Prince Rupert and Terrace make top 50 on Canada’s Best Communities List

Prince Rupert and Terrace made a list of top 50 communities to live in Canada.

The Canada’s Best Communities List, put out by Maclean’s, ranked Terrace 35 and Prince Rupert 46 out of 415 communities.

The top features for both cities were taxes paid and affordability. Prince Rupert also got noted for its commute while Terrace received points for amenities.

According to Maclean’s, they partnered with Environics, an analytic company, to compare and contrast the following categories to determine their rankings:

wealth and economy: 20 points;

affordability: 20 points;

demographics: 6 points;

taxes: 7 points;

commute: 10 points;

crime: 7 points;

weather: 10 points;

health: 11 points

amenities: 2.5 points and;

culture and community: 5 points.

READ MORE: Stats show violent crime in Prince Rupert drops overall

Any “town or city with its own mayor” is how Maclean’s has chosen to define community, using the names and census data provided by Statistics Canada.

According to Maclean’s research the average annual property tax bill is $1,477 (1.3 per cent of an individuals average income) for Prince Rupert and $1,649 for Terrace (1.4 per cent of the average income).

The median household income in Terrace was $88,018, with real estate averaging at $257,965 and rent $898 per month on average.

The average household income in Prince Rupert averaged slightly less than Terrace, at $84,518. Real estate was calculated to be $303,883 on average with rent at $873 per month.

Environics Analytics gave ranked cities on the percentage of residents who walk (three points), bike (three points) and take transit (four points) to work. More than 10 per cent of Prince Rupert’s population use one of those three methods when commuting to work, scoring in the city’s favour.

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“Larger centres like West Kelowna tend to be home to more commuters, with smaller and more remote communities like Salmon Arm, Terrace and Prince Rupert keeping the majority of residents within city limits for work,” wrote Maclean’s in their analysis.

Maclean’s provided no specific details on why Terrace ranked highly for amenities, however, their criteria stated that cities receive points for nearby universities, colleges, movies theaters, bars and restaurants.

Burlington, Ont. ranked number one overall, with Salmon Arm ranking number one for communities in British Columbia and sixth overall in Canada.

Taking just B.C. cities into account, Terrace ranks 10th and Prince Rupert 14th.

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