Worth Renting a car in Vancouver Prior to our crusie?

Our Alaska Cruise leaves on a Monday. We fly into Vancouver on Friday. We are thinking of renting a car from the airport for a few days. (We are staying at a Hotel close to the Piers and parking at the hotel is free)

We have heard that it is difficult to park around town, and if we do find a parking spot or a spot in a parking garage it may be expensive.

Is this true? Is it worth it? City congested?

Of course we will have to drop the car off back at the airport. If so we will need to take a cab to the piers. Does anyone know the cost per person?

Any suggestions would be appreciated.

Thank you

Mike

There are many car rental offices downtown, some quite close to Canada Place, so I would wait until you're in your hotel to get a car - cab or Skytrain from the airport initially, whatever.

 

Yes, Vancouver is a big city with big city traffic and congestion. However a car can be a wonderful asset if you want to drive, for example, up the Sea to Sky Highway toward Whistler, one of the most beautiful drives in North America, or to explore some of Vancouver's great neighbo(u)rhoods.

As a pretty frequent Vancouver visitor, I would put together a list of places you want to go. Vancouver is extremely transit-dense. Assuming you don't have mobility issues, I'd go from the airport to your hotel using Skytrain (the "subway" system). It should get you very close to your hotel and avoid some potentially slow traffic on city streets.

 

The Olympic "torch area", Chinatown, Gastown, downtown shopping, Coal Harbour, and even Stanley Park are all walkable from the Canada Place area. Many other points are easy to get to by transit- Granville Island, Grouse Mtn, Capilano, and the Museum of Anthropology. If you group them into the same day you can get an all-day transit pass for around $9 that's good on Skytrain, Seabus (ferry system), and city buses. The bus drivers and other employees are very friendly and helpful.

 

Save the rental car for outlying areas such as Whistler to minimize your rental days. As others mentioned, all the companies have rental offices within a few blocks of Canada Place. You will save the airport "junk fees" by renting downtown.

Edited April 7, 2014 by kenish

Sounds like this is a first-time visit. Assuming that's correct, I would not recommend a trip to Whistler or anywhere else out of town unless it's something on your bucket list - there is more than enough to keep you busy without ever leaving downtown.

 

Very, very few downtown areas are made more convenient in a car. I only use mine when I have a lot of groceries to schlep around or I'm going somewhere off the main transit routes. Parking is generally either hard to find, expensive, or often both! The biggest difference about Vancouver driving compared to dang near every other city in North America is that we have no highways downtown - there are some streets which are coded as highways, e.g. the 99 and the 1A, but aside from a teeny part of Highway 1 that just barely sneaks into the farthest eastern reaches of the city you're looking at surface streets with a 30mph/50kph limit or less basically everywhere.

 

In short: if stop-start driving, looking out for pedestrians and cyclists, and frequent lane changes to get around folks parking or turning left is your idea of a good time in a strange city - Vancouver driving is for you!!!

 

The amount you'd spend on renting a car, even if there's free parking at your hotel, would pay for a lot of transit day passes, cab fares, HOHO tickets - all of which let you relax, have someone else drive, avoid getting lost, save the time/money spent finding parking, and (most importantly to me!) have a few adult beverages while you're out and about.

 

Incidentally, if you have a hotel with free parking that is actually close to the pier please let us know which hotel - nobody local seems to be aware of any hotel in the downtown core with free parking included, so if there is one it would be a good piece of info to have.

Martin - I saw that too about the free parking - wonder if they meant included in the hotel price as the Best Western offers a sail and park package.

 

Just a thought.

 

Cheers!

 

Dennis

We are staying at the Holiday Inn Express on 2889 East Hastings Street Maybe it isn't all that close? to the cruise terminal?

Thanks for the information about ridding around Vancouver. Traffic doesn't bother me as long as it is moving...even at 30 MPH. I'm used to driving in the congested North East and New York City. Just wondering if there will be places to park. For example, In NYC you can never find a parking space...you have to park in a garage and it can cost anywhere from $30 a day and up. (The other day I paid $39)

What will be the cost for parking in a garage in Vancouver?

Also, we want to see the Olympic area... is it accessible by public transportation?

Thank you all for your responses....yes it will be our first time.

We are staying at the Holiday Inn Express on 2889 East Hastings Street Maybe it isn't all that close? to the cruise terminal?

It's not close to much of anything, and if you're locked into that hotel, then yes, I'd get a car at the airport and plan on returning it at some car rental office near Canada Place when you sail. First, though, I'd work at choosing a different hotel in a better location.

We are staying at the Holiday Inn Express on 2889 East Hastings Street Maybe it isn't all that close? to the cruise terminal?

Thanks for the information about ridding around Vancouver. Traffic doesn't bother me as long as it is moving...even at 30 MPH. I'm used to driving in the congested North East and New York City. Just wondering if there will be places to park. For example, In NYC you can never find a parking space...you have to park in a garage and it can cost anywhere from $30 a day and up. (The other day I paid $39)

What will be the cost for parking in a garage in Vancouver?

Also, we want to see the Olympic area... is it accessible by public transportation?

Thank you all for your responses....yes it will be our first time.

First, much concurrence with gardyloo - change hotels. You are technically still in Vancouver, but only by the skin of your teeth.

 

The direct route from where you are into, well, everywhere you'll go except other municipalities is along Hastings Street, the heart of the Downtown East Side. In addition to all the previously-mentioned traffic woes, you'll have to contend with a much-reduced speed limit (20-30 kilometers per hour) for chunks of the route as pedestrians literally wander out into traffic all too often in this area (drink, drugs, mental problems, combinations thereof) so local council lowered the speed limits to reduce deaths & injuries.

 

There are some genuine pockets of loveliness along Hastings, especially as far east as you'll be, but still I'd be loathe to recommend folks who don't know the city go a-wandering on foot.

 

Parking in general downtown is metered, with garages having much more reliable spots than on-street. Offpeak like weekends you may pay as little as $9 per day around the outskirts of downtown, but it can easily hit $30+ per day in the core.

 

Olympic area - this encompasses several very different areas, most of which aren't in Vancouver. If you want to see where people were actually skiing etc. then a car could be handy - Grouse Mountain has good transit and shuttle links, but Whistler is definitely best visited by car.

 

The Athlete's Village is inside Vancouver - The Village on False Creek as the realtors would have us call it now - is quite bustling, a lot of residents and a few restaurants & stores, but there's nothing except the buildings themselves left from the Olympics and frankly they're not exactly top-notch architecturally despite their admirable attempts to be LEED-compliant. Parking is free-but-very-limited on streets, or pay underground. Easy walk from Main Street Skytrain station.

 

The most visibly-Olympic thing left would be IMO the flame on Jack Poole Plaza - this is easily visited on foot from the pier before boarding, it's just a few hundred yards from Canada Place. Parking here would definitely fit the ka-ching end - the long-term pier garage for cruisers is right here at $31(?) a day. NB: the flame will not be lit when you're in town unless you are very, very lucky - anyone can pay council to fire it up if they pay $6400 for the 4 hour minimum burn time, but oddly enough not many people do!

Edited April 12, 2014 by martincath

That end of Hastings is called Hastings Sunrise though some want to rebrand it as East Village. It is a pleasant enough place and doesn't really start getting dodgy for some 20 blocks.

 

Top speed in virtually all of the City of Vancouver is 50 km/h.

 

As far as parking goes, metered parking runs up to $5/hour with a maximum of 2 hours (maybe 4 if you pay by phone?) It's also in effect from 0800 to, I believe, 2200 7 days a week. They price it high to get turnover so people are not tempted to park all day (supposedly the aim of traffic engineers is to have only 85% of parking spots occupied at all times so that traffic flows, i.e., not blocked by those looking for parking).

 

Parking is somewhat expensive as there's a pretty high parking tax (included in hourly and daily rates).

Thank you all for the very helpful information. I have another question.

If I decide to keep the car rental that I made, I show that I will be dropping the Hertz car off at 1038 Canada Place. Will that be very close to the NCL cruise line terminal??

Thank you!

Mike

Yes unless you are on one of the few NCL ships that will be docking at Ballantyne Pier.

 

Hope this helps!

 

Cheers

 

Dennis

Link to the docking schedule here - tab through by month or just select your vessel from the dropdown. If as UT mentioned you're going from Ballantyne, see if you can instead drop it off at the Pacific Central Hertz location - queues should be lighter as it's not inside a busy hotel next to the pier, and cab fare back to Ballantyne will be a couple of bucks less.

 

Hertz do list a Ballantyne location, but it's actually the office on Granville Street you have to pick up and drop off at (they'll refund up to $10 cab fare, but only with a receipt, so no good going to the pier after dropping off...)

Edited April 15, 2014 by martincath
fixed links