Two out of three North Shore municipalities saw their population numbers decline in the last year, according to BC Stats.
The provincial agency has released their annual municipal population estimates. The numbers reflect those released by Statistics Canada in their estimates, which came out in January. They vary only how they round percentage changes.
According to BC Stats, the City of North Vancouver added 1,117 people between July 1, 2019 and July 1, 2020, for a total population of 58,985, a growth rate of two per cent. North Van city was the third fastest growing municipality in Metro Vancouver that year, beaten out only by the City of Surrey (2.1 per cent) and City of New Westminster (2.9 per cent).
The District of North Vancouver had 89,767 residents as of July 1, a loss of 499 people from the year before, or a 0.6 per cent drop year over year.
The District of West Vancouver saw its population shift 336 downward – a loss of 0.8 per cent – for a total 2020 population of 43,805. In Metro Vancouver, only the Village of Anmore and the City of Pitt Meadows saw larger contractions in the population, at three per cent and one per cent respectively.
The average growth rate for a Metro Vancouver municipality during that time was 1.1 per cent. According to BC Stats, Metro’s population added 30,889 in that time.
Across the province, the fastest growing city was Langford, on Vancouver Island, at 4.9 per cent.
Since 2020, StatCan has been calculating estimated municipal population changes using census and tax data. BC Stats then follows after having done its own analysis.
