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Kelowna has seen a lot of growth in the last few decades. (Photo Adrian Nieoczym)
Kelowna is a growing city. In 1976, the city’s population was 51,955. It grew to 89,442 in 1996 and reached 106,707 in 2006, when the last census was conducted.
Several housing and construction booms have accompanied this influx of people. Houses, condos and resorts have sprouted up all over the city and sprawl has climbed up our hillsides.
Looking into the future, it doesn’t appear as if Kelowna is about to lose its popularity, given our spectacular setting and climate. At the same time this area has several challenges to deal with from climate change, water scarcity and other sustainability issues to the lack of public transportation to the need to preserve our agricultural land so food can be grown on it.
In a bid to find out how the candidates running in the Nov. 28 by-election would like to deal with growth, we asked them, “As Kelowna continues to grow, how should that growth be managed? Should we build up (taller multi-unit buildings) or continue spreading out?”
Their answers are listed in random order: Andrew Uitvlugt, Matthew Reed, Michael Loewen, Vern Nielsen, Mary-Ann Graham, Clayton Kessler, Rocky Mix, Kevin Craig, Todd Sanderson, Ernie Patterson and Mark Thompson.
Kim Ouellette, James Murphy, Dennis Rojem and Valerie Hallford did not reply to our questionnaire.
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Andrew Uitvlugt
With-out question we should build up. It is better for the environment. Urban sprawl takes 20 times the space, therefore, people need to drive further to work which in turn, makes for more harmful carbon emissions.
Read Andrew Uitvlugt’s profile
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One Response to “How to manage Kelowna’s future growth”
Tags: by-election candidates, Kelowna
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The most thoughtful answer to this question was provided by Matthew Reid who recognizes that “Building up is not a solution by itself” but rather than we must also look at resource constraints on growth e.g., water availability.
The remainder of the pack to one degree or other supports “growing up, not out” with nary a thought given to whether we have have sufficient resources to continue growing.
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