Funky, mostly independent stores and restaurants have helped Vancouver’s Commercial Drive earn a placing among the world’s top streets.

Global publication Time Out ranked the Drive fifth on its 2024 World’s Coolest Streets list. Montreal’s Saint-Hubert Street was the only other Canadian roadway that earned a spot, ranking 27th among the 30 that cracked the list.

“In a city of rapid change, Commercial Drive remains defiantly ungentrified,” wrote Time Out Vancouver-based contributor Shawn Conner.

The area covers a stretch of Commercial from about East 12th Avenue to Venables Street. The stretch contains mainly small premises ranging from record stores and restaurants to a bowling alley. Time Out praised the Drive’s many clothing shops for their devotion to vintage, citing The Only and Mintage as examples, or ethically sourced items from far-off places (Wander Emporium, Paranada).

The magazine also lauded the Drive for having a plethora of coffee shops and “more pizza (and pizza slice) joints than you can shake a pepperoni stick at.”

The Drive sits in a district known as Little Italy, whose name dates back to an era when Italian-Canadians owned and operated numerous restaurants and shops in the area. The area remains a haven for Italian-Canadians; however, most of the Drive’s businesses and locations today are ethnically and culturally diverse.

Pictured: Paranada clothing store on Commercial Drive

Photo: Paranada