FILE PHOTO - Kelowna at sunset.

Image Credit: ADOBE STOCK

Have you ever wondered when Kelowna will get its very own IKEA, or maybe how long it will take for Taylor Swift to give the city a look or whether an NHL franchise is in the Okanagan’s future?

Kelowna is one of the fastest growing communities in the country, and those things are still a long way off, but what the planning experts do know is it's going to take a lot of planning to get the city there one day.

The Central Okanagan’s population hit 247,000 in 2023 and is expected to keep on growing, according to the most recent report from the Central Okanagan Economic Development Commission. BC Stats expects the Central Okanagan to grow to roughly 350,000 people by 2040, and Kelowna’s population is expected to hit 180,000 by 2040.

Big businesses like IKEA, LEGO, Nike and Apple don’t publicize how they decide where to set up shop, but the region’s growth has presented other opportunities.

As more people flock to the Okanagan, Kelowna's airport is rapidly expanding, the Canadian Premier League is considering Kelowna for a professional soccer franchise, and the city and the regional district are looking at ways to grow the city more densely. 

Eva Weston from the economic development commission is part of the team working to identify what the region’s growth actually looks like.

The commission has a survey for businesses and their employees that it plans to use to inform its decisions on how to encourage the local economy.

“It's going to tell us what we need to focus on, is it workforce attraction, retainment and growth? Or technology, innovation and those sorts of things? Or is it sustainability, and being resilient when it comes to emergencies?” she said.

READ MORE: Can Kelowna support a professional soccer team? The mayor thinks so

The long range planning manager for the City of Kelowna Robert Miles said the city is prepared for rapid population growth.

“Things have changed a lot in the last five years and things might change a great deal in the next five years,” Miles said. “Major changes in things like immigration policy, big changes in the economy in terms of working habits and quite frankly a growing interest in mid-sized cities that provide a high quality of life.”

He said urban planners use a myriad of metrics to inform the Official Community Plan, including data published in the district’s economic reports and community feedback.

"When we undertake community engagement we learn about some aspects of that neighborhood that we didn't know before. That helps us craft better policies that are in part formed from hard data and what we understand about the neighborhood from what the folks out there are telling us. So it's a balance there," he said.

Housing starts are up more than 50 per cent, and 94 per cent of those new builds are multi-family homes rather than single family homes, according to the economic commission’s latest report. 

Miles said the city is preparing for denser urban centres like downtown, Rutland and Pandosy.

The city’s investments into parks are to help support more people in a smaller area, he said. Since a denser population means fewer private yards, the city is emphasizing park land. Last year, the city spent $18 million on a piece of waterfront property, which was triple the assessed value.

“It's important to think not just about the area like the size of the park, but how many people that park serves because if you've got a park that's within an easy walking distance of a lot of people it could be a very valuable investment,” Miles said.

The planning department values feedback, even outside of formal engagement processes, so people can email them at planninginfo@kelowna.ca to let the city know what they want out of their community.

Weston with the economic development commission said a challenge about planning a growing region or city is the vast amount of data, and which numbers to focus on.

She said one of the most interesting data points regarding the Okanagan’s growth is the prime working age population.

READ MORE: Kelowna airport spending $422M to catch up and keep up with air travel demand

“Historically, we've always been a retirement community, but we're seeing that shift of people who are in that prime working age population are coming here,” she said.

The Central Okanagan’s prime working age, people 25 to 54, grew by more than four per cent between 2019 and 2023, while the provincial average was less than three per cent.

Weston echoed Miles’ point about a post-pandemic shift in where people want to live and how they want to live.

“Our lifestyle, and there's an international airport, there's post-secondary (schools) here and quality of life. I think through the last five years and the pandemic, people have taken a look at their life and what's important,” she said. “There's an appetite for walkability and lifestyle and being close to amenities and maybe not relying on having a car.”

Miles said a denser population requires more transportation options, so the city has its Transportation Master Plan outlining how it intends to increase public transit, cycling opportunities and adapt to changing vehicle traffic patterns.

“That lays out really focusing on providing people with more options on how they get around. So for some places like Orchard Park (mall) which is very much a regional destination there's a lot of focus on ways that we can improve access by all modes to a destination like that in the transportation master plan,” Miles said.   

Kelowna has its draws and its flaws but with the right plan informed by data and feedback it will hit the projected economic and population growth, Weston said.

“We have all those amenities of a big city, but also it's a smaller sort of teenage community where we have agriculture that's built into our city centre and it's quite unique. But then on the flip side, it might not be big enough for some people or there might not be those opportunities for people that maybe can't find work that they're looking for and they go elsewhere or housing is too expensive and they leave,” he said.

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