Fairfield West is the half of Fairfield closest to Beacon Hill Park and downtown, roughly the streets around Cook Street Village, Oscar Street, Moss Street and Richardson Street. The MLS split between Fairfield West and Fairfield East is not an official boundary, so the two overlap along Moss Street and Fairfield Road. The area was Sir James Douglas's Fairfield Farm, and most of the houses went up between 1900 and 1913; today the streets hold Edwardian houses, 1960s and 1970s low-rise apartment buildings, many of which have converted to strata, and a handful of newer buildings like the 48-unit mixed-use project at 324 Cook Street.
Cook Street Village is the centre of daily life, with cafés, restaurants, a grocery store and Beacon Hill Park's 200 acres across the road. Dallas Road and the Strait are a few blocks south, the Moss Street Market runs Saturdays from spring to fall at Sir James Douglas school, and Five Corners at Moss and Fairfield Road is the smaller second village. Route 7 runs through Fairfield to downtown and UVic, and downtown is a five-minute drive or a twenty-minute walk through the park. The City's plan keeps growth here limited and focused around the two villages.
