Officially a part of the East Side, it is bordered by Downtown Vancouver's Chinatown neighbourhood and the False Creek inlet (across Main Street) to the west, Downtown Eastside (across Hastings Street) to the north, Grandview-Woodland (across Clark Drive) to the east, and Mount Pleasant to the south of Emily Carr University and the Canadian National Railway and Great Northern Railway (now BNSF Railway) classification yards.

Its residents have always been from many ethnic backgrounds, and while it was historically a working-class neighbourhood, it is currently made up by a diverse range of socio-economic and cultural groups.

The redevelopment plans proceeded with the construction of the MacLean Park housing development between Union, Keefer, Gore and Jackson, and Stamp's Place on Campbell between Hastings, Union and Raymur some 15 blocks of the neighbourhood were bulldozed including Hogan's Alley, the only Black community in Vancouver.

[12] Important municipal figures such as mayor Mike Harcourt and the TEAM and later COPE party emerged from this movement.

The Mau Dan Gardens Co-operative was established in October 1981, the last of five projects initiated by the Strathcona Area Housing Society (SAHS) to provide housing for the residents of the Strathcona area whose homes were expropriated and demolished in the urban renewal clearance scheme of 1965.

The land, owned by the City of Vancouver, is now leased to the Mau Dan Gardens Co-operative Housing Association.

The founding membership of the Co-operative was predominantly of Chinese ethnicity, but included families of Vietnamese, Cambodian, Japanese and Canadian origin.

[13] In recent years, Strathcona has been subjected to a significant gentrification process, reinforcing the economic disparity of the area.

This housing stock in particular is being renovated, thus raising property values and attracting wealthier home owners to the area.