Businesses in White Rock

#1 P: Decades of watching experience demonstrate the impact of seasonal customer patterns. Businesses can tell you: when the sun shines, people come to the waterfront, but relatively few necessarily become customers. Cold, rainy days are difficult everywhere. It is sad to see well-intentioned entrepreneurs try seven days a week and sometimes close before their leases even expire.
Docks Fish & Chips, for example, relies heavily on the high season and closes from November to April because four customers a week simply does not justify staying open. Another challenge is the relationship between restaurant seating and available parking. If two customers arrive per vehicle, and only a portion actually dine in, how many customers can the waterfront realistically accommodate? 2025 With expansion of patios, realignment and curbs – the stall numbers have changed, update welcome. An old Parking report of 2017 showed there were: 869 STALLS. Yet TOTAL restaurant/cafes had 2,205 seats

A wide variety of businesses. Several of the same reduces attractiveness and traffic to those clients only interested in one type of business, product or cuisine. Signage should be distinctive, but not gaudy, or outsized.

less indian food. maybe sportcheck or general sports store. more variety on the beach. shoe stores and fun boutique clothing.

More diversity. The city of white rock dropped the ball allowing too many of the same ethnic cuisine restaurants to compete side by side. Saying that, there should be more ethnic options! Bring back all the flavours of the world. For a council protecting the charm of white rock this was a big miss. Allow more food carts, seafood restaurants, a shop, market, make it so people who actually live down there can live. The beach doesn’t seem welcoming, safe, or fun anymore. The parking is absurd too, what are those dollars going towards because it’s certainly not making the beach better.

We already have an overabundance of south Asian restos in WR/SS. Would love to see a family-friendly, affordable restaurant, like a spaghetti joint (Spag Fac comes to mind) in the old Boathouse location. Parking is the biggest obstacle to visiting any of your waterfront businesses. I live ONE Block from the WR border and HATE paying $5/hr to go for a stroll and a snack; double that for a sit-down meal. Ridiculous. More often than not the local buses skip past stops, filled to capacity. Find a sponsor with money to build the funicular that was talked about before, connecting town centre with waterfront. Until something changes, we’ll choose Crescent Beach 99/100 times. Thank you.

I would like to see more diversity in restaurants on the waterfront. There are too many Indian restaurants. I like Indian food but there should be some choice.

What we see today is a typical waterfront community. It draws on that. I’d love to see a fast food restaurant but based on conversations wth a few franchise operators the rents are not allowing them a justification to open.
Take a look around a similar towns and cities they all share a similar appearance..
Maybe just ask a few operators to clean up their appearance and accept it for what it is.,
Thank you for your time.

I love a lot of these ideas! I love how Kits Beach has a basketball court. I know it’s a tight space but it would bring sooo many people down to the beach. We need a bookshop and cute shops, good coffee shops. Too bad Goldie donuts didn’t open on the strip.

Boutiques. Non franchise. Non big box.

Variety of global restaurants. Clothing and shoes supporting Canadian, women and indigenous entrepreneurs. Book stores and coffee shops. Places to gather and encourage community gathering places.

I worked on the beach for over a decade, only in the last two years did I stop. While there seems to be less variety of food options over the last year, the biggest concern for me was the public transport up and down the hill, its too infrequent and small for the summer season, if one of the unused buildings could be used for a shuttle depot service that brings people uptown or even up to five corners, it would increase the amount of people going to the beach. This would not only be good for the tourists, visitors and locals, but it would also be good for the businesses as their staff would have an easier time getting to and from work, which has always been a major problem for businesses on the beach

The area needs to attract the locals in order to stay vibrant year round. Public market like New West and Lonsdale Quays, high quality bakery like Pure Bread, brewery row like Port Moody, a single building of quality art galleries like Circle Craft, no more South Asian restaurants. Currently the evenings do not attract a diverse population.

White rock is too saturated with asian restaurants, predominantly Indian and Chinese. I wish the city of White Rock would ACTUALLY foster real diversity in dining options in this city.

We need more retail shops. Independent shops need to be able to thrive here so the local citizens and tourists have reasons to enjoy this place more. More variety retail shops for everyone to enjoy and frequent.

A grocery store, a flower mart, clothing stores, buskers, golf carts for transporting people along Marine, pack and go beach food, watersport/beach shop, a fabulous jazz lounge like the lounge in the Empress

I do not believe local government has any tools to regulate the mix of businesses on the beach. But customers decide with their patronage and nothing down there looks successful these days.
The things that are in the control of the city… get the streetscape cleaned up. When a business closes, require that the patio intrusion into our sidewalk space be removed immediately. All of the unused sidewalk patios contribute to the look of an unsuccessful ghost town. Let’s find a way to put some interesting window stickers over the vacant storefronts. It would help to animate the street in an interesting and positive way.
My personal concern these days is the lack of police presence down at the beach and promenade. By 10 pm the place changes. Young men gather. Loud cars, with blaring stereos etc. raise the parking rates after 10 pm. Enforce the parking rules at night and harass the crap out of these late night gatherers. Let’s stop people from walking four a breast on the promenade.

Local artisans, pet shops, card & specialty paper shops that carry local souveniers - similar vibe to store Kimprints in West End of Vancouver. Fruit and veg market on Marine would be incredible

Coffee shops, boutique clothing and gift stores, more diverse restaurants. There is too many of the same culture restaurants now.

Different things to do. Bookstore, wine bar, patios, cold plunge studio, Makers, bakery, public market like Granville isl

Hello city of whiterock! As someone who grew up on the beach with an adventurous and outdoor enjoyer I’ve always felt there is no healthy meeting place for youth along the beach! If I had any say in the matter I would construct an indoor rock climbing gym along the waterfront! In hopes of bringing the community together in a better more positive atmosphere! Also maybe consider expanding the fishing dock on the pier, it’s constantly packed with tourists for the few days I attempt to fish/crab from there! I know this isn’t the place to get involved but if there is ever the need for workers in sure I would contribute along the way!

Fine the Boathouse & ex Pearl for abandonment of White Rock’s prime real estate

Decent family style restaurants that are not East Indian, the beach restaurant scene is now more like India than Canada