Grande Prairie is the Youngest City in Canada

The demographic breakdown of our area from the 2011 census was released recently by StatsCan. The attached charts show how the city and county populations break down by age.

Both graphs are on the same scale to make comparison easier.

 Some interesting ways I found to look at the data….

• The City has more people under the age of 20 (15340) than the County has over the age of 20 (14230). That is to say that our population of school aged residents is larger than the whole adult population of the County. 

• The City's median age has risen slightly to 30.3. (the County's median age is 36.8), which is still MUCH younger than Canada as a whole (40.6).

• Grande Prairie can legitimately lay claim to being the YOUNGEST city in the province. 

Our median age of 30.3 is lower than ALL other Alberta cities: 

Camrose & Wetaskiwin both 41.2, St. Albert 40.2, Medicine Hat 39.8, Sherwood Park 39.1, Lethbridge 37.4, Lacombe 37.1, Calgary 36.4, Edmonton 36.0, Fort Sask 35.4, Red Deer 34.7, Leduc 34.0, Brooks 33.8, Spruce Grove 33.7, Airdrie 32.4, Wood Buffalo 31.8, Cold Lake 30.5

• Grande Prairie is also  the YOUNGEST city in Canada over 10,000 in population. 

If you include cities under 10,000, we are the fourth youngest behind only Lloydminster (the Saskatchewan side only), Martensville, SK and Iqaluit, NU.

If you broaden the list to include all communities (which includes counties and MDs) over 10,000, we are the third youngest community in Canada behind Mackenzie County, Alberta and Hanover, Manitoba

• The old data a point of "More people under the age of 4 than over the age of 65" still holds true for the City of GP. (0-4 = 4840, 65+ = 3420)

The skewing of our city's population obviously leads to some unique challenges (we're going to need more schools for sure - especially a the elementary level) but I believe it also is one of the reasons our city is so dynamic and active.