By Kevin Hollett with files from Allison Collins
Photo by Kris Krug

April Smith has bridged the digital divide.

Once homeless and living on the streets of Vancouver, the Downtown Eastside resident now tells stories about her community, thanks to W2’s Fearless City mobile project. With mobile phones and digital cameras, Smith tenaciously covers the people of her neighbourhood, uploading their stories onto the Internet.

The project is part of the new community-based media arts centre, W2, an ambitious initiative that brings a range of arts and Downtown Eastside service organizations together under one roof.

“I really like how W2 is locally focused, and helps bring all sorts of creative people together right in our own neighbourhood,” says the 24-year-old Smith, who now co-runs her own social media site, AHAMedia.ca.

Temporarily located in the old Perel Building across the street from the new Woodward’s development, W2 has lofty aspirations for the city’s arts and culture community.

“We want to build a new Vancouver,” says W2 executive director Irwin Oostindie. “We want a different Vancouver, and we want to hear the different voices. If those marginalized voices have access to the airwaves and the Internet, then we can work toward a new Vancouver. “W2 is both a community development and a media organization.”

This spring W2 will move into the Woodward’s building, which will feature a 150-capacity performance space, community TV studio, FM radio station, gallery, social enterprise café, letterpress studio and mobile media programs. It will occupy some 14,000 square feet, and will house non-profits like Fearless City and Gallery Gachet.

For now, they’re running programs and media arts residencies, laying the foundation for their transition into becoming an integral aspect of the Woodward’s development.

The intention is to provide a vibrant and complementary focal point in the redevelopment of Woodward’s, and to act as a catalyst in the revitalization of the neighbourhood.

“With W2, I can be an active advocate for issues that mean the most to me, which means I can be myself,” says Smith. “I can use my acquired skills through Fearless and W2 to help my community grow and heal.”

In light of criticism from some activists that the Woodward’s complex is responsible for divisive gentrification, W2 aims to ensure that it welcomes everyone in the neighbourhood.

“We want [Woodward’s] to be inclusive,” says Oostindie. “We don’t want it to be alienating for low-income residents. It’s very important—and we have been very dogged—to ensure that Woodward’s stays of value for low-income residents.”

A big test will occur during the Olympics: the W2 Culture + Media House will act as a 24-hour-a-day media centre to hundreds of non-accredited journalists and bloggers from the Downtown Eastside and around the world. These are citizen journalists who, like Smith, will offer their own perspective.

In this sense, W2 represents the democratization of media in Vancouver. If it’s successful, it will be a model for the rest of the country.