Courtenay, British Columbia
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British Columbia · Civic arena

Courtenay

Courtenay drinking water hardness is 246 mg/L on OpenStats, plus City Score rankings and local readings.

Civic arena · hometown HUD

Courtenay

Census_agglomeration63k pop
40XP
#311

#311 of 343

40% City Score XP

Surface
City Score XP

5/8 pillars on the board

40%#311

Decade trail

Courtenay packs 5 of eight open-data pillars into its composite standing. Tap a rival below to see how the hometown stacks up head-to-head.

Courtenay drinking water

Regional estimate from nearest municipal sample

Hardness, pH, and lead from municipal reports on the OpenStats water atlas. This page uses a regional estimate — open the water atlas for method notes.

Hardness
246 mg/L
very hard
pH
6.9
Lead
0.6 μg/L

Full Courtenay water quality report →City Score rankingsCompare cities · vs Prince Rupert · vs PentictonHardness guide

Watershed to tap · system map

How Courtenay's water works

Source, treatment, and distribution for Courtenay from municipal and provincial water records. Open the animated map for the full watershed-to-tap diagram — no nested topic navigation here.

Local numbers for Courtenay

Permits, tax, internet, radon, hazards, drinking water, and sports rankings where a CHL hometown applies.

How Courtenay scores

Courtenay sits at City Score rank #311 with a standing of 40%, from 5 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. The chart below shows how that standing moves year to year.

Published study placements for Courtenay are charted below when available. Topic atlases carry the underlying municipal readings for the same place.

Among Canadian cities on the hub, Courtenay carries a City Score standing of 40% (rank #311 of 343) with 5 of 8 pillars observed. That sits 7 points below the British Columbia peer average across 58 ranked cities. Within British Columbia, Courtenay ranks #49 of 58 on City Score.

The strongest signal in the current chart is population growth (standing 87%, rank #45 of 343, +2.6% annual growth). The weakest observed pillar is seismic hazard (standing 11%, rank #37 of 343). Crime severity uses the Statistics Canada police-service CSI mapped to Courtenay, British Columbia, Royal Canadian Mounted Police, municipal (table 35100063), not a regional proxy.

Drinking-water hardness on the water atlas reads 246 mg/L as CaCO₃ for Courtenay. Compare that figure to the hardness pillar on the chart and to the national hardness guide on the hub.

#311
Arena rank (of 343)
40%
City Score
5
Pillars observed

Arena loadout

Topic XP bars

Arena rank #311 of 343

City Score

5/8 pillars · main XP bar

40%#311
Drinking water

Pillar avg · hardness #49

15%
Building permits

No placement

—
Internet

Rank #204

41%
Radon

No placement

—
Hazards

Rank #37

11%
Property tax

No placement

—

Courtenay pillar standing

Eight equal-weight City Score pillars, 2025 panel year.

TaxPermitsNetRadonWaterHazardsGrowthCrime

Source: OpenStats composite / study editions

City Score standing trend

Standing percentage by panel year (higher is better).

Years: 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024, 2025

Source: OpenStats composite timeseries

Achievements

Surface water supply

Hometown notes

City profile

Older hometown notes stay on the desk archive (noindex) — this section shows recent highlights only.

Courtenay in brief

Courtenay is the Comox Valley's largest urban centre, the place Experience Comox Valley describes when it lines Courtenay up with seaside Comox and former coal-town Cumberland. Locals talk Downtown Courtenay and the Courtenay River in the same breath. The new 6th Street Active Transportation Bridge now links 6th Street to Simms Millennium Park for walkers and cyclists, tying into the Courtenay Riverway path and giving the river a proper pedestrian crossing that is not the busy 5th Street Bridge.

Riverfront work is the civic story of the decade. Simms Summer Concerts are back on Sunday evenings at Simms Park, lawn chairs pointed at the water. Across the bank, the Anderton Riverbank Restoration is reshaping the west shore from near 5th Street toward Riverside Park, opposite the Florence Filberg Centre. Lewis Centre runs the recreation desk, Sid Williams Theatre holds the stage nights, and the Courtenay and District Museum on 4th Street keeps the Elasmosaur and fossil-tour crowd in the downtown mix. Native Sons Hall and The LINC Youth Centre round out the booking map.

East Courtenay is planning Fire Hall #2 at the Waters Place training grounds, while Bill Moore Park and Dogwood Park are in the concept-feedback queue. The Comox Valley Record covers CVRD recreation debates and Area B politics that still shape life inside city limits, including outdoor-pool talk. Stage 3 watering restrictions on the Comox Valley water system are summer background noise. The hometown tell is whether you cross at 6th Street now, whether Simms has a band this Sunday, and whether Downtown Courtenay feels like the Valley's main street.

Drawn from City of Courtenay, City of Courtenay, Experience Comox Valley, Comox Valley Record.

City Score over time

City Score from 2016–2025 across eight open-data pillars. Individual study placements are listed in the panels below.

0%25%50%75%100%2016201720182019202020212022202320242025
OpenStats City Score

Rankings for Courtenay

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 Broadband Download Speeds

OpenStats

Cities ranked by household-weighted maximum advertised download (Mbps) from ISED National Broadband Data hex ISP rows, with hex-to-city assignment by population-weighted gravity. The headline 2025 score is the dwelling-weighted mean of per-hex technology ceilings (fibre and cable at 1 Gbps, DSL lower). Household-weighted 50/10 availability (%) is stored on atlas rows as avail_5010_pct. Earlier panel years backcast along a national speed curve with city-specific fiber and availability paths.

10 editions · 2016–2025

#204
Latest · 2025 · of 343
Score 358.8

Composite · OpenStats

OpenStats City Score

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). Crime severity uses StatCan police-service CSI only (Tables 35-10-0026-01 and 35-10-0063-01); cities without a police-service match take median standing on the safety pillar. Growth uses StatCan CSD estimates; construction uses verified municipal building-permit value per resident (population field on each city record, 2021 Census vintage); 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

#311
Latest · 2025 · of 343
Score 0.404

Safety · OpenStats

OpenStats Crime Severity Index

OpenStats

Communities ranked by Statistics Canada Crime Severity Index at police-service grain (Tables 35-10-0026-01 and 35-10-0063-01 for British Columbia). Rank 1 is highest CSI (worse). Cities without a police-service match are not listed; the safety pillar scores at median standing on City Score. Hometown pages name the police service and reference year.

CSI from Courtenay, British Columbia, Royal Canadian Mounted Police, municipal (2025, Table 35-10-0063-01).

10 editions · 2016–2025

#20
Latest · 2025 · of 102
Score 121.22

Water · OpenStats

OpenStats Drinking Water Hardness

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

#49
Latest · 2025 · of 343
Score 246

Growth · OpenStats

OpenStats Population Growth

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

#45
Latest · 2025 · of 343
Score 0.025969972219621062

Hazards · OpenStats

OpenStats Seismic Hazard (PGA)

OpenStats

Communities ranked by NRCan peak ground acceleration (higher = stronger shaking hazard). Rank 1 is highest PGA. The seismic model is multi-year; values are carried across the City Score panel and flagged as static until NRCan publishes a new generation.

10 editions · 2016–2025

#37
Latest · 2025 · of 343
Score 0.205

Livability

Maclean's Best Communities

Maclean's

Successor-style municipal livability ranking published by Maclean's for 2019 and 2021 (no 2020 edition).

Single edition · 2021

#49
Published · 2021 · of 415

Only one published edition places Courtenay in this study so far. Open the edition for method notes and the full table.

Original source · Full edition

Worth knowing in Courtenay

Distinctive local notes and places, each linked to its source.

  • Tourism copy still calls Courtenay the Comox Valley's largest urban centre, which matches how Valley residents assign downtown errands.

    Experience Comox Valley

  • The 6th Street Active Transportation Bridge opened in 2026 as a four-metre cable-stayed crossing for walking and cycling to Simms Park.

    City of Courtenay

  • Anderton Riverbank Restoration runs about 320 metres along the Courtenay River opposite the Florence Filberg Centre.

    City of Courtenay

  • The Courtenay and District Museum advertises an Elasmosaur skeleton and fossil tours, a paleontology flex unusual for a mid-Island downtown.

    City of Courtenay

Places to see

Simms Millennium Park

Riverfront park at the end of the new 6th Street bridge, home to free Sunday summer concerts. Bring a chair; the Courtenay River is the backdrop.

Courtenay and District Museum

Downtown museum and palaeontology centre on 4th Street with deep-time exhibits and fossil tours. It keeps science curiosity on the same street grid as Sid Williams Theatre.

Florence Filberg Centre

Municipal recreation and culture facility facing the Anderton riverbank project. It is a landmark for finding Riverside Park from downtown.

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