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No, Surrey not going to overtake Vancouver in population any time soon

November 3rd, 2011 · 17 Comments

People love to say Surrey is going to be bigger than Vancouver within 10 years. (And that all the businesses and developers are moving there, as well.)

Stats nerds know that’s not true and frequently tell me so. Now, blogger Gordon Price has nicely laid out the numbers.

This break from stupid election stories brought to you courtesy of me.

Categories: Uncategorized

  • Roger Kemble

    Who cares?

  • jesse

    If Surrey is bigger than Vancouver… it shudders me to think: who, then, is the flagship mayor of BC?

    It’s almost unthinkable should that title be untimely ripp’d from the cold dead hands of the ruling entities at Cambie and 12th.

  • boohoo

    Right you are Roger–get back to wandering rants with your cute q’s and z’s and personal insults. It suits you best.

    The point Jesse is that it isn’t (population wise), nor will it ever overtake Vancouver as the primate city for culture/business.

  • Tessa

    Let’s remember that Surrey is twice the size of Vancouver, so it’s hardly a sensible comparison. Frankly, I don’t think Surreys borders make any sense geographically – do residents of South Surrey really have a lot in common with residents of Fleetowod? What about the rural areas and Central Surrey?

  • jesse

    “nor will it ever overtake Vancouver as the primate city for culture/business”

    Still, it’s harder to make a case that a smaller city will be justified to represent a region. It’s rather embarrassing at mayoral powwows. Better to increase the City’s population, just in case.

  • jesse

    “do residents of South Surrey really have a lot in common with residents of Fleetowod”

    Do residents of Point Grey have a lot in common with residents of Collingwood? Income stratification is massive; geography is an excuse to maintain appearances of urban chic trumping urban sprawl.

  • Joe Just Joe

    I’m surprised no mention of the discussion about redrawing the municipal boundaries to exclude native territories. Believe the theory is that people living on native land should not be allowed to vote in municipal elections. No idea how serious the proposal is but it should have interesting ramifications. Guess they wouldn’t count in the population numbers either then?
    Regarding the bragging rights I’d think by the time Surrey catches Vancouver proper population-wise that at least some amalgamation will have occurred. Even just swallowing the UBC district would buy a lot of time.

  • boohoo

    jesse, that’s the thing, it won’t. Vancouver will remain larger.

  • Robert in Calgary

    Tessa,

    Sensible comparisons?

    From my viewpoint, you’ve got….18 Mayors too many.

  • ThinkOutsideABox

    Robert in Calgary,

    re 18 mayors – from your mouth to the ears of Gaia on Cortes Island.

  • Josh

    “Still, it’s harder to make a case that a smaller city will be justified to represent a region. It’s rather embarrassing at mayoral powwows. Better to increase the City’s population, just in case”

    Jesse, you apparently aware of the many cities around the world with a notable smaller population than their suburban counterparts.

    Population-wise, the city of London (population 11,000) is much smaller than all its other boroughs. Manhattan is smaller than Brooklyn or Queens. Hong Kong is smaller than Kowloon or New Territories. San Francisco is smaller than Oakland. Etc etc… Do you see any of these latter cities/boroughs with a larger population representing their respective regions? I’ll be damned if anyone thinks Queens is more representative than Manhattan.

    If Surrey ever surpasses Vancouver in population, so what? Surrey will still be in the shadows of Vancouver, just like the cases of those aforementioned cities.

    Surrey will always be a suburb of Vancouver.

  • Agustin

    From my viewpoint, you’ve got….18 Mayors too many.

    Have you seen Toronto lately?

    No, thanks.

  • MB

    @ Agustin 11 … exactly.

  • Bill Lee

    Hmm.

    And where would Occupy Surrey start to flourish.

    Surrey will grow when they have good regional transport links. The houses along Panorama Ridge have enough Captains of Industry…. etc.
    Now they want 100 km/hr speedways to airport and downtown meetings.

  • Ron

    Vancouver will always remain the protest capital of the region.

  • Mike from Vancouver

    I don’t think the issue here is that Surrey will be bigger than Vancouver anytime soon. It won’t..and doesn’t look like it will for another 20 years if not longer.

    The more pressing issue is the fact that just over 25 percent of the population in Metro Vancouver actually lives in the City of Vancouver. Who can truely represent/speak for Metro Vancouver? The job has traditionally defaulted to the Mayor of Vancouver, but this hardly seems realistic nor fair.

  • Hans Goldberg

    I wonder what is Surrey’s contribution to affordable rental accommodation?