Canadian Redistribution - Provincial and Municipal

[Hatman 🍁]

I don't think anything is changing on PEI, because their Premier has decided he doesn't care what voters think.

[Hatman 🍁]

Might have to add Nova Scotia, as the court ruled the abolition of the 3 protected Acadian ridings by the previous government was unconstitutionnal.

But getting rid of the African Nova Scotian riding was OK?

[Hatman 🍁]

I am of course partial to my 170 seat Ontario map I posted a while ago:

[Hatman 🍁]

Let's remember that there are more people in Kenora than the census reported because there were a lot of forest fires during the census season preventing counting being done. Also, some reserves don't like to do the census.

But anyways, I think if you lob off all the northern reserves from Kenora-Rainy River, you are still left with more than half the population of the riding, no?

[Hatman 🍁]

You can't really put two ridings up there, because the only good way to divide the region is how they do it now (which is based on air links), and I think a James Bay based riding would be quite a bit smaller than the other Patricia based riding. However if you put in one big riding in the far north, you will have a problem with there being no east-west air connections.

[Hatman 🍁]

The Prince Edward Island Electoral Boundaries Commission (http://www.electoralboundaries.pe.ca/) has kicked off it's public hearings.

http://www.theguardian.pe.ca/news/local/2017/2/7/illegal-districts-on-p-e-i---boundaries-map-under-review.html

They are tasked with creating a new map of 27 ridings.  So that means that:

(a) the province is going to add 13 list MLAs to reflect the victory of the MMP side in the recent Electoral Reform plebiscite (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prince_Edward_Island_electoral_reform_referendum,_2016); or

(b) Do a Justin and toss PR out the window.

They've already tossed it out the window. A Liberal, is a Liberal, is a Liberal.

[Hatman 🍁]

the new geosearch program makes amateur redistricting a lot easier. I've just put an hour or so into a PEI proposal, and got a pretty good map so far outside of Charlottetown.

[Hatman 🍁]

What about adding Fort Erie to Niagara Centre, and moving Thorold and the small part of St. Catharines north of it to Niagara West?  The populations wouldn't be as even as your map (NF would be ~105K;  Niagara West would be ~125K), but it avoids an awkward split of St. Catharines.

[Hatman 🍁]

Any riding that connects Niagara-on-the-Lake to the rest of the island by a thin strip of land fails compactness. (though I'm aware this was done back in the 1960s with the provincial riding monstrosity of "Lincoln")

[Hatman 🍁]

Any riding that connects Niagara-on-the-Lake to the rest of the island by a thin strip of land fails compactness. (though I'm aware this was done back in the 1960s with the provincial riding monstrosity of "Lincoln")

If only there was a map that showed some sort of community of interest among Grimsby, Lincoln and Niagara-on-the-Lake, connected by a transportation route along the southern edge of St. Catharines...

Ahh, I know there is a community of interest, but it's an ugly shape.

[Hatman 🍁]

Here's my attempt to equalize the populations of all 87 Alberta provincial electoral divisions: https://goo.gl/DcCPF0.

The population statistics will be added once the 2016 Census figures are released on February 8.

I have revised my proposed Alberta map using the new 2016 Census population counts.  Please look it over and let me know what you think.

https://goo.gl/DcCPF0

(Just looking at Calgary) Pretty good map, except for that Calgary-Klein abomination. Was that unavoidable?

[Hatman 🍁]

In Edmonton, I would want to re-draw Edmonton-Southwest and Edmonton-Riverview. I don't like how the river bifurcates both ridings (Edmonton SW is particularly awful with all that uninhabited area in the middle of the riding). Also, I don't like how Edmonton-Getty crosses the highway.

[Hatman 🍁]

Much better!

Oh, and why is Edmonton-Meadowlark called that IRL? The Meadowlark area is not in the riding Maybe we should rename it Edmononton-Murphy? Though "West Edmonton" of course is the only acceptable name.

[Hatman 🍁]

Yeah, my problem with Calgary-Klein was that it crossed the Deerfoot. Krago's fix did not address that issue. I know fixing the problem would create a domino effect in other ridings, but I think it would be nice to see what it would look like.

[Hatman 🍁]

The new Calgary split in the north makes the baby Jesus cry

[Hatman 🍁]

It's almost as if they want to keep the public in the dark! Hmm...

[Hatman 🍁]

The Consultants hired to draw Oshawa's ward boundaries released their proposed maps today, only a couple of hours before a public hearing scheduled to discuss them!

Here is the report.

And here is my favourite map:

rofl. Whoever designed that map needs to be arrested for anti-democratic treason. It actually appears to be a gerrymander to ensure that left wing councillors aren't elected.

[Hatman 🍁]

PEI report is up: http://www.gov.pe.ca/photos/original/epeiEBC2017.pdf

[Hatman 🍁]

Yeah, "Calgary-Airport" is pretty dumb. I also thought the "Edmonton City Centre" decision to be even more egregious. At least they didn't put "University" in any of the names.

At least they got rid of that awful Calgary-McCall-Nose Hill abomination.

[Hatman 🍁]

The Far North Electoral Boundaries Commission in Ontario was announced on May 8.  They are required to issue their report by August 1, and the government must introduce legislation by October 30.

Here are some sample maps prepared by the Commission.

My guess is they go with map 1. All the others have significant draw backs.

My main complaint with all of them is that they put in some White communities (Red Lake, Pickle Lake, etc) into the new district. Also, with the big Hudson Bay district, you have no air links between the east half and the west half. That's the advantage of the current map.

The second and third maps are dumb because they make Timmins its own electoral district (making it the least populous in the province in map #2, and still laughably undersized in map #3). Map #4 creates for a ridiculously underpopulated James Bay riding.

Anyways, this proposal would be great for the NDP, as they're likely to get 80-90% in this new district(s), and will still probably win Kenora-Rainy River and whatever riding Timmins finds itself in (Timmins-Kapuskasing?).

[Hatman 🍁]

Ok, the proposed Hudson Bay District would not be as lobsided as I thought, but still overwhelmingly NDP. The quick & dirty results from the last election would be:

NDP: 68.4%
Lib: 18.4%
PC: 9.3%
Grn: 4.0%

With a total turnout of just 4372 (35.4%), and that's just of registered voters.

[Hatman 🍁]

Your map is definitely an improvement, but I must be nitpicky of course, and I understand if you can't or won't make any of my suggestion.

I'm not a fan of how they split up Grande Prairie. This is probably an unpopular opinion, but I think when cities are just a bit too big to be one ED, they should be split up evenly, unless you can get away with a donut hole district (which probably isn't possible in this case).
I don't like that weird panhandle in Drayton Valley-Devon (in the east)
I think Fort McMurray-Athabasca would be a better name for the Fort Mac-Lac La Biche riding. Athasbasca for the river and the town.
While you've gotten rid of that awful Fort Sask-St. Paul riding, you have now created another awful (albeit less so elongated Lloydminster-Cold Lake district). 
Does Red Deer need to be in three electoral districts? The commission has it right IMO. Why should it have 3 when Lethbridge only has 2?
Just like Grande Prairie, I would try and split Airdrie evently in half. Also, your Cochrane-Crossfield riding has that area south of the Bow River which is awkward. I would like to see this area transferred to the Banff-Stoney riding, to make the boundaries less awkward.
Even though this isn't the case right now, I'd prefer to see Medicine Hat split evenly in two.

Edmonton:
You have kept the current border for Edmonton-Decore, but they are very awkward. What's with Kilkenny being in Edmonton-Manning?
Edmonton-Riverview must be destroyed immediately. So awkward.
Edmonton-South West must also be destroyed. Glastonbury is so far away from the rest of the riding.

Calgary:
Not too bad overall, I don't like the Calgary-Kwong riding. The Cranston area is too separate from the rest of the riding. Also, Calgary Lougheed is weird with Fish Creek separating the two parts of the riding. I suppose having a riding cross Fish Creek is inevitable though. I do prefer the commission's map for the south east part of the city better.

Do you hate me yet?

[Hatman 🍁]

Yeah, I understand that some of my suggestions are impossible to deal with, but thought I should bring them up anyways. As it stands, your map is better than the commission's, and in the end, isn't that the most important thing?

[Hatman 🍁]

Of course, since I hate naming ridings after people, here are my suggested names for your ridings named for people:

Edmonton-McClung -> Edmonton-Callingwood
Edmonton-Parlby -> Edmonton-Jasper Place
Edmonton-Murphy -> Edmonton West
Edmonton-Decore -> Edmonton-Glengarry
Edmonton-Edwards -> Edmonton-Whitemud
Edmonton-McKinley -> Edmonton-Rabbit Hill
Edmonton-Rutherford -> Edmonton-Blackmud
Edmonton-Getty -> Edmonton-Ellerslie (this means re-naming your Edmonton-Ellerslie to something boring like Edmonton Southeast or Edmonton-Mill Woods South)

Calgary-Cross (is this named for someone?) -> Calgary-Village Square
Calgary-Klein -> Calgary-North Hill
Calgary-Lougheed -> Calgary-Evergreen-Woodbine
Calgary-Shaw -> Calgary-Shawnessy
Calgary-Hays -> Calgary-South Trail
Calgary-Kwong -> Calgary-Academy

[Hatman 🍁]

Don't forget Calgary-McCall, Edmonton-Calder, Edmonton-Manning and Central Peace-Notley.  They can be replaced by Calgary-Airport, Edmonton-Off Leash Site, Edmonton-Institution and Central Peace-Unpaved Access Road.

And St. Albert, Ste. Anne and St. Paul look pretty suspicious too. 

ha! I would drop Notley of course, but the others are fine, as they are also place names.