Some analytical bites, this time by Urban Futures’ Andrew Ramlo, derived from the 2011 National Household Survey, on commuting patterns in the Lower Mainland. I’ve highlighted the one that surprised me most.
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The number of people commuting from the City of Vancouver to a usual place of work in Richmond was ten percent greater than the number of Richmond residents commuting into the City of Vancouver for work each day (22,700 versus 20,215).
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As the number of employment locations outside of the downtown peninsula has grown over the past four decades, so too has the diversity of our daily commute: by 2011, 56.1 percent of the Vancouver CMA’s residents commuted between non-Vancouver municipalities, the highest share dating back to 1971.
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- While the general pattern of inter-municipal commuting has continued to diversify within the region as the share of non-Vancouver trips has increased, the most recent data also point to slower pace of change, or a growing stability, in the pattern of regional journeys to work.
- Residents in the City of Vancouver who commuted to a usual place of work within the region each day, 174,015 (68 percent) did so to a location that was also in the City of Vancouver, the highest proportion of any municipality in the Vancouver CMA.
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The municipality that saw the greatest increase in the share of its residents working in their home municipality was White Rock.
- A significant share commuted into the Valley, with 7,405 to Abbotsford, 880 to Mission, 750 to Chilliwack and 200 to Squamish.
- Relative to those commuting to neighbouring Squamish, more people actually travelled to Calgary (430), to Toronto (395), and across the straight to Victoria (300) for their usual place of work.
- Perhaps most interesting of all was that there were 260 people who indicated that they hiked all the way to Wood Buffalo in northern Alberta’s oil patch to their usual places of work, four times greater than the 65 CMA residents who did so in 2006.
Interesting numbers regarding Richmond.
I’d like to share a few of my very unscientific observations after having commuted from central Richmond to East Van over the last year via transit (Canada Line) and car (Knight St Bridge). I leave for work between 7-8 and come home after 4.
Knight:
-the traffic is busier going into Richmond in the morning and coming back into Vancouver in the afternoon
-my guess is that although the East Richmond office parks have issues with vacancy at the moment, they are a big employment centre. Lots of non-sexy tech companies are based out there.
-Bridgeport Rd is all jobs with furniture stores, small offices, and big box retailers like Ikea
Canada Line:
-always packed going into Vancouver in the morning and uncrowded going into Richmond
-always packed going back in Richmond in the afternoon, but pretty busy the other way
-I suspect most of the commuters from Richmond are students and downtown workers
-the alternating YVR/Richmond train is a big source of annoyance for those commuting from Richmond
-the morning train into Richmond might get more crowded as the retailers and restaurants open up closer to 10am
About 8 years ago I didn’t have full time daycare for my daughter so several times per week I drove to Richmond in the morning to drop her off with grandparents before returning to Vancouver to work. So on those days I crossed both Oak and Knight bridges each way.
My experience aligns with Graeme’s. Knight was at least as busy, if not more, in the “reverse” commuting direction while Oak displayed the traditional heavy flow to Vancouver in the morning and to points south in the evening.
Looking at the data in the article we have a clear decentralization trend, but the trend is slowing. Without knowing the reasons behind that it’s hard to say what steps we should be taking.
I know Surrey is building a new downtown, but I wonder what White Rock did to make such gains in number of people working there. It’s a pretty small place and mostly residential so maybe more telecommuting?
I’m guessing that “Greater Vancouver A” is the UEL. The drop in the percentage of resident workers there is obvious. UBC isn’t adding any jobs, but they are building hundreds of units of new housing.