During an informal guessing session at Parksville city hall, Mayor Ed Mayne estimated that newest census numbers would show the community’s population at 13,700.
He was very close. The 2021 population for the seaside community was 13,642, up 9.5 per cent from 2016, Statistics Canada said Wednesday when it released the latest population numbers.
Most communities around Vancouver Island are seeing significant percentage increases in their populations.
The higher numbers show the need for affordable housing and more social services. They put pressure on transportation systems and on municipal infrastructure.
In the past three years, 900 rental and condominium units have gone up in Parksville, where the rental vacancy rate was a tight 1.7 per cent in summer 2021, said Mayne.
He would like to see more affordable units, both rental and strata, come on the market. Single-family home prices are out of reach for many.
Mayne is hoping that an upcoming Statistics Canada report will show that more young families are moving into the community.
With a higher than average median age, Parksville is trying to attract young families, he said. An outdoor amphitheatre is going up and 90 new daycare spaces and programs for young people are in the works.
The rapid pace of growth requires communities to look at the future. Tofino grew by 27.9 per cent, to a population of 2,516 in 2021.
Population growth raises questions about how much Tofino wants to grow and in what direction, Mayor Dan Law said. “All those things are very front and centre for us. We are putting a lot of effort into understanding that and having a vision for the future.”
Tofino’s internationally renowned setting on Vancouver Island’s west coast has been attracting tourists and new permanent residents.
In North Cowichan, Mayor Al Siebring said the 7.7 per cent growth in the community of 31,900 is partly due to being between the urban centres of Victoria and Nanaimo. Nearby Duncan has grown 2.1 per cent, to 5,047 people.
“People are starting to discover our particular part of the world.”
This in-migration has led to a “huge housing shortage,” he said.
Council will have to discuss what this means in terms of planning for future growth, he said.
“We have some elements on council who are firmly convinced that that kind of growth is not a good thing environmentally, and they want to try to curb it.
“I’m not sure how you do that in the context of marketplace demand.”
He predicts the next council will tackle these issues. “I don’t think we have time in this term to get all that straight.” Province-wide municipal elections are on Oct. 15.
Nanaimo, at 99,863, saw its population increase by 10.3 per cent, or about two per cent annually since the last census, Mayor Leonard Krog said.
“That’s a pretty remarkable level of growth for any community.”
As in other municipalities, that puts increasing demands on infrastructure, the school system, emergency services, parks, recreational facilities and traffic, he said.
Higher population numbers have led to increased employment and job opportunities.
“Everywhere you look in the city of Nanaimo there’s construction. … People want to live in Nanaimo. It has lots of amenitites,” Krog said.
Much of the new housing is concentrated in the city’s core and in urban nodes, he said. Nanaimo officials hope to see people living near their work places, and walking to them.
The value of building permits reached $272 million last year, a new record, Krog said.
In the first month of this year, $43 million in building permits went to city hall.
Increasing the housing supply is crucial to meet demand, Krog said. “We have a housing shortage and it is expensive relative to what it was.”
There’s an “immense amount of new construction,” in Courtenay as well, said Mayor Bob Wells, who believes many residents are attracted by an outdoor lifestyle. Courtenay’s population climbed by 10.8 per cent to 28,420.
