Old Town Mission City, Block by Block

There is a version of Mission's old town you get from a windshield, and it does you no good at all. The Lougheed drops off the hill's shoulder onto the flats, the blocks roll by, and then you are through. The old town below the hill is one of the oldest main streets in the Fraser Valley, and like most old streets it gives nothing to people who do not stop. So stop. Park once. Walk.

The shape of it first. Mission City sits on the flats between the Fraser River and the hillside that carries Westminster Abbey on its shoulder. The commercial spine runs along First Avenue and North Railway Avenue, a block back from the railway line that made the town. The riverfront park sits at the foot of the slope, the West Coast Express ends its run at Mission City station at the east end, and most of what a person needs is within a short walk of one of the two.

The history deserves two paragraphs, because the town is proud of it and right to be. The name comes from St. Mary's Mission, the Oblate mission founded by Father Leon Fouquet in 1861, which moved uphill in 1882 to make room for the Canadian Pacific Railway. The settlement grew up around the railway, the district was incorporated in 1892, the village that became the Town of Mission City split off in 1922, and the two voted themselves back together in 1969. Ten years on the local desk taught me that towns which know their own history hold together better, and this one knows it.

Start at the station, because the town did. Mission City station is the eastern terminus of the West Coast Express, the commuter line that runs weekday trains into Vancouver's Waterfront Station. On weekday mornings the platform fills with the same faces, and the coffee habit around it is a civic institution. The Penny is the independent room for it, close enough to the tracks that the train is part of the atmosphere.

For something hot, Mission Station Grill sits on Horne Avenue near the station, and it does the breakfast work the way breakfast work should be done. It is the kind of room where the regulars have seats by custom rather than reservation, and where a newcomer gets coffee without being asked twice. That is the standard the old town sets for its food, and the rest of the blocks are judged by it.

The shopping blocks run along North Railway and First: The Bargain Store for the everyday and the unexpected, Magnolia's on Main for flowers, and Totally Book・ish for the thing you came in for plus the thing you did not plan on. Antique booths, vintage racks and thrift shelves fill in between. The storefronts change hands more often than any of us would like, and I keep a running map of them, which is a reporter's habit I see no reason to break. The habit pays off the week a sign comes down: you notice it early, not the month after.

If you want the story before you walk the blocks, start at the Mission Museum on Second Avenue, where the town keeps its photographs, its objects and its memory. The museum also runs walking tours of the historic downtown, which is the right way to see the old town if it is your first time, and a better way than you expect if it is not.

End at the water. The riverfront park at the foot of the slope is where the old town remembers why it exists: the Fraser moving wide below town, the Mission Bridge crossing toward Abbotsford, freight trains announcing themselves before they arrive. On a summer evening the light lies down on the water and nobody leaves on time. In winter the same park does the grey river just as well, and the benches know their regulars then too. This block of river is the oldest public room in town, and it still does the job.

Give the old town an afternoon on a weekday, when the commuters are gone and the shops are quiet, and give it a Saturday too, when the whole valley seems to have the same idea. Spend the money here rather than at the big boxes on the way through. Bring someone who has never been, and let the blocks do the talking. The main street survives the way every main street survives: one customer, one habit and one parked car at a time.