Search for Metro Vancouver's best neighbourhood: Northern Region, round 1

In some areas of Metro Vancouver, what's thought of as "a neighbourhood" can be a sprawling area of 10 to 20 blocks, often with tens of thousands of people inside: your Kitsilanos, your Newtons, your Stevestons.

It's a little different on the North Shore.

"Unlike Vancouver or Surrey or Richmond which are relatively flat the North Shore is broken up into smaller pieces," said Coun.Craig Cameron of West Vancouver.

Depending on what definitions you use, you could argue West Vancouver has more than 15 neighbourhoods for its 42,000 residents, packed into small geographic pockets some semi-isolated for decades, some developed as part of a planned community many separated by rivers, mountains and cliffs.

It's much the same in the District of North Vancouver, and means that in the final quadrant of the Search for Metro Vancouver's Best Neighbourhoods which includes the entire North Shore, Tri-Cities and Ridge Meadows area a number of smaller neighbourhoods in West Vancouver and the District of North Vancouver aren't able to be included.

But while North Shore neighbourhoods have a smaller population, it can have benefits in creating community pride.

"We actually do get a collective identity, that at least for the inhabitants is distinctive," said Cameron.

"If you asked someone from West Van where they're from, they'll say West Vancouver to an outsider, and to a West Vancouver resident, they'll say the neighbourhood."

But which neighbourhoods will advance?

Today, July 16, we'll have voting in the first round. Polls are open until midnight.

How were neighbourhoods determined?

We've divided the 192 neighbourhoods into four quadrants, aiming for relatively equal population between them. Aside from all being north of the Fraser River, the municipalities in this bracket have more than 20 per cent of the region's population.

Of those, the Tri-Cities (which, somewhat confusingly, also includes the municipalities of Belcarra and Anmore) have about half the population, and therefore get half the bracket, with the other half going to the North Shore and Maple Ridge.

We're also including the entire municipalities of Bowen Island, Anmore, Lions Bay and Belcarra in the bracket, so that all 21 Metro Vancouver municipalities are included.

Because of the number of small neighbourhoods on the North Shore and Tri-Cities, a series of Twitter polls were conducted in May to reduce the bracket to a size of 48.

The following neighbourhods received automatic byes to the second round: Lynn Valley, Lower Lonsdale, Ambleside, Horseshoe Bay, Deep Cove, Coquitlam City Centre, Maillardville, Austin Heights, Westwood Plateau, Heritage Mountain/Woods, Moody Centre, Downtown Port Coquitlam, Glenwood, Haney, Albion and Silver Valley.

Vote now!