The challenge of making an ultra-low-cost airline work in Canada

We haven’t seen a rush of potential new entrants into the Canadian airline market like this in 15 years.

Winnipeg-based NewLeaf Travel started operations just over a year ago as a “virtual airline”, selling low-priced tickets to places like Edmonton and Hamilton on chartered Boeing 737s. In recent months, Flair Air, NewLeaf’s primary chartered-aircraft provider, purchased NewLeaf’s assets and started operating the service under the Flair brand.

More recently, WestJet announced plans to start an ultra-low-cost “airline within an airline” to compete on price-sensitive routes. Jetlines, a completely new startup, announced a Summer 2018 proposed launch date; and Enerjet, a small Calgary-based charter operator, also hopes to get a proposed ultra-low-cost airline called FlyToo into the air.

All hope to avoid the fate of the low-cost startups of the late ‘90s and early ‘00s. These included Greyhound Air (Greyhound quit the industry in 1997, aircraft operator Kelowna Flightcraft survived), JetsGo (bankrupt, 2005), CanJet (changed from a scheduled operator to charter operator, 2006; suspended operations, 2015) and Harmony Airways (suspended operations, 2007).

If Europe’s Ryanair can take you from London to Portugal for fares as low as £101 round-trip ($166 Cdn.), and Australia’s JetStar can offer a Sydney-Adelaide round-trip for as little as $224 (same in Canadian dollars), why has it been so difficult to make low-fares work in Canada.*

Quite often, high taxes and fees have been blamed. For example, a Sept. 6-13 round-trip between Winnipeg and Montreal on Air Canada can be booked for $391.57 if you’re willing to fly on the less heavily booked flights. Of this, $89.57 — or 23 percent — is made up of taxes, fees and charges.

The other challenge is in convincing enough passengers to part with enough money to make the venture profitable.

Let’s take Ryanair, one of the industry’s fiercest penny-pinchers, as an example. This is the airline alleged to have pressured flight attendants to meet sales targets, spread families and couples randomly throughout the cabin for not paying extra for seat selection, and which mused about charging passengers to use the toilet.

Ryanair’s costs are impressively low, averaging out to just 3.63 U.S. cents (4.6 cents Cdn.) per seat per kilometre in recent times. Only a few airlines, such as Air Asia, have been able to wrestle their costs any lower. One way Ryanair does this is by packing more seats into each aircraft: one of their Boeing 737-800s can carry 189 passengers; WestJet only fits 168 seats into the same space.

What if a Canadian operator, hypothetically called JetManitoba, started flying Boeing 737-800s around North America, and matched Ryanair’s low costs through a combination of low wages, no overnight crew stops, high-density seating and a stringent nobody-gets-anything-for-free pricing model?

JetManitoba Flight 1, our hometown low-fare leader, starts out early in the morning with a round-trip to Vancouver and back. In the afternoon, it does another round-trip to somewhere else.

At a rock-bottom cost of 4.6 cents per seat-kilometre, JetManitoba’s 189-seat Boeing 737 needs sales of $32,516 (before taxes, fees and charges) to make each Winnipeg-Vancouver round-trip nominally break even.

No problem, you might think. $32,516 divided by 189 seats is a very reasonable $172 per seat round-trip. Add the taxes, fees and charges to that, and you can still offer a no-frills round-trip to Vancouver for less than $300. Just make the profit off of charging people $25 per checked bag or roll-aboard, $15 per person each way for seat selection (at risk of being assigned a random seat if you don’t pay up), and $15 per person for a drink and a sandwich (because JetManitoba has a monopoly on food sales at 36,000 feet).

Now, imagine it’s early February. The Canadian tourism industry is largely in hibernation. Winnipeg is under a Wind Chill Warning because it’s -24°C at midday, with the wind blowing from the northwest at 30 gusting to 50 kilometres per hour. In Vancouver, it’s raining as usual and no one has actually seen the sun in more than a week. Hardly anyone wants to be on holiday in either city.

Then what? The business travellers, who have no choice but to travel, tend to prefer Air Canada and WestJet over JetManitoba because of the better schedules. That leaves you largely with a tiny pool of would-be passengers that you somehow need to get at least $32,516 from to make each Winnipeg-Vancouver round-trip break even.

It doesn’t matter if you convince 189 people to part with $172 (plus taxes, etc.) each or 50 people to part with $650 each. It’s raising enough to cover that average of $32,516 in bills per round-trip that counts.

You could have a sale, offering 25 seats you know you will never sell for $172 for $99 or even $59 just to get a bit of cash flow to help you get through the low season, even if the flights are unprofitable.

Or cancel your Winnipeg-Vancouver service until the summer and fly to places that people actually want to fly to in February, such as southern resorts, competing directly with other airlines already serving these destinations. Again, for each round trip, you need to find a way of separating enough people in the community from enough money to keep your bills from falling into arrears. Not easy if there are more seats available than people capable of filling them.

Or just park the plane and lay people off until the tourism business starts to pick up again in the summer. You’ll still need to pay for the plane, if you can’t rent it out for the season, but at least your payroll and fuel costs will come way down.

Those are the challenges of running an ultra-low-cost airline in Canada. It is very difficult to make it work in a country where domestic leisure tourism all but shuts down for two-thirds of the year, the less price-sensitive business travel market is already well-served, and the seasonal international leisure routes are also well served by existing operators.

The ultra-low-cost-carrier business might start out with four contestants. Don’t bet on it carrying on like that.

 

* – Seat-only prices. Baggage, seat selection, food, beverages, etc. all extra.

The stinginess goes on and on and on

“Big changes considered for Ontario workplaces,” said one headline on the CBC News Toronto web site this past February, after it had been revealed that, among other things, Ontario’s provincial government was considering raising the minimum annual holiday required by the province’s Employment Standards legislation from two weeks to three.

As far as annual holidays goes, however, what was ultimately proposed by Ontario premier Kathleen Wynne’s government at the end of May certainly could not be described as “big”. Even to describe the proposed changes as “modest” could be considered an exaggeration.

The Ontario government is indeed proposing to raise minimum annual holidays from two weeks to three weeks. Here’s the catch, however: it only applies to those who have worked for the same employer continuously for at least five years. Anyone with less than five years’ service could still legally be offered only two weeks per year under the proposed change.

“We have fallen behind,” Wynne said as the proposed change was revealed.

“And we don’t really feel like catching up,” she might as well have added.

Even by Canadian standards, Ontario’s “two weeks for the first five years, then three weeks” plan represents an insignificant change. Alberta, B.C., Manitoba and Quebec have all had the same conditions in their employment laws for years, while most other provinces and the federal Labour Code offer a third week after longer periods of service, ranging from three weeks after six years at the federal level to three weeks after 15 years in Newfoundland and Labrador.

Ontario and P.E.I. remain the only provinces without a third-week provision.

Saskatchewan is the only province to have broken the two-week baseline. Their laws provide for three weeks annual holiday to start, rising to four weeks after 10 years.

By international standards, Ontario’s not-so-big change looks even less impressive. In 1970, signatories to the International Labour Organization’s (ILO) Holidays with Pay Convention each pledged to provide for annual holidays that would be “in no case . . . less than three working weeks for one year of service.” Canada, however, was never among the signatories.

The list of advanced economies offering less than three weeks (or 15 working days) per year is small, and has been shrinking in recent years. The United States provides no legal minimum. Hong Kong, Singapore and Taiwan each provide for seven days off. Japan and Israel are more or less on par with Canada at 10 to 12 working days. Then, that’s about it, except for a gaggle of smaller or less thoroughly developed economies.

Now, compare that to Australia. Australians first won the right to two weeks annual holiday with the Annual Holidays Act in 1945. This was raised to a three-week minimum — still unheard of in Canada outside of Saskatchewan — in 1963. That country further increased the legal minimum to four weeks in 1974.

Across the Tasman Sea, New Zealand — a country which dislikes being compared to Australia, but I’ll do it here anyway — was a little more restrained. They won two weeks annual leave in 1944, threw in a third week 30 years later, and finally raised their legal minimum to four weeks per year in 2007.

Surely to God a modest boost from two weeks to three weeks annual holiday per year, merely meeting the ILO’s recommended rock-bottom minimum and matching what New Zealanders had from 1974 to 2007, would not make a dent in any province’s economy. It might even provide a very mild stimulus as people used the time to spend money on things that they don’t normally spend money on during the typical work day or weekend. It would be an easy and fairly equitable crowd-pleaser, too.

It was a risk that Kathleen Wynne’s nearly 14-year-old (i.e., geriatric, in political terms) Liberal government could have afforded to take. Instead, they reinforced a penurious status quo, only a little bit more generous than Japan’s legendarily limited allowances — although even Japan has slowly started to come around to the idea of taking holidays in the face of a persistent economic and quality-of-life malaise.

Meanwhile in Canada, the stinginess on annual holiday provisions goes on and on and on.

To attract tourists, a good narrative matters

Winnipeg architect Brent Bellamy had a rather fascinating piece in today’s Winnipeg Free Press about the branding of what has been traditionally called the city’s Exchange District as “the Design Quarter”, along with nearby areas of Downtown and The Forks. He wrote:

The world is becoming smaller, travel is becoming easier and globalization is making cities more homogenous. As a result, tourists have begun to look more often for unique stories and authentic, local experiences in non-traditional destinations.

In recognition of this changing trend, last Friday a new initiative was launched to further attract this evolving tourist market as well as provide Winnipeggers with a new experience in their own city.

Design Quarter Winnipeg is an organically organized, grassroots initiative hoping to position downtown Winnipeg’s artistic community as a design and cultural tourism destination.

The idea hopes to bring together local, independent, design-focused events, shops, services and organizations under a single marketing umbrella, empowering them by establishing a broader collaborative network. It’s modelled after existing programs in similarly isolated winter cities Reykjavik, Iceland and Helsinki, Finland, where the design district concept has strengthened their civic image as design centres and tapped into new opportunities in the growing trend of cultural tourism.

Indeed, long-haul international travel has never been as affordable to both Canadians and to many foreigners as it is today, or as easy to plan online, offering opportunities for places considered “flyover country” to develop small but lucrative niches.

Tourism is like a library. Just as probably 99 percent of the books in the library are of absolutely no interest to 99 percent of the population, so too are 99 percent of places in the world likely of absolutely no interest to 99 percent of the world’s population.

But that one percent or even less who are attracted for some reason to that book on the shelf, or that place on the map — that’s what matters. One percent of Canada’s population, for example, is a still-substantial 350,000 people. Not that they’re all going to descend on Winnipeg all at once, or even visit at all. But if the narrative is right, they might consider the possibility.

Which brings me back to the “similarly isolated winter cities Reykjavik, Iceland and Helsinki, Finland” noted above.

In recent days, I actually seriously looked at the possibility of taking a trip to Helsinki this summer. Helsinki ticked a lot of the right boxes: the airfare-plus-accommodations price of a visit was competitive; the summer weather isn’t too bad; the seaside setting was appealing; the fact that many Finns speak English would have made communication easy; Finland is a safe country with a strong culture of trust; and Helsinki is considered by some visitors to be an underrated city that could become the next “hot” city to visit for a weekend city-break.

There was also something appealing about visiting a more normal and serene European city like Helsinki, not being in the mood just now for the Disneyland-for-Adults environment that can characterize A-List cities like Paris, Amsterdam and Rome. And I just plain like the Nordic countries, having been to Denmark and Sweden on two previous holidays. They’re not the cheapest places, but the Nordic countries are “Order People” (as opposed to “Chaos People”) cultures who like to keep things running smoothly, and you can afford to relax a bit more.

Helsinki didn’t quite make the cut, however, having decided on cozy Edinburgh instead. There was enough of a narrative there to justify spending two or three days in Helsinki in conjunction with somewhere else; but not enough of a narrative to justify spending a week there.*

Or, when I asked myself, “Why spend a week in Helsinki and not somewhere else?”, I couldn’t answer that question to my complete satisfaction, despite plenty of help from the Visit Helsinki web site and their Twitter feed, both of which are as good as any other tourism agency’s. (If you’re reading this, Visit Helsinki, cheer up: One year’s runner-up is often a future year’s winner.)

If it had been easier to pair Helsinki with somewhere or something else — nearby Tallinn, Estonia is apparently a great city, but suffering from weak air links for visitors from North America — the narrative might have been complete.

So too it might have been if the city offered a wider array of thematic walking tours, which is an area where Helsinki has a weak selection on a walk-up-pay-and-go basis. Cities that don’t have a good offering here are less competitive for the burgeoning solo-tourist market. These are people for whom spending an afternoon walking around town, conversing with fellow Canadians, Australians, Americans, Brits and other nationalities who share their interests, is far more fun than visiting yet another (*yawn*) famous museum.

Winnipeg faces those same challenges as Helsinki in attracting tourists. Tourists will come here if there is a good supporting narrative.

“I’m on a business trip” or “I’m visiting family” are perfectly good narratives that attract many people to this city every year. So too are “I’m 20 years old and I can’t legally drink at home in North Dakota,” or “Winnipeg has a hell of a lot more nightlife than Minot,” or even “Winnipeg is the back-of-beyond from where I live, and I just wanted to see what’s there.” (That, above all else, was what attracted me to the otherwise nice-but-not-spectacular Perth, Western Australia in 2006.)

Some people come from further afield because there are similarly strong narratives supporting their visit. These include, “We can’t do the kind of fishing and hunting we can do in Northern Manitoba back home in Germany,” or “I’ve been cooped up on this train from Toronto for 36 hours; let me off before I lose my goddamn mind!” That last one might be a bit crude, but it’s a fantastic rationale for spending a few hours being a tourist in Winnipeg.

The supporting narrative matters. Give people a convincing answer as to “Why should I spend a [day, weekend, week] in Winnipeg and not in [insert place name here]?” and their odds of actually paying a visit soar. It’s possible that 99 percent or more of the world’s population will never have a good answer to that, no matter what.

But, so what? Like that seemingly untouched book in the library, to someone somewhere, for the most complicated of personal reasons, that’s exactly what they’re looking for. The key is to find that person.

 

* – Indeed, Finland’s main tourist sources seem to be its immediate neighbours including Russia, for whom Finland is an easy weekend getaway; and the Japanese, for whom Helsinki is a logical gateway to other places in Europe thanks to the curvature of the Earth and Finnair’s use of Helsinki as a hub for connecting Europe and Asia. (There might also be some interesting underlying cultural reasons, discussed here, for the Japanese interest in Finland.)

The World’s Best Countries, 2017 Edition: Denmark, Made Great Again

It has been more than two years since the last time I compared countries across four indices — the Human Development Index, the Corruption Perceptions Index, the World Competitiveness Scoreboard and the Global Peace Index — in search of the world’s best countries. So, I decided that it was time to do so again to see if anyone has moved up, or down, in the world.

This is particularly timely given that the White House is currently occupied by a bizarre new president who has vowed to “make America great again”. Just what does “great” look like? To be a contender, by my standards, a great country needs to provide its citizens with an exceptional quality of life, an honest form of government and judicial dispute resolution, economic opportunity, and protection from harm. Thus, it should rank highly across all four of the indices noted above.

As I did last time, I converted each country’s raw score in each index — not its rank — into a new score showing the country’s proximity to the best performer in that class. Then, I calculated the average score across the four indices

Last time out, Denmark emerged as the world’s best country, followed closely by Switzerland, New Zealand, Finland and Norway. Canada’s average score of 91.6 was good enough for a seventh-place finish, just behind Sweden.

This year, not much has changed. Denmark, Switzerland and New Zealand repeat their first-, second- and third-place finishes, with Sweden and (surprise!) Singapore rounding out the top five — even though Singapore performed relatively weakly in the Global Peace Index. Iceland, Norway and Canada tied for sixth place with a score of 91.5, while Finland and the Netherlands round out the top 10 with another tie at 90.1 each.

COUNTRY	HUMAN DEVELOPMENT INDEX (2015)	CORRUPTION PERCEPTIONS INDEX (2016)	WORLD COMPETITIVENESS SCOREBOARD (2016)	GLOBAL PEACE INDEX (2016)	AVERAGE
Denmark	97.5	100.0	93.6	95.7	96.7
Switzerland	98.9	95.6	100.0	87.0	95.4
New Zealand	96.4	100.0	87.3	92.6	94.1
Sweden	96.2	97.8	94.2	81.6	92.5
Singapore	97.5	93.3	99.6	77.7	92.0
Iceland	97.0	86.7	82.2	100.0	91.5
Norway	100.0	94.4	91.9	79.5	91.5
Canada	96.9	91.1	91.9	85.9	91.5
Finland	94.3	98.9	83.7	83.4	90.1
Netherlands	97.4	92.2	93.2	77.4	90.1
Germany	97.6	90.0	90.4	80.2	89.6
Ireland	97.3	81.1	93.4	83.2	88.8
Australia	98.9	87.8	86.0	81.4	88.5
Austria	94.1	83.3	81.8	93.3	88.1
Japan	95.2	80.0	80.3	85.4	85.2
Belgium	94.4	85.6	82.3	78.0	85.1
United Kingdom	95.8	90.0	85.0	65.1	84.0
United States	96.9	82.2	99.9	55.3	83.6
France	94.5	76.7	74.9	65.2	77.8

What if we calculate each country’s standing a bit differently by looking not at the average, but at the weakest link — the point at which the country deviates the most from the perfect score of 100? In this case, Denmark still remains number-one, with a score of 93.6, followed by New Zealand and Switzerland. Canada, meanwhile, breaks out of its tie with Norway and Iceland for a fourth-place finish.

COUNTRY	HUMAN DEVELOPMENT INDEX (2015)	CORRUPTION PERCEPTIONS INDEX (2016)	WORLD COMPETITIVENESS SCOREBOARD (2016)	GLOBAL PEACE INDEX (2016)	“WEAKEST LINK”
Denmark	97.5	100.0	93.6	95.7	93.6
New Zealand	96.4	100.0	87.3	92.6	87.3
Switzerland	98.9	95.6	100.0	87.0	87.0
Canada	96.9	91.1	91.9	85.9	85.9
Finland	94.3	98.9	83.7	83.4	83.4
Iceland	97.0	86.7	82.2	100.0	82.2
Austria	94.1	83.3	81.8	93.3	81.8
Sweden	96.2	97.8	94.2	81.6	81.6
Australia	98.9	87.8	86.0	81.4	81.4
Ireland	97.3	81.1	93.4	83.2	81.1
Germany	97.6	90.0	90.4	80.2	80.2
Japan	95.2	80.0	80.3	85.4	80.0
Norway	100.0	94.4	91.9	79.5	79.5
Belgium	94.4	85.6	82.3	78.0	78.0
Singapore	97.5	93.3	99.6	77.7	77.7
Netherlands	97.4	92.2	93.2	77.4	77.4
France	94.5	76.7	74.9	65.2	65.2
United Kingdom	95.8	90.0	85.0	65.1	65.1
United States	96.9	82.2	99.9	55.3	55.3

Improving in one area can help a country improve its performance in all four areas. For example, corruption can take a toll on a people’s well-being, stifle economic growth and spark a desperate struggle for mere survival that can rob a country of its peace. Likewise, improvements in education — a “human development” issue — can reduce tolerance for corruption, open up additional economic opportunities and calm the overall social environment.

Some countries, including Canada, have done a good job in that regard, and have the excellent quality of life to show for it. But for now, the Danes can justifiably pat themselves on the back for a job well done — and grin broadly at how jealous the Swedes, their traditional friendly rivals, will be.

As AM empties out, FM is nearly full with no relief in sight

My first introduction to Winnipeg’s CKJS 810 came in high school when one of my classmates, either knowing it would appeal to my fondness for the absurd or in a failed bid to save my soul, handed me a leaflet promoting The Bob Larson Show. As I recall it, Larson performed on-air exorcisms and chattered away about Satan during a controversial, quasi-religious syndicated show that aired on CKJS starting at 11 p.m.

So, for a while, I would listen to 15 minutes or maybe a half-hour of Larson doing his weird late-night show until I lost interest after a while. Given that I remain about as religious as your average coffee pot, it hardly sold me on Larson’s quirky brand of Christianity, but it was mildly amusing all the same.

The times haven’t been kind to CKJS, whose schedule is a mix of ethnic and Christian programming. If the 43-year-old station ever had an impact on Winnipeg’s radio ratings, those days are long over. This week, parent company Dufferin Communications applied to the Canadian Radio-Television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) for permission to move CKJS from 810 AM to 92.7 FM for economic reasons:

While analyzed on its own, CKJS has been operating at a low PBIT margin, its role within the Winnipeg Cluster cannot be overstated. Dufferin is very concerned about it’s declining revenues year over year. The scenarios with and without approval, filed confidentially, clearly show the outcome stemming from this decision. Denial will keep CKJS on the downward trend, likely to become more aggravated when combined with rising operating costs and inflation. Approval on the other hand will ensure its incumbent status, reverse the trend and keep it modestly profitable as a key and integral part of the Winnipeg cluster.

[…]

At present, Dufferin leases several acres of land in order to operate the antenna array required to deliver the signal of CKJS. In contrast, single tower rents for FM services in the market are not nearly as expensive. Allowing Dufferin to operate CKJS on the FM frequency would result in an immediate decrease in costs, as well as ongoing savings into the future. These profits would then be used to ensure all three members of the Winnipeg Cluster can deliver high quality programming to the demographics they are intended to serve.

“The Winnipeg Cluster” refers to Dufferin’s other Winnipeg stations sharing CKJS’s Corydon Ave. studios, Hot 100.5 and Energy 106.

If the CKJS application is approved, the new 92.7 FM signal would originate from a Rogers Broadcasting-owned tower on St. Mary’s Road at a maximum power of 35,000 watts. The current 10,000-watt AM signal originates from a series of towers just off Waverley St. south of the Perimeter Highway.

The new signal would complicate the operations of Awaz 92.9, a very-low-power East Indian radio station operating, without a CRTC licence thanks to a regulatory loophole, “from the second floor of [owner Baldev Gill’s] Gill Taxi Meter and Radio shop on Selkirk Avenue.” Gill’s station would be forced to a new frequency both to prevent interference to 92.7 and to avoid being completely drowned out by the stronger signal.

Yet CKJS 92.7 might struggle with its own reception issues. If you tune your radio to 92.7 right now — especially in the south end of the city, close to where most of the high-powered 100,000-watt FM transmitters are located — you might not necessarily hear the calming hiss of dead air, but a cacophony of signal spillovers from other stations.

Some of this might come from 92.1 CITI FM, whose powerful signal throws off radio debris up to several FM frequencies away in both directions. The lower end of 92.7’s bandwidth is also nearly 10.6 MHz below the powerful Virgin Radio 103.1 signal, which could cause some radios to pick up both signals due to design issues.

The state of the lower FM dial, April 2017. Note the splatter thrown off by the high-powered station, and the background interference on 92.7 (upper right).

The 92.7 frequency is also one of a shrinking number of plausibly useable FM frequencies in Winnipeg. Stations with the kind of strength needed to push an easily audible FM signal deep into office buildings generally need to be kept at least 0.6 MHz apart just to prevent mutual interference.

Depending on signal strength, new FM signals may need to be up to 290 kilometres (180 miles) apart from existing FM stations on the same frequency, and up to 240 kilometres (149 miles) apart from neighbouring-frequency stations. The latter radius alone includes Kenora, Grand Forks, Brandon and other communities.

Add to that the aforementioned splatter from other high-powered stations which has left very few “quiet” zones between stations on the local FM band.

Normally, the regulators at the CRTC frown on a single station owner holding more than two FM licences in a single metropolitan area, a limitation that CKJS’s owners have asked to be exempted from on public service grounds. Granting the exemption, however, raises the question of why a low-listenership station should be given priority over Winnipeg’s two remaining commercial AM stations, CJOB 680 and TSN 1290.

Even if they would prefer to abandon the AM dial, it would be very difficult to shoe—horn either CJOB or TSN 1290 into a crowded and interference-plagued FM band. There has been talk about extending the FM band down to 76 MHz now that TV channels 5 and 6 have been nearly abandoned due to their poor suitability for digital TV broadcasting, but any action is still years away. So too is a migration to all-digital radio, which would allow two or more stations to share the same frequency, just as digital TV stations are able to do today.

* – Some fellow radio geeks might wonder how I was able to generate the image above. This was thanks to a handy device called the SDRPlay Wideband USB Radio Receiver, which allows the user — after downloading a free program called Cubic SDR — to receive radio signals almost up to the microwave range on a laptop or desktop computer. I’ve used its visualizations with a bit of success to improve my digital TV reception, by finding the “good” spots where my antenna receives the most signal and the least noise on the troublesome VHF band. One of my discoveries: both channels 7 and 13 are vulnerable to FM harmonics. That is, the same FM stations that litter the rest of the FM dial with signal splatter are throwing their radio debris up into the 176 to 216 MHz range, i.e., 88 to 108 MHz times two.

Here to there and there to here

Statistics Canada has long been in the habit of releasing annual interprovincial net migration numbers, which never fails to stir up a bit of debate here in Manitoba because we — like several smaller provinces — almost annually see more people move out to other provinces than move in from them.

If we’ve long known where provinces stand in relation to one another, the same hasn’t been true for cities. Only recently did Statistics Canada release its first data on movement between the nation’s cities — this coming to my attention only after reading the Worthwhile Canadian Initiative blog’s analysis of the patterns.

What does Statistics Canada’s numbers say about Winnipeg? To no one’s surprise, the majority of Winnipeg’s domestic newcomers in 2014-15 — 57 percent — came from other parts of Manitoba. Meanwhile, 41 percent of those who left Winnipeg, but not the country, also stayed within Manitoba.

English-speaking Canada’s five big metropolitan areas — specifically, Toronto, Vancouver, Calgary, Edmonton and Ottawa — were the next largest sources of both domestic newcomers and leavers, collectively accounting for 17 percent of those who moved to Winnipeg and one-third (32%) of those who moved away from the city. Rural and smaller cities and towns in the western provinces and Ontario collectively accounted for little more than one-in-ten newcomers and leavers.

The flow to and from more distant parts of Canada was distinctly thinner. Fewer than two percent of those who moved out in 2014-15 ended up in either Quebec or Nova Scotia, while the other East Coast provinces and the northern territories only drew tiny numbers of Winnipeggers.

Indeed, across Canada there was a distinct pattern whereby those who left their communities either stayed within their provinces, or moved to Alberta or B.C., or to a lesser extent moved to the closest convenient province, eschewing more distant ones.

For instance, of those who left Thunder Bay, Ont. in 2014-15 — a city facing a bleak future — 69 percent remained within Ontario, while the only other provinces to capture five percent or more of leavers were Manitoba (5%), B.C. (9%) and Alberta (11%). A similar pattern could be seen in Halifax, where there was a strong preference for Ontario (27%, identical to the percentage of Halifax-leavers who moved to other parts of N.S.), with only Alberta (18%), B.C. (7%) and New Brunswick (7%) cracking the five-percent mark. (Newfoundland and Labrador, however, came close at 4.7 percent).

The same pattern of staying as close to home as possible unless a truly compelling economic, educational or retirement opportunity beckons shows on the arrivals side. Of domestic migrants who arrived in Winnipeg in 2014-15, for example, 57 percent were moving within the province as noted above, while nearly one-half of those who arrived from another province came from either Ontario (38% of those arriving from outside of Manitoba) or Saskatchewan (11%). Almost all of the remainder came from within western Canada: 22 percent from Alberta and 16 percent from B.C.

The strong pull of the Big Five cities, compared to the inconsequential effect of the country’s secondary cities, illustrates the former’s importance in Canada’s future. But ultimately the most important markets for each of Canada’s cities, in terms of the ebb and flow of citizens, are their own hinterlands.

Amazon’s annual list: Canada’s 20 most romantic cities, or its dullest ones?

To garner some publicity ahead of Valentine’s Day, Amazon produced last week its annual list of Canada’s 20 most romantic cities. As in past years, it included some odd picks. Cities like Montreal and Quebec City, known for their character and nightlife, were completely excluded from the list. Yet cities like Grande Prairie, Alta. and Burlington, Ont. — cities which even some locals might hesitate to describe as “romantic” — made the cut.

What gives? There’s a good chance that Amazon’s own methodology inadvertently results in a list of Canada’s dullest cities instead of its most romantic ones. As the online retailer described in its news release, the rankings are based on Amazon’s per capita “sales of romance novels (both print and Kindle editions), romantic comedies, relationship books, jewelry and sexual wellness products.”

@abbyploms I know like Abbotsford is the least romantic city in Canada 😂😂 how is this real

— ss (@simraansidhuu_) February 5, 2017

HAHA Prince George got voted the 6th most romantic city in Canada

— El bandito (@Modern_Don_Juan) February 3, 2017

I'd like to know why and how Abbotsford was voted the second most romantic city in Canada!?!?

— Sarah O (@sarahbobarah6) February 3, 2017

Grande Prairie is the 4th most romantic city in Canada? Wouldn't call everyone getting knocked up in high school overly romantic but alright

— Jordan (@wpgfeasey) February 2, 2017

Naturally, this would tend to produce a skew toward places where these things are not easily available in the community and must instead be shipped in.

So, if Abbotsford and Grande Prairie aren’t exactly Paris in the Spring, where might love be in the air in Canada? “Romance” is difficult to quantify, and a city’s romance factor can vary greatly between the inner city and the suburbs, so just for fun, let’s have a look at one basic metric: the percentage of the population age 15 and over who are available — that is, single (and not living common-law), separated, divorced or widowed.

Since 43 percent of Canadians aged 15 or older are “available”, one would expect that the areas where this percentage is far higher must have some sort of special appeal — to be the places where love, or at least sex, are in the air.

Fortunately, Statistics Canada allows us to focus on specific neighbourhoods now that they provide demographic statistics by Forward Sortation Area (FSA) — better known to most Canadians as the first three characters of our postal codes.

With that data available, which of Canada’s urban neighbourhoods have the highest concentrations of available people? A Top 10 list, with a few hard-to-explain surprises of its own:

1. Montreal, Que. H2X (Place-des-Arts/Ville Marie): This neighbourhood on the northeast side of downtown Montreal can claim to be the Singles Capital of Canada. Not only are 70 percent of its residents neither married nor in a common-law relationship, it’s one of those rare neighbourhoods in which the majority — 57 percent — are single. Credit at least in part a large university population, with McGill University and UQAM being in close proximity.

2. Vancouver, B.C. V6A (Downtown Eastside [!]/Strathcona): A questionable #2, admittedly. While Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside (often abbreviated “DTES”) is somewhat notorious for being one of Canada’s most troubled neighbourhoods, at least the area can claim to have lots of available people, as 70 percent of residents were neither married nor living common-law as of the 2011 census.  Perhaps there’s a Skid Row effect at play here? Nevertheless, between the mountains and the sea, the City of Vancouver is at least a stronger contender than some of Amazon’s picks for “most romantic” status.

3. Saint John, N.B. E2L (City Centre): I’m not too familiar with foggy Saint John, N.B., but for whatever reason, the inner city has a disproportionately high concentration of available people, given that 68 percent are neither married nor living common-law, and nearly one-half are single. The city has become a popular cruise ship stop, so it must have something going for it.

4. Ottawa, Ont. K2P (Centretown/Golden Triangle): The nation’s capital attracts a lot of young people who work long hours for low pay as political staff. So, perhaps it should be no surprise that inner-city Ottawa, within walking distance of Parliament, has one of the nation’s highest densities of available people. Not only are two-thirds (68%) neither married nor in a common-law relationship, but the majority (53%) are single.

5. London, Ont. N6B (City Centre-Woodfield, south/east of Downtown): Another surprise. Unlike its British namesake, London, Ont. has a reputation for being rather dull. But it’s a university town, and that’s perhaps why its inner city has a disproportionately high number of available people (68%) and particularly of singles (48%). This particular area also has a number of high-rises, which in themselves tend to have higher concentrations of single, separated, divorced or widowed households than do neighbourhoods full of detached homes.

6. Toronto, Ont. M5B (Garden District): If you’re looking for nightlife, you can’t go wrong living in Toronto’s highrise-intensive Garden District, which includes Toronto’s busy Yonge St., Massey Hall, the Ed Mirvish Theatre and Ryerson University. That might explain why two-thirds of the area’s residents (67%) are neither married nor common-law, and 55 percent are single.

7. Ottawa, Ont. K1N (Byward Market/Lower Town/Sandy Hill): With the University of Ottawa within its boundaries and Parliament Hill being just a 25-minute walk away, this area of Ottawa, heavy with apartments and condos, can’t help but to have its share of available people. Sixty-one percent are neither married nor common-law, and 51 percent are single.

8. Toronto, Ont. M5T (Chinatown/Kensington Market): Located west of downtown Toronto and made famous by the ‘70s TV show King of Kensington, this area of the country’s biggest city adjacent to Queen’s Park and the University of Toronto is not a bad place to look for love: 66 percent are neither married nor common-law, and 50 percent are single.

9. Halifax, N.S. B3J (City Centre): If you’ve ever been to Halifax, it’s not hard to see how its city centre could be conducive to a bit of romance, with the harbour on one side and the Citadel on the other. A large university population — Dalhousie and Saint Mary’s universities being nearby — help account for the fact that fully 58 percent of the area’s residents are single. Add in the divorced, separated and widowed, and the availability rate rises to 66 percent.

10. Montreal, Que. H2L (Gay Village): Perhaps it should be no surprise that a neighbourhood simply known as the Gay Village has a population that is 66 percent available, including 52 percent single. Located northeast of downtown Montreal, the neighbourhood is close to both UQAM (ostensibly boosting the student population) and to the nightlife, for which Montreal is famous, along Rue Saint-Denis and in the Quartier des Spectacles.

Winnipeg falls just short of the Top 10 list, with R3B — north of Portage from the University of Winnipeg to the Exchange District — being good for a #11 finish, as 65 percent of residents aged 15-plus were neither married nor living common law in 2011, including 45 percent who were single. While this includes some sketchy areas — a moonlight walk along Cumberland Ave. is perhaps not the safest thing to do — the presence of the university and the development of the Exchange District quite likely helps.

At the extreme opposite end of the list, the hunt for love is not likely to be harder than in Ingolf, Ont. P0Y. Not only is the population small — just 63 people — but only 17 percent of residents aged 15 or older are neither married nor living common-law. But if we once again exclude the most thinly populated areas, Canada’s most “settled” neighbourhoods — the bottom five — include:

5. Calgary, Alta. T3L (Tuscany/Scenic Acres): These two outer suburbs in northwest Calgary start off this list, with just 29 percent of those aged 15 or over being single, separated, divorced or widowed. Not much to do for fun out that way, except perhaps to go for a coffee at the Starbucks in the strip mall parking lot.

4. Winnipeg, Man. R3X (Island Lakes/Royalwood): Way out on the edge of town, with virtually nowhere to go for fun locally, this suburban area is Married-With-Children country. Seventy-one percent of the area’s age-15-plus population is either married or living common-law, leaving just 29 percent available.

3. Bedford, N.S. B4B (Bedford/Hammonds Plains): This deeply suburban area on the western outskirts of Halifax offers little to see or do, except perhaps a walk in the woods. Not surprisingly, this has one of the country’s lowest proportions of single, separated, divorced or widowed people — just 28 percent.

2. Whitby, Ont. L1M (Brooklin): Brooklyn, New York might offer a lot for the single, separated, divorced or widowed to do; but Brooklin, Ont. — politically part of the city of Whitby, but physically separated from it by a freeway and open land — certainly does not. Strictly suburban Brooklin doesn’t even have a town centre; just a mall called the Brooklin Towne Centre where you could look for love at the Tim Horton’s, or perhaps at Dollarama. For more excitement, downtown Toronto is just 45 minutes away — by freeway.

1. Calgary, Alta. T3M (Cranston/Auburn Bay): What could be more romantic that the cul-de-sacs of the most far-flung subdivisions of a city defined by sprawl? Just about any other neighbourhood in Canada, really. The Cranston and Auburn Bay neighbourhoods, on Calgary’s southeastern edge, are the most settled of Canada’s urban neighbourhoods: three-quarters of its residents aged 15-plus are married or living common-law, leaving just 26 percent up for grabs.