centre and Yaohan Centre are prominent malls for Chinese retailing. Also, with a myriad of Cantonese seafood eateries, many top Hong Kong chefs have been lured to restaurants in the Golden Village.
As of 2006, two-thirds of Richmond's population was of Chinese descent, which was approximately 100,000 people . Many affluent Hong Kong Chinese especially chose to come to the Vancouver area to escape the perceived implications of the Hong Kong handover of sovereignty in 1997 from Britain to communist Mainland China.
Burnaby
Increasing Chinese migration to Burnaby (among suburbs in the Metropolitan Vancouver Lower Mainland) has led to the development of the Crystal Mall, a pan-Asian mall in the Metrotown area of Kingsway, although the other malls and plazas in the area also have a marked Asian clientele.
Victoria
A very small Chinatown can be found in the provincial capital of Victoria, and as with most North American Chinatowns it is mostly touted as a tourist attraction. Chinatown is located within minutes walking distance of other Downtown Victoria shopping, entertainment, and cultural venues such as: Save On Foods Memorial Centre Arena, Bay Centre Mall, Market Square, Victoria, Centennial Square, Bastion Square. It is centred on Fisgard Street and is, along with the much larger one in downtown Vancouver, one of the oldest surviving historic Chinatowns in North America. There are about two dozen Chinese-oriented businesses in this area.
Despite its small size, it was once the largest and oldest Canadian Chinatown on the West Coast of North America. It is the second oldest Chinatown after San Francisco's and it played an important part in local history, including the British Columbia Gold Rushes. Companies based here were the contractors for railway labour on the Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR) and Canadian National Railway (CNR). During the 20th Century, the second floor of the building on the southwest corner of Government and Fisgard Streets was the International Headquarters of the Chinese Communist Party. Records of Victoria's Chinese Benevolent Association, the oldest Chinese-Canadian organization, display a wide range of pursuits including advocacy for full political equality as well as self-help and mutual aid activities.
The Victoria, BC Chinatown was made up of several streets (about 6 square city blocks, Chinatown, Victoria) at its highest population in around 1910-1911.
Other Chinatowns in British Columbia
- New Westminster's Chinatown
- New Westminster Museum and Archives Chinatown Project
- Lillooet's Chinatown - the BC Interior's first Chinatown
- Barkerville's Chinatown - although ostensibly about Barkerville per se , content here is all Chinese-related.
- Map of Barkerville, explaining location and circumstances of Chinatown
- Yale's Chinatown - the first Chinatown on the BC Mainland
- Yale's On Lee House - a surviving structure of Yale's Chinatown
- Cumberland's Chinatown - once the second-largest on the West Coast of North America (c.1910)
- Cumberland's Chinese Strikebreakers, from Digital Collections "King Coal" series
- Picture of Cumberland's Chinatown, 1910
- Stanley, British Columbia - a gold-mining community near Barkerville which became the largest town in the Cariboo goldfields after Barkerville's decline. In 1900 well over half its population was Chinese. Other towns in the Cariboo goldfields were also noticeably Chinese in composition - Richfield, Antler and others.
Manitoba
The Chinatown in Winnipeg was formed in 1909. It is on King Street between James and Higgins Avenues, and was officially designated in 1968. Some 20,000 Chinese live in the Winnipeg area.
Ontario
Toronto
Toronto's historic Chinatown is centered on Spadina Avenue and Dundas Street. More recently the enclave has come to reflect a more diverse set of East Asian cultures, including Chinese, Vietnamese, and Thai. A smaller enclave known as East Chinatown is located in the Riverdale neighbourhood, centred at the corner of Broadview Avenue and Ge
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