The streetcars have long stopped arriving at the old tram station on Commercial Street and 18^th Avenue.

Now, the SkyTrain just passes over on the way to and from Nanaimo Street and Broadway.

The once thriving village on the 3400 to 3600 blocks of Commercial Street [not the same as the Drive] has ceased to be a hub of commercial activity.

It wasn’t just the end of the interurban line in 1954 that led to its decline.

As cars become more popular, shops and businesses moved to busy thoroughfares.

The two-storey building with ground floor commercial units at 3495 Commercial Street is about as old as the village.

It now sits empty, and there’s a plan for its rebirth.

A development application has been filed to revive the building, currently known as Cedar Court.

The plan also seeks to designate it as a protected heritage property.

A history prepared as part of the application recalled that the British Columbia Electric Railway Company obtained a 40-year franchise on the streets of South Vancouver in 1910.

“The development of this infrastructure led to residential subdivisions, and drew merchants who opened shops around the tram stop at 18th and Commercial,” according to the account. “By the 1910s, a small but independent village with a post office, 40 stores and a school had sprung up around the 3400-3600 blocks of Commercial.”

It went on to relate that South Vancouver was growing at the rate of 200 families per month.

“This booming economy prompted real estate agents Charles Frederick Broadhurst and Frederick A. Whitaker to commission the construction of the Broadhurst and Whitaker Block and they opened their office on the ground floor in 1910,” noted the account, referring to 3495 Commercial Street building.

Marianne Amodio and Harley Grusko Architects Inc. made the development application with the City of Vancouver.

“The scope of restoration includes the retention of the building as a whole and the reinstatement of its original commercial use at grade, while adding a one storey residential addition above,” Amodio wrote in a letter to the city.

According to Amodio, the project also proposes the designation of the property as a heritage building that will be protected “in perpetuity”.

The original second floor of the building will be restored for four new condo units. The additional third storey will be for rental units.

The project includes a new multi-family residential building at the back of the property.

All in all, there will be 18 strata and rental homes in the entire development.

In the application, the building is referred to as Broadhurst + Whitaker Block, after the two realtors who developed the old property.

“The intent of the proposal is primarily to preserve, rehabilitate and restore the existing significant Heritage Building and return it to its rightful place as an integral component of this historic community,” states the project’s design rationale.