Hundreds of thousands of people will fill the streets of Downtown Vancouver Sunday for the city’s biggest Pride parade to date.
It will mark 30 years of both the Vancouver Pride Society (VPS) and the rainbow flag.
John Boychuck, president of the VPS, said this year’s parade has increased by one-third in length and 25 per cent in participation, bringing the total to more than 150 entries.
One new participant is Sher Vancouver, a social support group for gay Sikhs. It will enter a Bollywood-themed float.
“It’s truly becoming a celebration of diversity,” said Boychuck. “It’s a party that the city just loves to experience.”
He added there will also be 150 vendors with “everything that you can imagine in the marketplace that has to do with rainbows and blankets and pins.”
This year’s grand marshals are Jane Rule, a well-known lesbian author, Sahan Abeysundara, a founding member of Equal Ground who is crusading for gay rights in Sri Lanka and Gilbert Baker, designer of the rainbow flag.
Boychuck said that various community organizations have been given free entry into the parade as well as a budget for decorating.
“So we should see even more colour and more fantastic marching units rather than just a feather boa and a placard,” he said.
The parade will begin at the intersection of Robson and Thurlow streets and go down Denman and Pacific streets before ending at Sunset Beach, where the festival’s main stage will be.
The two-hour event begins at noon.
