Four more provincial ridings needed for Metro Vancouver: commission

Four more provincial ridings needed for Metro Vancouver: electoral boundaries commission

New provincial ridings in the Lower Mainland. (BC Electoral Boundaries Commission)

The independent British Columbia Electoral Boundaries Commission has made its final recommendations for population growth-based changes to provincial electoral boundaries, and it is proposing six more electoral districts.

This includes four new provincial electoral districts within Metro Vancouver, with Vancouver, Burnaby, Surrey, and Langley each gaining more representation from one additional riding.

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The number of provincial ridings, each represented by its own member of the Legislative Assembly (MLA), would grow from the current 87 to a total of 93.

The commission is calling for changes to the boundaries of 72 existing ridings, while 15 existing ridings will see no changes to their names or boundaries.

Within Metro Vancouver, according to the commission, the populations of many ridings are currently over 25% over the electoral quotient and are projected to continue to grow faster than the populations of ridings in the rest of the province. Based on the 2021 census, the updated electoral quotient is now 53,773, and the range of residents within a riding is established as between 40,330 and 67,216 per riding.

Existing provincial electoral district boundaries:

metro vancouver existing provincial ridings map

Existing provincial ridings in the Lower Mainland. (BC Electoral Boundaries Commission)

New provincial electoral district boundaries:

metro vancouver new provincial ridings map

New provincial ridings in the Lower Mainland. (BC Electoral Boundaries Commission)

In the City of Vancouver, including the University Endowment Lands and the University of British Columbia, the number of ridings would reach 12.

The additional riding for Vancouver comes from a redrawing of the areas currently covered by the existing Vancouver-False Creek riding (a portion of the downtown Vancouver peninsula plus the south shore of False Creek and Kitsilano) and the existing Vancouver-Fairview riding (a portion of the Kitsilano, Fairview, Shaughnessy, and Mount Pleasant areas).

Instead, both central Vancouver ridings would be redrawn into the ridings of Vancouver-South Granville, Vancouver-Little Mountain, and Vancouver-Yaletown, which effectively creates a second downtown peninsula-only riding.

To the east, the areas of the existing ridings of Burnaby-Deer Lake and Burnaby-Edmonds would be redrawn into new ridings called Burnaby Centre and Burnaby South-Metrotown. This rejig accommodates the new riding of Burnaby-New Westminster, with southeast Burnaby and northern New Westminster sharing an electoral district.

Existing provincial electoral district boundaries:

Existing provincial ridings in the Lower Mainland. (BC Electoral Boundaries Commission)

New provincial electoral district boundaries:

New provincial ridings in the Lower Mainland. (BC Electoral Boundaries Commission)

South of the Fraser, the new Surrey City Centre riding would be borne from the existing Surrey-Whalley and Surrey-Green Timbers ridings.

The area of the existing riding of Surrey-Panorama would shrink considerably from the redrawing of the boundaries to accommodate the new Surrey-Serpentine riding, which is basically a division of the existing Surrey-Cloverdale riding. With the changes, Surrey would grow to a total of nine ridings, including the shared Surrey-White Rock riding.

Over in Langley, the area would be represented by three ridings instead of two, with the new Langley-Willowbrook riding centred on Langley City, and taking on small areas of Langley Township immediately to the north and south.

Langley Township would span two new ridings, including the new riding of Langley-Walnut Grove in the northwest corner of the municipality. The new riding of Langley-Abbotsford would cover most of the municipality, absorbing parts of the existing Langley, Langley East, and Abbotsford West ridings.

Existing provincial electoral district boundaries:

Existing provincial ridings in the Lower Mainland. (BC Electoral Boundaries Commission)

New provincial electoral district boundaries:

New provincial ridings in the Lower Mainland. (BC Electoral Boundaries Commission)

The remaining two new additional ridings would be created in the Langford area of Vancouver Island and the Kelowna area in the BC interior.

According to the commission, with these changes, the number of ridings outside of the population range per riding will fall from the existing 17 to five. The weight of a vote in the province’s least populated riding will no longer be four times more than the weight of a vote in the province’s most densely populated riding, with the difference decreasing to about three to one.

Currently, 21 of the 87 ridings are larger than 10,000 sq km, including three more than 100,000 sq km. Five ridings are smaller than 10 sq km. In terms of population, 45 ridings have more than 60,000 residents, and 10 ridings have fewer than 40,000 ridings.

The electoral boundaries commission is reactivated after every second general provincial election to ensure the boundaries of the electoral districts reflect population growth.

This provincial process should not be confused with the federal government’s separate process for reconsidering the boundaries of federal ridings.

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