British Columbia · Civic arena
Victoria drinking water hardness is 225 mg/L on OpenStats, plus City Score rankings and local readings.
Civic arena · hometown HUD
#151 of 343
52% City Score XP
7/8 pillars on the board
Decade trail
Victoria packs 7 of eight open-data pillars into its composite standing. Tap a rival below to see how the hometown stacks up head-to-head.
Rivalries on deck
Hardness, pH, and lead from municipal reports on the OpenStats water atlas.
Full Victoria water quality report →City Score rankingsCompare cities · vs Fernie · vs MerrittHardness guide
Watershed to tap · system map
Source, treatment, and distribution for Victoria from municipal and provincial water records. Hardness and grade are published readings.
Drinking water first, then permits, tax, internet, radon, and hazards for Victoria.
Victoria sits at City Score rank #151 with a standing of 52%, from 7 of 8 open-data pillars (tax, construction, connectivity, indoor air, water, seismic hazard, growth, safety). Missing pillars score at median standing so thin coverage cannot inflate the rank. Dropping 62 places versus 2022 (#89 → #151).
Latest owned placements: building permit value rank #123 of 343 (2025); indoor radon rank #220 of 343 at 125 Bq/m³ survey mean; residential mill rate rank #240 of 343 (8.67 mill rate). Full tables and method notes live on each study edition; atlas readings for the same slug open from the topic buttons.
Arena loadout
Arena rank #151 of 343
7/8 pillars · main XP bar
Rank #85
Rank #123
Rank #255
Rank #220
No placement
Rank #240
Achievements
Published residential mill-rate context for Victoria.
Victoria West park with beach access, tennis, and water view amenities. It pulls harbour-side neighbourhood life away from the tourist core.
James Bay shoreline access on the municipal parks list. It is the walking edge locals mean when they say they are heading to Dallas Road.
Beacon Hill Park carries Mile 0 status as the western terminus of the Trans-Canada Highway on the city parks page.
Where Victoria sits in published building-permit figures for July 2026.
Victoria faces the Strait of Juan de Fuca more than it faces a mainland skyline. Beacon Hill Park in Fairfield is the big municipal green, with Garry oak ground, footpaths, and Mile 0 status at the western end of the Trans-Canada Highway. South of Dallas Road the leash rules loosen and the water opens; Dallas Road Beach keeps a James Bay address for shoreline walks. When the Snowbirds fly, Times Colonist coverage points people to Dallas Road and the pathway between Clover Point and Finlayson Point, which is how an Island capital marks a summer afternoon.
Neighbourhood names do real work here. Fernwood, Victoria West, and James Bay sit on the parks directory as filters, not marketing copy. Banfield Park gives Victoria West a beach-access park with a water view; Bastion Square holds a downtown square that still faces the harbour. Recreation menus name Crystal Pool & Fitness Centre, Royal Athletic Park, and Save-On-Foods Memorial Centre the way other cities name arenas and ballparks. Transit is Victoria Regional Transit under BC Transit, bus routes and depot fights, not Expo Line transfers.
City pages open with the Songhees Nation and Xwsepsum Nation land acknowledgement, and hanging baskets remain a municipal parks program beside the serious park ecology files. Crystal Pool and Save-On-Foods Memorial Centre keep winter recreation on city letterhead while Dallas Road handles the salt air. On the OpenStats City Score for 2026, Victoria sits at rank 30 of 125. Rankings aside, the hometown tell is Dallas Road wind, Beacon Hill Mile 0, and Greater Victoria buses: coastal capital geography that does not interchange with Metro Vancouver's SkyTrain map.
Drawn from City of Victoria Beacon Hill Park, City of Victoria Dallas Road Beach, City of Victoria, BC Transit Victoria, Times Colonist.
City Score from 2016–2025 across eight open-data pillars. Individual study placements are listed in the panels below.
Each study below is its own ranking. Where a study has more than one edition for this city, the chart shows standing across those years only.
Connectivity · OpenStats
OpenStats
Cities ranked by estimated best advertised download (Mbps). Anchored to the current ISED National Broadband Data vintage, then backcast along a national speed curve with city-specific fiber-arrival and 50/10 availability paths so relative ranks can change over the decade. Not a claim of audited historical hex maps for every year.
10 editions · 2016–2025
Construction · OpenStats
OpenStats
Cities ranked by calendar-year building permit value. Direct rows sum Statistics Canada Table 34-10-0292-01. Cities without a direct reading use population × provincial per-capita permit intensity (estimated), so every seed city has a year-varying construction signal.
10 editions · 2016–2025
Composite · OpenStats
OpenStats
Dimensional average of OpenStats open-data pillars for each panel year 2016–2025: tax, construction, connectivity, indoor air, water, seismic hazard, population growth, and crime severity. Each series is scored 0–1 within its edition; series in the same pillar are averaged, then all eight pillars are averaged with equal weight. Missing pillars score at median standing (0.5). Growth and CSI use StatCan annual tables; permits, mill rates, and broadband use live rows plus documented year-varying estimates where needed. Radon, water, and PGA may be survey/model vintages carried forward and are flagged when static for more than two years. External commercial livability lists are never inputs.
10 editions · 2016–2025
Safety · OpenStats
OpenStats
Communities ranked by Statistics Canada Crime Severity Index (Table 35-10-0026-01). Rank 1 is highest CSI (worse). Values are CMA where a metro match exists, otherwise provincial CSI. Hometown pages label the grain.
10 editions · 2016–2025
Water · OpenStats
OpenStats
Communities ranked by municipal drinking-water hardness (mg/L as CaCO₃). Hardness changes slowly; the atlas vintage is carried across panel years and flagged when static for more than two years.
10 editions · 2016–2025
Water · OpenStats
OpenStats
Communities ranked by reported lead (µg/L) on the OpenStats water atlas. Carried across panel years until annual municipal report panels are ingested.
10 editions · 2016–2025
Health · OpenStats
OpenStats
Communities ranked by Health Canada survey mean indoor radon (Bq/m³). Rank 1 is the highest mean. Decade panel years without a new survey carry the CMA survey vintage forward; they are not annual retests.
10 editions · 2016–2025
Growth · OpenStats
OpenStats
Cities ranked by year-over-year population growth from Statistics Canada annual CSD estimates (Table 17-10-0155-01). Rank 1 is fastest growth. A few places without a clean CSD match use a provincial-path estimate anchored to seed population.
10 editions · 2016–2025
Property tax · OpenStats
OpenStats
Municipalities ranked by residential mill rate. Rank 1 is the highest rate. Published municipal years are used when available; gaps are interpolated or follow the provincial median path so the tax pillar moves year to year for every city.
10 editions · 2016–2025
Housing
Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation
Average rent for purpose-built 2-bedroom apartments (all tenants) from CMHC Rental Market Survey. Rank 1 = lowest average rent among covered CMAs.
Single edition · 2025
Only one published edition places Victoria in this study so far. Open the edition for method notes and the full table.
Housing
Canada Mortgage and Housing Corporation
Purpose-built rental apartment vacancy rate from CMHC Rental Market Survey (October). Rank 1 = highest vacancy (most available rental stock among covered CMAs).
2 editions · 2024–2025
Livability
The Globe and Mail
2023 data partnership with Environics Analytics ranking 439 Canadian communities on ten livability categories.
Single edition · 2023
Only one published edition places Victoria in this study so far. Open the edition for method notes and the full table.
Livability
Maclean's
Successor-style municipal livability ranking published by Maclean's for 2019 and 2021 (no 2020 edition).
Single edition · 2021
Only one published edition places Victoria in this study so far. Open the edition for method notes and the full table.
Livability
MoneySense
Annual composite ranking of Canadian municipalities on economy, housing, crime, health, and weather.
4 editions · 2014–2018
Housing
National Bank of Canada Economics and Strategy
Ranked by Mortgage Payment as a Percentage of Income (MPPI) on a representative home. Rank 1 = highest MPPI (least affordable). Free quarterly Housing Affordability Monitor tables.
2 editions · 2025–2026
Quality of life
Numbeo
Crowd-sourced composite Quality of Life Index. Historical snapshots are free on Numbeo ranking pages; OpenStats cites Canadian cities from those public pages (cite_only). Higher index scores are better; ranks are global position on the snapshot page.
3 editions · 2024–2026
Housing
RBC Economics
Ranked by RBC aggregate Housing Affordability Measure (% of median pre-tax household income for mortgage, property taxes, and utilities on a benchmark home). Rank 1 = highest ownership-cost burden (least affordable). CMA markets mapped to primary city slugs.
2 editions · 2024–2025
Distinctive local notes and places, each linked to its source.
Beacon Hill Park carries Mile 0 status as the western terminus of the Trans-Canada Highway on the city parks page.
Within Beacon Hill Park, dogs are on-leash except in the leash-optional area south of Dallas Road.
Dallas Road Beach is listed as a James Bay park with beach access and water view.
Snowbirds viewing guidance on the local desk names Dallas Road and the waterfront pathway between Clover Point and Finlayson Point.
Fairfield's flagship park with Garry oak ecology, sports fields, and open views across the strait. Mile 0 gives the lawn a highway-end story without needing a brochure voice.
James Bay shoreline access on the municipal parks list. It is the walking edge locals mean when they say they are heading to Dallas Road.
Victoria West park with beach access, tennis, and water view amenities. It pulls harbour-side neighbourhood life away from the tourist core.
Downtown square listed with a water view on the city parks directory. Markets and lunchtime music keep it civic rather than purely ceremonial.
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