Amid the economic turbulence brought on by low oil prices, Airdrie has remained one of the province’s best communities for business according to Alberta Venture magazine.
Michael Ganley, editor of Alberta Venture, said the feature list – released in the June edition – is a data driven exercise to offer both businesses and people information to aid in important decisions concerning the communities to locate in.
“There’s a bit of a lack of (hard information) right now, which is a problem we’ve come up against in the last few years,” he said.
Airdrie Mayor Peter Brown said he was not surprised to learn Airdrie had once again been noticed as a prime community for business.
He said Airdrie has a long-standing track record with being entrepreneurial and providing good opportunities for businesses to get going.
“I’m very proud of the work the municipality has done to support business,” he said. “But we can always be better and try and continue to be the community that businesses want to locate to and I think that’s always a challenge.”
The list focused on population growth, of which it reported Airdrie experienced the third highest in the province from 2011 to 2015 at 35 per cent, behind Grand Prairie at 36 per cent and Cochrane at 49 per cent.
Observing both residential and non-residential tax rates, Ganley said Airdrie has been able to keep relatively low tax rates in relation to its massive population growth.
The average home resale price in Airdrie reported by Alberta Venture was $484,450.
Ganley said, before oil tanked more businesses seemed happy to move outwards from the business core of Calgary to surrounding communities.
“That helped Airdrie,” Ganley said.
Businesses have continued to focus attention towards the city, he added, with Alberta Venture reporting a total of “51 new commercial and industrial businesses, and 300 home-based businesses.”
This growth in the business sector, it went on to state, equated to the creation of about 400 jobs.
Brown said the best mix of residential and non-residential is somewhere in the 70 per cent to 30 per cent range.
Though Airdrie has been busy on developing its commercial and industrial areas, he said the residential growth has been significantly stronger and still sits at 84 to 16 per cent.
“You never see the split,” Brown said.
At one point in its history, nearly all of Airdrie’s residents were commuting to Calgary for work, he said.
Presently, Brown said people who are not residents of the community and are actually commuting into Airdrie from elsewhere for work own a third of its storefront businesses.
“We’re creating an opportunity for investment,” he said.
With the communities on the list ranked for the first time since 2013, Ganley said Alberta Venture noticed a stark geographical shift in the thriving communities.
In 2013, Airdrie placed seventh on the list with surrounding communities Rocky View County and Okotoks placing sixth and fourth respectively.
On 2016’s list, however, Edmonton moved from the 12th spot to take the number one position.
This flourish, Ganley said, was because Edmonton’s economy relied less on oil than its Battle of Alberta hockey counterpart. The communities surrounding Edmonton benefited from its strength and also moved up the list, he said.
Though Calgary remained steadfast near the top of the list in 2016, those surrounding communities that ranked impressively in 2013 lost ground with Airdrie slipping to 14th, Okotoks at 13th and Rocky View County holding on to the 10th spot.
“The satellite communities around Calgary are impacted more,” he said. “It is all relative, though, and I think everyone in Alberta is suffering somewhat.”
