Across the street from Indian restaurant Rajput’s Bistro is Eggsmart, a breakfast franchise. Beside that is the Vietnamese eatery Pho Ngon. A Tim Hortons and Baskin Robbins are a few blocks west, not too far from a Subway.

Welcome to the changing face of Koreatown.

Along Bloor Street between Christie and Bathurst, Korean restaurants and shops still dominate. In an area associated with Korean culture and business since the 1960s, however, an increasing number of Western franchises and restaurants offering food from elsewhere in the world have been moving in.

About 60 percent of the BIA’s two hundred–plus businesses are Korean, says Joseph Kang, chairman of the Koreatown Business Improvement Area. When the BIA was first established in 2004, that number was closer to 80 percent.

“Over the last few years, we’ve seen more and more other communities joining us,” Kang says, citing Portuguese and Ethiopian businesses as examples.

One reason for non-Korean businesses moving into the area could be financial: it’s cheaper to rent commercial space west of Bathurst than it is to rent in the nearby Annex, or closer to Yonge Street. Ben Castanie, who owns board game café Snakes and Lattes two blocks west of Bloor and Bathurst, pays about $16 per square foot in rent. When he was scoping out potential locations just east of that intersection, the rent jumped to about $35 per square foot. “That’s why non-Korean businesses move in,” he says.

Kang and his BIA board members say they aren’t threatened by the change—they're embracing it. A more diverse business community, after all, is an opportunity to expand their customer base.

“It’ll bring non-Koreans in and maybe introduce them to a culture they might have nothing in common with,” says Soozi Schlanger, a local artist and Koreatown BIA board member. Schlanger, who is not Korean, grew up in the area from 1953 to 1961, before moving back in 1983.

“I think it’s great we have other communities coming in,” Kang adds. “People who come to Koreatown can choose their flavour.”

In the past, says Eggsmart manager Mary Grigorakis, nearby residents and customers complained they could only get Korean food in Koreatown. For a neighbourhood so dominated by Korean restaurants and shops, the Korean population is surprisingly small: according to the 2006 Census, only 1.78 percent of residents in the area between Harbord, Dupont, Christie/Grace, and Bathurst are Korean.

“People that lived around here wanted…a home-style Canadian breakfast,” which they couldn't get, Grigorakis says. Her restaurant opened in August, 2010, but her family used to own a Greek business in Koreatown, called The Tasty, for twenty-nine years.

As Koreatown becomes more diverse, maintaining a strong Korean culture and presence remains a priority. “It’s part of that mosaic we want Toronto to be,” Schlanger says.

Kang is confident the area will remain distinctly Korean, as well. “The Korean presence is always here, and will always be here,” he says. The BIA may be a young organization, but Koreans began moving to the area—and setting up shop—half a century ago. A Koreatown Business Association existed prior to the BIA, and the annual Korean Dano Festival will be celebrating its nineteenth year at Christie Pits Park in June 2011.

“There’s too many restaurants that work really well,” Castanie says, arguing for the staying power of the Korean community along Bloor Street. The Korean Village Restaurant—one of the first Korean restaurants in Canada when it opened in 1978—is one neighbourhood staple of many.

While the BIA is optimistic about Koreatown’s future, for some the area isn’t yet the vibrant, inclusive community it aims to be.

Castanie says he sees pedestrian traffic “just die” west of Palmerston Boulevard into Koreatown, which isn’t lost on the BIA. In an effort to breathe new life into the area, a stronger visual and virtual presence are in the works: hand-painted planters and hanging baskets are two new additions to the streetscape, and Jason Lee, vice-chair of the BIA, hopes to use social media to promote the area.

With a more diverse business community, some are also concerned about what they see as a division between Koreans and non-Koreans. There’s a “big divide,” Castanie says. “They stick together…and talk their own language,” Grigorakis adds, though she says that the younger generation of Koreans in the area “are much more involved" in the community-at-large.

That includes Jason Lee, whose parents own The Korean Village Restaurant. “As a young person, I hope to bring new perspective as well as new ideas,” Lee says. “I just want to help promote the area and see this neighborhood grow, and have more people from all over the GTA get to know Koreatown and what it has to offer.”