Royal Oak is the part of Saanich West straddling the Pat Bay Highway, made up of the Broadmead, Falaise and Viewmont neighbourhoods. It was farmed from the 1860s and held the Saanich municipal hall until 1965; Broadmead was R.P. Rithet's horse farm, developed from 1965 with a tree-retention plan that still shapes its streets. About 55 per cent of homes are detached and 45 per cent apartments and townhouses, with condominium buildings clustered around the two shopping centres and the Royal Oak Drive corridor, and the Lodge at Broadmead and other seniors' housing give the area an older profile.
Broadmead Village and Royal Oak Shopping Centre handle groceries and daily errands, and Saanich Commonwealth Place, built for the 1994 Commonwealth Games, has the pools, waterslide, gym and the Bruce Hutchison branch library. Rithet's Bog, Colquitz River Park and Elk and Beaver lakes are the green spaces, and Royal Oak Middle School is the local school. The Royal Oak Exchange at Elk Lake Drive is a major transit hub, with Routes 6, 9, 30, 31, 32, 39, 75 and 83 and the 38 to Westhills, and the highway puts downtown about fifteen minutes away and the airport and ferries about twenty.
