Banff—Airdrie (Alberta) 13/338

Banff—Airdrie (Alberta)

Today we have our first Alberta riding, Banff—Airdrie!

Banff—Airdrie has existed as a riding since the 2012 redistribution, gaining boundaries from the ridings Wild Rose and Macleod. The largest municipalities are Airdrie (61,581 in 2016), Cochrane (25,853 in 2016) and Canmore (13,992 in 2016). The riding also contains the namesake mountain town Banff.

Politically, while there are pockets of Liberals and NDP, namely Banff and Canmore, the riding is solidly Conservative. The margin in 2015, a Liberal wave year, was still more than 35 points. However, in 2019 the margin grew to more than 60 points. The riding is currently represented by Conservative MP Blake Richards.

This riding is pretty on par with the rest of Alberta/the entire rural portion of the Prairies: Very large majority plus some pockets of Liberal/NDP in small communities. One interesting note is that the Greens were in second place in this riding in 2008, netting 12.6% of the vote and had quite a presence in Canmore and Crossfield, and basically the whole region. In 2019, the riding was 19/34 in Alberta and 318/338 in Canada by margin.

Rating:

Name: 7.3/10 - Less than 4 names is a win in my book, but I wish they were more general with the Rockies because Banff has less than 10,000 people.

Shape: 4.1/10 - The BC border is the reason this isn't lower, but the rest of it is so ugly! Thankfully you can't scream gerrymandering because the neighbouring ridings are just as conservative.

Individuality: 4.6/10 - The second place for the greens is so cool to me, but it's very par for the course for Alberta.

Total: 15/30 (50%)

See you tomorrow with Barrie-Innisfil!