Rural no more: How P.E.I. immigration is changing

Immigrants who arrived on P.E.I. before 2001 prefer to live in rural areas, but in the new century that trend has changed dramatically.

2016 census numbers released Wednesday by Statistics Canada show 2,180 of the immigrants who arrived between 2011 and 2016 lived in Charlottetown on July 1, 2016, and just 1,180 chose to live inthe rest of the province.

By contrast, more than twice as many of the immigrants who arrived in P.E.I. before 2001 live outside of the capital city as live in it.

The pattern matches what is happening nationally, with immigrants attracted to the cities. More than half of all the country's immigrants live in Vancouver, Toronto and Montreal.

On census day, 48 per cent of P.E.I.'s immigrants lived in Charlottetown.

Earlier this year the provincial government announced a program to try to attract more immigrants to rural parts of the Island.

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