Metro Vancouver is slated to add more than a million people and generate 600,000 jobs by 2040, presenting policy-makers and planners with a challenging mandate.
That stark reality also avails opportunities for growing cities like Surrey and Maple Ridge to grow job-creating industries, enhance transportation interconnectivity and preserve cultural vitality.
While cities seek to locate tax-generating, job-creating industries within their sphere of influence, they still employ an interdependent regional growth strategy.
Trade organizations like the Surrey Board of Trade see tremendous value in regional collaboration, according to CEO Anita Huberman.
“We work together with other boards of trade and chambers of commerce throughout the Lower Mainland on issues like the environment, international trade, crime and transportation,” Huberman said. “I know Surrey’s perspective is to ensure that everyone’s issues, challenges and strengths are on the table for collective, efficient growth of the region.”
Surrey participates in a consortium of 10 cities through Metro Vancouver Commerce (MVC), a partnership dedicated to championing the region’s business-friendly attributes. A 2008 trip to the Beijing Olympics kick-started its mission to promote Vancouver and aattract business to B.C.
“There’s a great opportunity through MVC to work between the cities to promote economic and social health throughout the region,” said Shaun Greffard, general manager of investment and intergovernmental relations for Surrey. “If we can all work together, we can realize the economic benefits.”
Case in point, MVC is working with its member agencies on a project to streamline the business licensing and permitting process. “The right thing to do is to facilitate economic growth throughout the region,” he said.
Transportation interconnectivity remains an integral component of regional growth, as commuters fill area roads and businesses seek to transport goods and cargo to key shipping points.
Key infrastructure upgrades in the past couple years, namely the Golden Ears Bridge and Pitt River Bridge and the forthcoming South Fraser Perimeter Road, function to alleviate systematic congestion.
“The Golden Ears Bridge is an example whereby traffic, goods and people movement benefits both communities,” Huberman said. “These create a competitive advantage for Surrey because it further enhances growth and movement of goods and people.”
Transportation improvements matter to Surrey because economic development prospects hinge on reliable, dependable access to transportation networks.
“Surrey is positioned at two border crossings with the United States. We have an international shipping and docking facility,” Huberman said. “We have port access here with Fraser Surrey Docks to bring in goods from India, Russia and China.”
Sandy Blue, manager of strategic economic initiatives with the growing community of Maple Ridge, says regional collaboration is imperative to addressing future population and job growth.
“We have to find ways to fund this and make it happen, because the population is continuing to grow and there will be pressure on infrastructure,” Blue said. “We always can work together through forums like MVC. Hardly a week goes by that I’m not talking economic development with someone in Surrey. In some cases, we’re specifically partnering.”
Blue cited Maple Ridge’s ongoing co-operation with TransLink and other municipalities in creating transit solutions for its residents.
Conversely, challenges arise when communities grow faster than their counterparts, elevating competition for provincial and federal resources.
“We have to work across cities to figure out how we can best leverage dollars available for transit,” Greffard said. “That may mean one area may get more money than another region. South of the Fraser is growing a lot faster than north of the river.”
With 46% of the region’s available industrial land and one-third of its city limits designated as agriculture reserve, challenges aplenty await Surrey’s next steps.
“This growth means we need to be doing things differently,” Huberman said. “There are different cities within the region that have not historically received what they should have based on population growth.”