Halifax Population & Growth

[someone123]

Originally Posted by Drybrain

I'm curious as to how much of "Hakifax" is rural population (certainly there are parts of HRM that are not significant parts of the city's commuter shed, but functionally independent towns or villages).

This page gives us a pretty good hint: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Halifax,_Nova_Scotia

Statscan has tables showing employment by industry, but I don't have time to find them right now. The Wiki page suggests that about 3,600 people in HRM work in primary industries like fishing, farming, and forestry. 230,000 or so people are employed in HRM, so primary industries make up less than 2% of employment.

This doesn't jive at all with the idea that the Halifax metro area is inflated and actually 1/4 or more rural. In reality, most of the "rural" parts are just low-density suburbs, economically speaking. Places like Fall Rivers aren't really rural.

This economic angle is really what matters from a provincial perspective and an economic development perspective.

[portapetey]

Originally Posted by Drybrain

I'm curious as to how much of "Hakifax" is rural population (certainly there are parts of HRM that are not significant parts of the city's commuter shed, but functionally independent towns or villages).

Noentheless, HRM is all we have as far as a legal/political/jurisdictional body, so from now on I assume when people say "the city" that's what they mean.

I'd say you're correct that the population target, for example, is for all of HRM, as it is the legal entity we have to work with.

My quibble is more about the fact that since amalgamation, we tend to conflate HRM with the actual "city" part of the vast municipality, and talk about having a city of 415,000. I think we have a city of 300,000 inside a vast area with another 115,000 - and not just functionally independent towns and villages, but large swaths of purely rural hamlets.

StatsCan has a concept called "Municipal Influenced Zones" that describes how much of the population of an area is part of the city commuter base, but unfortunately they only apply that concept to areas outside of Census Metropolitan Areas, and for better or for worse, HRM as a whole has been adopted more or less as Halifax's CMA (this wasn't always the case), so there is no such analysis within HRM's boundaries (as far as I'm aware - please correct me if I've got that wrong.)

I think, from a statistical / demographic perspective, it's rather unfortunate that StatsCan data for "metro" Halifax are essentially defined as HRM, because HRM includes so much that is not realistically part of any real "metro".

[portapetey]

Originally Posted by someone123

This page gives us a pretty good hint: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Halifax,_Nova_Scotia

Statscan has tables showing employment by industry, but I don't have time to find them right now. The Wiki page suggests that about 3,600 people in HRM work in primary industries like fishing, farming, and forestry. 230,000 or so people are employed in HRM, so primary industries make up less than 2% of employment.

This doesn't jive at all with the idea that the Halifax metro area is inflated and actually 1/4 or more rural. In reality, most of the "rural" parts are just low-density suburbs, economically speaking. Places like Fall Rivers aren't really rural.

This economic angle is really what matters from a provincial perspective and an economic development perspective.

Fall River is included in the "population centre", actually, according to StatsCan's maps.

There are a few spots like Hubley that are labelled rural but could arguably called suburbs, and we would certainly count as part of "metro".

But still, StatsCan's data show 89,000 people in rural areas, and a few thousand more here and there living in "named places" (whatever that means).

I think the data do in fact support the idea that upwards of 1/4 of the HRM population lives outside of anything we could reasonably call part of "the city", and this is an anomaly of the amalgamation of the rural county with the urban municipalities.

As I've said in other threads in the past, my goal in providing this perspective is certainly not to put Halifax down; it's really to say that if you consider how big the city really is, it's actually a pretty happenin' place and punches well above its weight in many ways. (For example, saying we have 500,000 people or something like that and comparing us to cities that really do have 500,000 is a sure way to feel we're lacking something and end up defeated.)

And in the context of the population targets, are we trying to grow "the city", or are we looking for growth in the rural areas too? (I think the report addresses that - I'd have to go back and read more...) And how much growth in each category? If we value density, then should most of the growth be in the core? Will too much growth outside of the core result in ugly sprawl? There's an interesting discussion of those questions in response to the HRM Regional Plan here:

http://spacing.ca/atlantic/2012/12/12/urban-development-does-halifax-need-to-grow-up/

[fenwick16]

Originally Posted by OldDartmouthMark

In NS it's true, but I don't think the world's population is just redistributing. Just did a google search and came upon this interesting site:

http://www.worldometers.info/world-population/

The graph on the page is really eye-opening, as is the following text:



Hopefully how we use our world's resources will offset the continuing population growth for a while, but the way we source food is not looking very promising for the future, IMHO.

We will probably continue to disagree on this point since I have posted links to United Nations reports in the past, which you didn't accept; here is another link - http://www.un.org/en/development/desa/po...d%20Population%20Situation%202014/en.pdf

Population projections are like stock market projections; there are many different opinions and projections; one projection in the United Nations 2014 report indicates that the population will plateau at 8.3 - 8.3 billion by 2040 - 2050 (this is what I expect). I could post links to many reports on declining fertility rates worldwide by choice in developed nations, and, conversely, population growth in the poorer nations and some Roman Catholic nations. Population growth is self correcting in animal populations - when food is scarce then the population naturally declines - and there is no reason to think that it will be different in the human population. The human population cannot grow beyond its capacity to feed the population.

In reality, seriously declining population rate of growth is considered to be a problem in many developed nations. In my opinion, considering the lack of interest for many younger people to have families, the real problem in the future will be a serious population decline resulting in vacant buildings (such as in Detroit), declining real estate values and possibly even a slowing of technological progress. This is not just a Nova Scotia issue - I recommend that you do some more research on the topic.

One more point, the baby boomer generation has heard never-ending reports of fossil fuel shortages and concerns that eventually we would be freezing in the dark, however this hasn't come to pass; we have fossil fuel gluts and numerous cleaner energy sources.

[ILoveHalifax]

Originally Posted by portapetey

Fall River is included in the "population centre", actually, according to StatsCan's maps.

There are a few spots like Hubley that are labelled rural but could arguably called suburbs, and we would certainly count as part of "metro".

But still, StatsCan's data show 89,000 people in rural areas, and a few thousand more here and there living in "named places" (whatever that means).

I think the data do in fact support the idea that upwards of 1/4 of the HRM population lives outside of anything we could reasonably call part of "the city", and this is an anomaly of the amalgamation of the rural county with the urban municipalities.

As I've said in other threads in the past, my goal in providing this perspective is certainly not to put Halifax down; it's really to say that if you consider how big the city really is, it's actually a pretty happenin' place and punches well above its weight in many ways. (For example, saying we have 500,000 people or something like that and comparing us to cities that really do have 500,000 is a sure way to feel we're lacking something and end up defeated.)

And in the context of the population targets, are we trying to grow "the city", or are we looking for growth in the rural areas too? (I think the report addresses that - I'd have to go back and read more...) And how much growth in each category? If we value density, then should most of the growth be in the core? Will too much growth outside of the core result in ugly sprawl? There's an interesting discussion of those questions in response to the HRM Regional Plan here:

http://spacing.ca/atlantic/2012/12/12/urban-development-does-halifax-need-to-grow-up/

You really need to rent a car and take a drive out hwy 7 to see if you can find a 100,000 people out there. I am sure business would be happy to supply such a large market.
Then the next weekend take a drive out to Lunenburg Co on the west of Halifax to see how many people live out there and are not included in Halifax population figures.
Try driving out 102 and 103 to see how many people commute into the city from the appropriate counties and these people are not included in Halifax population figures.
Suggested figures of 650,000 all city centered are quite real, less the 835 people you find along Hwy 7.

[someone123]

I lived in St. Margaret's Bay for a while, an area that at the time was about as rural looking as it gets. It was full of middle managers, teachers, lawyers, etc. who commuted into town. Some of them decorated their lawns with lobster traps and the like. A lot of people driving along St. Margaret's Bay road probably think the area has some kind of fisheries-based economy, but it doesn't. It depends on urban employment in modern, growing industries.

(A while later I was working in a lab at Dal and we had people commuting in from Lunenburg and Hants counties.)

That employment statistic about < 2% primary industries shows that this is the norm in the supposedly rural quarter of HRM. If you look at a fishing village, a farm town in the Annapolis Valley, or a small town with a pulp mill in Northern NS you will see different numbers. Those are the truly rural places with rural economies and prospects.

We'll probably have to agree to disagree about Halifax being an especially rural town. I don't think it's all that unique within a North American context. Statistics Canada calculates all of the CMAs in a very similar way so I think they are comparable. They also consider all of the CMA "urban" for the purposes of urban-rural split within NS, the same as they do for any other province.

In any case, the employment and commuting situation really gets at the heart of why it makes sense for all of NS to try to increase the population in Halifax. The area within easy travelling distance of the city is where it's cheapest to provide good services and is the sort of area where a wide variety of skilled people and high potential businesses want to locate. Consequently promoting growth in this area increases the province's per capita wealth and tax base while lowering costs, making it easier to support better services even in outlying areas.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by beyeas

I am 100% fine with a shoot for the stars mentality, as that has been sorely lacking in this province. Time to actually start being ambitious and pushing to execute "shoot for the star" plans, rather than settling for a status quo mediocrity that in real terms means a slow but steady economic death!

I've said this before, but living out of province the difference in perception versus reality as far as NS is concerned really stands out.

Halifax and Vancouver have been roughly equal lately as far as population and economic growth, and I think the changes in Halifax have arguably been more positive for the local population at large (whereas there's a big affordability problem here and it's not clear how much economic activity is due to a housing bubble). When I visit Halifax every couple of years I get the same sense of "progress" that I do visiting other growing cities. But the prevailing attitude in Halifax is much more negative than other comparable places. And there's a sort of grim resignation in NS in general.

I'm not sure why NS has to be so badly off. It wasn't always so, and today with overseas trade connections and a growing number of industries that can locate anywhere there isn't much reason for it to be so. Manitoba has a growing population and they have achieved that through bumping up immigration. Actually PEI has done this as well and the province has a growing population despite not having any large cities. Similarly in the US a lot of second-tier, more affordable cities and states have become successful in recent years. I'm thinking of places like Austin or Raleigh. Halifax and NS are basically the Canadian equivalent of a place like NC. Given the number of people faced with long commutes and sky-high real estate in the GTA there is an enormous opportunity for NS.

[Drybrain]

Originally Posted by someone123

I'm not sure why NS has to be so badly off. It wasn't always so, and today with overseas trade connections and a growing number of industries that can locate anywhere there isn't much reason for it to be so. Manitoba has a growing population and they have achieved that through bumping up immigration. Actually PEI has done this as well and the province has a growing population despite not having any large cities. Similarly in the US a lot of second-tier, more affordable cities and states have become successful in recent years. I'm thinking of places like Austin or Raleigh. Halifax and NS are basically the Canadian equivalent of a place like NC. Given the number of people faced with long commutes and sky-high real estate in the GTA there is an enormous opportunity for NS.

Manitoba's an interesting case too, because in so many ways it's objectively worse off: far higher urban outmigration than Halifax (offset by immigration, but still) higher poverty rates, higher crime rates. And while I like Winnipeg, it definitely has a sort of beaten-down, rough-around-the-edges vibe that Halifax doesn't.

But I don't get the sense that the attitude is quite so grim.

[portapetey]

Originally Posted by ILoveHalifax

You really need to rent a car and take a drive out hwy 7 to see if you can find a 100,000 people out there. I am sure business would be happy to supply such a large market.
Then the next weekend take a drive out to Lunenburg Co on the west of Halifax to see how many people live out there and are not included in Halifax population figures.
Try driving out 102 and 103 to see how many people commute into the city from the appropriate counties and these people are not included in Halifax population figures.
Suggested figures of 650,000 all city centered are quite real, less the 835 people you find along Hwy 7.

Once again, look at the census tract data. They demonstrate quite clearly that there are indeed 100,000 people outside of the urban population centre, which has around 300,000 people in it. I've provided all the links necessary to verify that Canada's census of population shows a very widely dispersed population throughout the wilds of the rural county. If I'm wrong, then the National statistical agency is wrong too.

[ILoveHalifax]

Originally Posted by portapetey

Once again, look at the census tract data. They demonstrate quite clearly that there are indeed 100,000 people outside of the urban population centre, which has around 300,000 people in it. I've provided all the links nedpcessary to verify that Canada's census of population shows a very widely dispersed population throughout the wilds of the rural county. If I'm wrong, then the National statistical agency is wrong too.

Once again take a drive.

[portapetey]

Originally Posted by someone123

We'll probably have to agree to disagree about Halifax being an especially rural town. I don't think it's all that unique within a North American context. Statistics Canada calculates all of the CMAs in a very similar way so I think they are comparable. They also consider all of the CMA "urban" for the purposes of urban-rural split within NS, the same as they do for any other province.

Actually, they don't consider all of the CMA urban. Their census tract maps show clearly what they call urban core, versus urban fringe, versus rural. The map of HRM is mostly rural.

They also calculate the populations of the "population centre", formerly known as the "urban centre", and in some cities the contiguous urban area accounts for a large majority like say 90% of the CMA population, and in some cities like Halifax and Ottawa-Gatineau the urban area only accounts for about 75% of the population with the other 25% coming from more rural areas. As you point out, these CMAs also include thousands of square kilometers of land area outside the city, like HRM does, which explains some of this variation.

I think it is helpful in some contexts to focus on the urban population to get a good perspective on what is really "city" / how big the "city" part really is. In the context of much of what we discuss on the skyscraperpage forum, urban development issues, I don't think it's always helpful to put ourselves in the "almost 500,000" category and mourn the fact that we don't have everything that might exist is other cities that really do have populations of 500,000. We'll get there, but we're not there yet. So let's be happy we're doing so well for our size, as you point out in your other post. Much of the negative narrative around Halifax is simply wrong - were doing quite well in so many ways.

And then, we've just seen an example directly above of someone saying we have a city of 650,000 people. (Can that really be what he meant? Would anyone really count Bridgewater, Wolfville, and Truro as part of Halifax, which is what seems to be implied?). Quebec City and Winnipeg are (urban and CMA) cities in the 600,000 to 700,000 range. They are both twice the size of Halifax - one only need take a quick glance at a map or some satellite images to see that - or actually get out and visit them. Why try to suggest we're as big as they are, when it is simply untrue? I guess I just don't understand the need to imagine a city is much bigger than it really is. Dreaming big for future growth is great, but I don't see the point of saying 6 is 9 and 12 is 18.

The debate as to whether we're a city of 300,000 or 400,000 is a valid one - there are stats and definitions to support both arguments, and they are both right, in their own way. You're right, we don't have to agree - but we can see one another's points. But 650? That's just making things up.

[portapetey]

Originally Posted by someone123

In any case, the employment and commuting situation really gets at the heart of why it makes sense for all of NS to try to increase the population in Halifax. The area within easy travelling distance of the city is where it's cheapest to provide good services and is the sort of area where a wide variety of skilled people and high potential businesses want to locate. Consequently promoting growth in this area increases the province's per capita wealth and tax base while lowering costs, making it easier to support better services even in outlying areas.

Agreed 100%. Hence my original question as to whether we should be targeting growth mostly in the urban population centre versus all throughout the broad HRM. I think the vast majority of population increase happening in the urban centre will best serve the need for our social and economic ends, and for urban development without too much increase in sprawl.

[Colin May]

Originally Posted by Drybrain

I dunno, the intraprovincial migration figures for Halifax suggest that the emptying is still ongoing, and in fact slightly increased in recent years.

I said 'pretty much emptied'
I know what other parts of Nova Scotia were like in the seventies and eighties and many of them now look like ghost towns, places with a very high proportion of people age 50+ and facing school closures, lack of doctors and store closures.
Go to Truro, Pictou, New Glasgow and watch paint dry.
Metro Halifax will always be in demand for obvious reasons.

[icetea93]

I think it's fair to say in 2016:
Halifax Urban Area Population: 300,000+
Halifax Metro Population: ~430,000
Halifax Catchment Area / Economic Region: ~650,000 (people who live roughly an hour away or closer who can regularly shop/eat/play/attend events in the city)

The Halifax malls use the 650,000 figure as their "secondary drawing area" to attract retailers on their websites, but also list the metro population as the primary drawing area. Either way I get that we should view our city in a more positive light

[portapetey]

Originally Posted by icetea93

I think it's fair to say in 2016:
Halifax Urban Area Population: 300,000+
Halifax Metro Population: ~430,000
Halifax Catchment Area / Economic Region: ~650,000 (people who live roughly an hour away or closer who can regularly shop/eat/play/attend events in the city)

The Halifax malls use the 650,000 figure as their "secondary drawing area" to attract retailers on their websites, but also list the metro population as the primary drawing area. Either way I get that we should view our city in a more positive light

Ah, thanks for the explanation of where that number comes from. Maybe not quite so made up after all, but still what I'd call a marketing ploy rather than a real representation of our city. It's like saying Antigonish and Port Hawksbury are both part of Sydney.

StatsCan's boundary for the Halifax Economic Region (yup, they have those too) is also the same as the HRM, and 2011 size was 390K.

This just adds to my puzzlement over why HRM boundaries define practically everything (except the urban population) for us, while that isn't the case for other cities. Amalgamation ruined everything!

[portapetey]

Originally Posted by icetea93

I think it's fair to say in 2016:
Halifax Urban Area Population: 300,000+
Halifax Metro Population: ~430,000
Halifax Catchment Area / Economic Region: ~650,000 (people who live roughly an hour away or closer who can regularly shop/eat/play/attend events in the city)

And by the way, that's a nice succinct summation of the whole thing.

[portapetey]

Originally Posted by Colin May

I said 'pretty much emptied'
I know what other parts of Nova Scotia were like in the seventies and eighties and many of them now look like ghost towns, places with a very high proportion of people age 50+ and facing school closures, lack of doctors and store closures.
Go to Truro, Pictou, New Glasgow and watch paint dry.
Metro Halifax will always be in demand for obvious reasons.

Truro's actually not too badly off, not like New Glasgow and Pictou.

If you want to be really depressed, go to Oxford. It's very sad.

[OldDartmouthMark]

Originally Posted by fenwick16

We will probably continue to disagree on this point since I have posted links to United Nations reports in the past, which you didn't accept; here is another link - http://www.un.org/en/development/desa/po...d%20Population%20Situation%202014/en.pdf

I'm sorry, it's not that I don't accept the UN report, I honestly must have forgotten it. If we've had this conversation before I apologize for dredging it up again, as I didn't go back through the thread to review. I'm juggling a lot of things in my mind these days, so sometimes stuff like this gets forgotten - frankly, I need a vacation.

Population projections are like stock market projections; there are many different opinions and projections; one projection in the United Nations 2014 report indicates that the population will plateau at 8.3 - 8.3 billion by 2040 - 2050 (this is what I expect). I could post links to many reports on declining fertility rates worldwide by choice in developed nations, and, conversely, population growth in the poorer nations and some Roman Catholic nations. Population growth is self correcting in animal populations - when food is scarce then the population naturally declines - and there is no reason to think that it will be different in the human population. The human population cannot grow beyond its capacity to feed the population.

My point regarding this was not that the earth's population is necessarily going to continue spiraling out of control. I have no reason to dispute the UN's projections, nor the extensive research that you've done. My point actually was that as these highly-populated poorer nations become more developed, they will likewise be able to adapt technological solutions to the food supply situation as well as other technologies. As has already been demonstrated in China's transition from a mainly rural country to an industrial world power, the companies based in richer countries often take advantage of the lower costs of labour and lack of safety and environmental regulations of developing nations for the availability of cheap manufacturing. The resultant industrial growth in these countries often utilizes older technologies that are more highly regulated in developed countries and aren't necessarily the best choices environmentally (such as China's rapid building of thousands of coal-fired power plants a few years back).

Taking the ability to adopt the food-factory mentality to feed the masses, and the money from rapidly developing manufacturing industries to fuel it, then suddenly the existing world's population, even if its numbers remain static, has overwhelmed the environment's ability to handle the by-products of industry.

That's all that I was getting at.

In reality, seriously declining population rate of growth is considered to be a problem in many developed nations. In my opinion, considering the lack of interest for many younger people to have families, the real problem in the future will be a serious population decline resulting in vacant buildings (such as in Detroit), declining real estate values and possibly even a slowing of technological progress.

I don't think Detroit is a good example - in fact Detroit's situation is directly related to a decline in manufacturing (mostly the auto industry) and an economy that was dependent on it.

This is not just a Nova Scotia issue - I recommend that you do some more research on the topic.

I will defer to your research and expertise, as I truly don't have the time or energy to research it as extensively. I accept your assertions.

One more point, the baby boomer generation has heard never-ending reports of fossil fuel shortages and concerns that eventually we would be freezing in the dark, however this hasn't come to pass; we have fossil fuel gluts and numerous cleaner energy sources.

I don't think that fossil fuel availability is the problem, frankly (and I'm a tail-end boomer/post boomer and have thus heard the same concerns). What I hear from the scientific community is that climate change is already well on its way, and it may actually already be too late to turn it around.

Sorry for the tangent - back to the original topic as that's all I will write on this.

[fenwick16]

Originally Posted by OldDartmouthMark

I don't think that fossil fuel availability is the problem, frankly (and I'm a tail-end boomer/post boomer and have thus heard the same concerns). What I hear from the scientific community is that climate change is already well on its way, and it may actually already be too late to turn it around.

Sorry for the tangent - back to the original topic as that's all I will write on this.

In my opinion, you shouldn't worry about man-made climate change, as explained at the following links (and many others), man-made CO2 is a very small percentage of naturally occuring greenhouse gases - http://www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/greenhouse_data.html and https://www.skepticalscience.com/human-co2-smaller-than-natural-emissions.htm. I do believe in climate change, I just don't think that mankind is having any significant effect on it (I believe climate change is a natural occurrence, not man-made, as historical records of past ice-ages and warming cycles indicate). Unfortunately the man-made climate change theory has become a political issue where people are verbally attacked if they question climate change models.

One thing to remember is that CO2 is a very important component in the atmosphere, without it photosynthesis would not be able to convert CO2 to plant matter, and life as we know it would soon come to an end - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxygen#Photosynthesis_and_respiration. In fact, in order to grow plants in greenhouses the concentration of CO2 is often increased 2 - 3 fold to increase the growth rate of plants - http://www.omafra.gov.on.ca/english/crops/facts/00-077.htm.

Although I believe that man-made climate change is a red herring, the end result should be a cleaner atmosphere which is certainly good for mankind.

[terrynorthend]

Originally Posted by portapetey

It's like saying Antigonish and Port Hawksbury are both part of Sydney.

Nonsense! Clearly Sydney and Antigonish are both part of the PHRM (Port Hawksbury Regional Municipality)