Kanata-Stittsville leads the way as Ottawa’s population grows

Ottawa continues to welcome new residents as the population steadily climbs and developers build new homes.

Commercial and industrial space vacancies inched up last year, but developers continued to add more space to the market.

All of the latest statistics are in the City of Ottawa’s 2016 development report, published this week.

The City of Ottawa’s population at the end of 2016 was 968,580, up 0.8 per cent from 2015. It was lower than the 975,008 projected in the city’s official plan. The greater Ottawa-Gatineau region had a population of 1,457,464.

The percentage of people living inside the greenbelt has slowly decreased since the 2001 amalgamation. At the end of 2016, 55 per cent of the population lived inside the greenbelt and 35.3 per cent lived in suburban centres. Downtown had 10.6 per cent of the population and the rural areas had 9.7 per cent.

The community with the largest growth in 2016 was KanataStittsville, with 27.8 per cent of all growth.

There was no change in the 6.3-per-cent unemployment rate between 2015 and 2016. The government and knowledge sector had the most workers by far, with retail being a distant second.

There were 5,019 housing starts in 2016, an increase of 6.9 per cent from 2015. Of the starts, 36 per cent were for single-detached homes, 35.1 per cent were for townhouses, 24.8 per cent were for apartments and four per cent were for semidetached homes.

The average resale price for all units was $371,000 in 2016. The price of a new, single-detached home averaged $527,609.

The city included the “walkability” scores for each of the future 13 LRT stations (including Bayview, which is also a Trillium Line station) and the other four existing Trillium Line stations. Using the Walk Score analysis of nearby paths and amenities, Rideau station is considered the ultimate “walker’s paradise.” Tremblay station is considered the most cardependent.

It might have been slightly harder for people to find an apartment to rent last year. The rental vacancy rate was three per cent, a decrease of 0.4 per cent. The average rent for a two-bedroom apartment in 2016 was $1,201 (in Gatineau the average two-bedroom rent was $763).

There was a growing availability of office, retail and industrial space in 2016. The office vacancy rate was 12.4 per cent (compared with 11.6 per cent in 2015) and the retail vacancy rate was 5.3 per cent (compared with 4.6 per cent in 2015). Industrial space vacancy was at 7.7 per cent (compared with 7.1 per cent in 2015). Still, the inventory in all three categories grew in 2016.

More people moved to Ottawa than left. According to the 2014-15 statistics (the most recent available), the net number of people moving to Ottawa was 5,827, an increase of nine per cent from the previous year. Greater Montreal provided the largest number of new Ottawa residents.