Quote:
Originally Posted by Addy
You could be right; I’ve only lived here for seven months so I don’t have a solid understanding of Kingston yet. I assume without Queens, Kingston would be hurting. The City has some interesting plans, which would attract more people and business, but nothing solid and with no deadlines to do anything I can’t see things improving anytime soon.
|
Pretty much. The census--which excludes Queen's students from the data--showed that the entire city of Kingston only grew by about 1,500 people or so between 2011 and 2016 and the central area actually dropped by around 500 (although much of that drop is explainable by the closure of Kingston Penitentiary, whose inmates actually did count in the local census). Queen's added 1,100 students in that same time period, though, so the net population of the core including all residents would have increased by 600. A further 900 students were added between the 2016 census and now and another 300 are going to be added this September.
The city actually projects that outside of the student population, the entire city population (now at 124,000) will peak at around 135,000 in 10-15 years and then start falling, as they think the aging baby boomers dying off will not be fully offset by new arrivals.
Better rail connections to Toronto and Ottawa and increased economic development could reverse that--a theoretical HSR to Toronto (not likely in the foreseeable future) in particular could make the downtown boom like crazy as it would provide affordable urban life within commuting distance of Toronto--but that's all theoretical at this point.
In any case, I'm not complaining. Slow growth keeps this city affordable and it makes it easy for the city to plan for future needs.