Friday, June 29, 2012

Ranking the proposed BC ridings by population

More looking at the report.

With 4,400,057 people in 42 ridings means an average of 104,763 per riding
+- 5% range is 99,525 to 110,001
  1. South Okanagan-West Kootenay - 114,676
  2. North Okanagan-Shuswap - 112,399
  3. Kelowna Lake Country - 111,577
  4. Kamloops-Thompson-Cariboo - 111,231
  5. Vancouver Island North 110,769 
  6. Nanaimo-Cowichan 110,413 
  7. Surrey Centre - 110,174 
  8. Nanaimo-Alberni 109,624  
  9. Kootenay-Columbia - 109,058
  10. Cariboo-Prince George - 108,840
  11. Saanich-Gulf Islands 108,244 
  12. Central Okanagan-Coquihalla - 107,929
  13. West Surrey-Whalley - 107,827
  14. Esquimalt-Colwood 107,565 
  15. North Vancouver - 107,384
  16. Prince George-Peace River - 107,382
  17. North Surrey-Guildford - 106,551
  18. West Vancouver-Sunshine Coast-Sea to Sky Country - 106,174
  19. South Cowichan-Juan de Fuca 105,487  
  20. Vancouver East - 104,883
  21. New Westminster-Burnaby East - 104,786
  22. Vancouver Centre - 104,142
  23. Victoria 104,136
  24. Burnaby North-Seymour - 103,707 
  25. Coquitlam-Port Coquitlam - 103,632
  26. Vancouver South - 103,610
  27. Abbotsford-Sumas - 102,971
  28. South Surrey-White Rock - 102,771
  29. Chilliwack-Fraser Canyon - 102,619
  30. Vancouver-Quadra - 102,416
  31. Vancouver-Granville - 101,879
  32. Burnaby South-Deer Lake - 101,778
  33. Langley-Cloverdale - 101,526
  34. Vancouver-Kingsway - 100,918
  35. Delta - 100,588
  36. Mission-Matsqui - 100,414
  37. Richmond East - 99,359
  38. Richmond West - 98,239
  39. Fort Langley-Aldergrove - 97,804
  40. Port Moody-Coquitlam - 97,621
  41. Pitt Meadows-Maple Ridge - 96,956
  42. Skeena-Bulkley Valley - 89,998
What stands out to me when I look at this list is that of the seven ridings that are more than 5% over the average, four are in the Thompson Okanagan, two are on the island and only one in the lower mainland.

When you look at the ones with the smallest populations, five are from the lower mainland and only one from the north.

Of the eight ridings in the Interior of BC, all of eight of them have above average populations

This redistribution is very much biased towards the lower mainland and against the rest of the province.  

The riding of Chilliwack-Fraser Canyon has to be altered.   Everything west of Hope needs to be moved to the Fraser Valley ridings.   Pemberton needs to be with West Vancouver-Sunshine Coast-Sea to Sky Country.  Doing this would all there to be ten ridings fully in the interior or the north.

14 of the 21 largest ridings in this proposal are outside of the 604 area code.   


4 comments:

Anonymous said...

The Lower Mainland will probably be growing quickest; I have more issues with the ridings on the extremities (Skeena) being over-represented.

Bernard said...

Actually the Okanagan is growing faster than most of the lower mainland. Skeena meanwhile is the most difficult riding to represent in BC because of the geography, even then it is with 15% of the quotient.

It really does bother me that there is a systemic bias against the large and harder to reach ridings in BC versus the very small ones in the lower mainland a short drive from the airport.

ST said...

Bernard, Can you give your comments to the commission?

Bernard said...

I will be a offering a detailed analysis to the commission