First to 1 Million - Vancouver or Surrey

[logan5]

For nearly three decades, various projections have pegged Surrey to become British Columbia’s most populous city, surpassing the Metro Vancouver region’s namesake city of Vancouver.

Some previous forecasts put this date sometime in the 2010s or late in the 2020s.

Now, Metro Vancouver Regional District’s newly updated population growth forecast predicts Surrey will reach the milestone of surpassing Vancouver’s population in 2038.

As well, Surrey will also reach the milestone of growing to one million people in 2051 — the first municipality in British Columbia to hit seven digits in its population.

https://dailyhive.com/vancouver/surr...t-bc-city-2038

With so many development opportunities in Vancouver - TOD Skytrain policy, Broadway Corridor policy, Renfrew/Rupert, Cambie Corridor, Villages, and a few more things, it's hard to see Surrey overtaking Vancouver in the next 25 years.

On top of that, there are generous land use policies in other cities like Burnaby, and other more desirable areas that will divert a lot of development activity away from Surrey.

Surrey may have to wait another 50 years before it passes Vancouver.

[James Bond Agent 007]

If they decide to plow over all that farmland in Surrey, then maybe Surrey can pass Vancouver. If not, then probably not.

[ranvancan]

My money is on Surrey. Two easy facts to support my reasoning, immigration and reproduction. Prove me wrong......

[djmk]

Originally Posted by ranvancan

My money is on Surrey. Two easy facts to support my reasoning, immigration and reproduction. Prove me wrong......

immigration down, reproduction down and boomers now in their 80s.

[jollyburger]

Vancouver will get to a million before Surrey surpasses Vancouver's population.

[svlt]

They've been saying that Surrey will surpass Vancouver for as long as I remember and have been pushing the year when it happens for decades. I don't see it.

[libtard]

And Kenneth Chan over on urbanized thinks we need to increase new home starts to record levels theres already a a massive glut of homes on the market that no one can afford. Couple that with the revised lower population growth and it just makes no sense

[Changing City]

Metro has a long history of projecting Surrey's growth to be greater than they achieve, and the City of Vancouver's growth to be less than actually occurs. It may be the way they model future growth, because (In the past) it was built off a capacity model that didn't reflect the potential (much) higher densities that might be achieved through rezoning, and through emerging new plans in Vancouver that add significant capacity.

That said, Vancouver has pretty consistently added around 60,000 people every decade to Surrey's 100,000. So gradually, Surrey gets closer to Vancouver's population. All things being equal, if that trend continued, Surrey would be the first to a million, and would overtake Vancouver's population some time after 2041. Neither would get to a million in the next 30 years.

Vancouver out-builds Surrey, in terms of units, and has done for many years. What gets built determines the population change, and Surrey has traditionally built a lot more ground-oriented lower density homes, and very few higher density apartments. The 2021 census identified a total of 8,810 'apartments in a building that has five or more storeys' in Surrey, and 94,785 in the City of Vancouver. Surrey only saw 13% of what was built from 2016-2021 in those type of apartments, Vancouver saw 40% (and another 25% in apartments with four or less storeys).

The size of the average household has fallen steadily in Vancouver over 25 years, from 2.36 to 2.17. In Surrey it's actually gone up slightly, from 2.98 to 3.06.

The growth of Surrey's population doesn't have a lot to do with immigration (more recent immigrants (who arrived in the previous 5 years) were in Vancouver than in Surrey in 2021). The number of births does have some impact. Surrey has a younger population, and more births than in Vancouver. In 2014 there were 5,534 births in Surrey, compared to 6,971 in 2024. (That's not a higher birth rate, the population added more families of childbearing age than is reflected in the added number of births). In Vancouver there were in 6,133 in 2014 and 5,281 in 2024.

The big difference is the housing that gets built, and the 'larger' families that end up living in them - like rowhomes (over 1,000 a year built in Surrey in the past decade, 155 a year in Vancouver). Most of the growth is younger families moving from all over the Lower Mainland to where ground-oriented family housing has been built in volume, and where it has (in the past) cost less.

There are factors that could change the momentum of growth in both cities. Vancouver has a bigger popualtion of baby boomers, and they're dying off so their homes are getting cycled back into the population (or redeveloped). That will probably slow the decrease in household size. At some point in the next decades, assuming the families stay in Surrey, the household size will fall as the children leave home (eventually).