Victoria, British Columbia
This article refers to the city of Victoria. Information on Greater Victoria can be found in the Greater Victoria article. For electoral districts with the name Victoria, or in the area of greater Victoria, please see Victoria (electoral districts)altitude= 23 | RD= Capital Regional District | regional_district= Capital | mp_names= Denise Savoie | mla_names= Carole James, Rob Fleming | mayor_name= Alan Lowe
(past mayors) | manager_name= | governing_body= Victoria City Council | time_zone= PST (UTC-8) | postal_code= V0S, V8N-V8Z, V9A-V9E | area_code= +1-250 | footnotes= Victoria.BC.caVictoria is a Canadian city, and the provincial capital of British Columbia. It is also the seat of the Capital Regional District. Victoria is located on Vancouver Island, and is considered a major tourist destination.Located near the southeastern tip of Vancouver Island, and overlooking the Strait of Juan de Fuca, the City of Victoria has a total population of approximately 74,100, and is the thirteenth most populous municipality in the province. The metropolitan area comprising thirteen municipalities informally referred to as Greater Victoria has more than 335 000 and is the largest urban area on Vancouver Island. [1]. The city's chief industries are tourism and provincial government administration. Other major employers include the Canadian Forces (the township of Esquimalt is the base for the Pacific Fleet), and the University of Victoria (located in the municipalities of Oak Bay and Saanich).
The city of Greater Victoria is the southernmost urban area in Western Canada, located below the northern 49th parallel, which bisects Vancouver Island at the community of Ladysmith, British Columbia.Prior to the arrival of the Europeans in the late 1700s, the Victoria area was home to several communities of Coast Salish peoples, including the Songish (Songhees). The Spanish and British took up the exploration of the northwest coast of North America beginning with the voyage of Captain Cook in 1776, although the Victoria area of the Strait of Juan de Fuca was not penetrated until 1791. Spanish sailors visited Esquimalt harbour (within the modern Capital Regional District) in 1790 and again in 1792. Founded by the Hudson's Bay Company in 1843 as Fort Camosun (after the "camosack", a type of wild lily native to southern Vancouver Island) as a fur trading post, the settlement was later called Fort Victoria, in honour of Queen Victoria [2]. The Songhees established a village across the harbour from the fort. The Songhees' village was later moved north of Esquimalt. When the crown Colony of Vancouver Island was established in 1849, a town was laid out on the site and made the capital of the colony. The Chief Factor of the fort, James Douglas was made governor of the colony, and would be the leading figure in the early development of the city until his retirement in 1864.
With the discovery of gold on the British Columbia mainland in 1858, Victoria became the port, supply base, and outfitting centre for miners on their way to the Fraser Canyon gold fields, mushrooming from a population of 300 to over 5000 literally within a few days. In 1866 when the island was politically united with the mainland, Victoria remained the capital of the new united colony and became the provincial capital when British Columbia joined the Canadian Confederation in 1871. Victoria was incorporated as a city in 1862. In 1865 Esquimalt was made the North Pacific home of the Royal Navy, and remains Canada's west coast naval base.
In 1886, with the completion of the Canadian Pacific Railway terminus on Burrard Inlet, Victoria's position as the commercial centre of British Columbia was irrevocably lost to the City of Vancouver. The city subsequently began cultivating an image of genteel civility within its natural setting, an image aided by the impressions of visitors such as Rudyard Kipling, the opening of the popular Butchart Gardens in 1904 and the construction of the Empress Hotel by the Canadian Pacific Railway in 1908. Sir Robert Dunsmuir, a leading industrialist whose interests included coal mines and a railway on Vancouver Island, constructed Craigdarroch Castle in the Rockland area, near the official residence of the province's lieutenant-governor. His son James Dunsmuir became premier and subsequently lieutenant-governor of the province and built his own grand residence at Hatley Park (used for several decades as a military college, now Royal Roads University) in the present City of Colwood.
A real estate and development boom ended just before World War I, leaving Victoria with a large stock of Edwardian public, commercial and residential structures that have greatly contributed to the City's character. A number of municipalities surrounding Victoria were incorporated during this period, including the Township of Esquimalt, the District of Oak Bay, and several municipalities on the Saanich peninsula. Since World War II the Victoria area has seen relatively steady growth, becoming home to two major universities. Since the 1980s the western suburbs have been incorporated as new municipalities, such as Colwood and Langford. The thirteen municipal governments within the Capital Regional District afford the residents a great deal of local autonomy, although there are periodic calls for amalgamation. | Victoria's Inner Harbour with The Empress hotel in the background. |
Victoria has a Mediterranean climate, with mild, rainy winters and cool, dry summers. Daily temperatures rise above 30 °C on an average of only one day per year and fall below -5 °C on an average of only 2 nights per year. During the winter, the average daily high and low temperatures are 8.2 °C and 3.6 °C, respectively. The summer months are equally mild, with an average high temperature of 19.6 °C and low of 11.3 °C . Victoria does occasionally experience more extreme temperatures. The highest temperature ever recorded in Victoria was 35.3 °C on July 23, 2004, while the coldest temperature on record was -15.6 °C on December 29, 1968. Victoria has not recorded a temperature below -10 °C since 1990.
Thanks to the rain shadow effect of the nearby Olympic Mountains in Washington State, Victoria is the driest location on the B.C. coast, with much lower rainfall than other nearby areas. Total annual precipitation is just 608 mm at the Gonzales weather station in Victoria compared with 1,589 mm in Vancouver, 100 km to the north, and 3,671 mm at Port Renfrew, just 80 km away on the southwest coast of Vancouver Island. Even the Victoria Airport, 25 km north of the city, receives about 45% more precipitation than the city proper. One of the most striking features of Victoria's climate is the distinct dry and rainy seasons. Nearly two thirds of the annual precipitation falls during the four wettest months, November to February. Precipitation in December, the wettest month (109 mm) is nearly eight times as high as in July, the driest month (14 mm). During the summer months, Victoria is the driest major city in Canada.
Victoria averages just 26 cm of snow annually. Every few decades, Victoria receives very large snowfalls, including the more than 100 cm of snow that fell in December 1996. On the other hand, roughly one third of winters will see virtually no snow, with less than 5 cm falling during the entire season. When snow does fall, it rarely lasts long on the ground. Victoria averages just 2-3 days per year with at least 5 cm of snow on the ground.
The rainshadow effect also means that Victoria gets more sunshine than surrounding areas. With 2,223 hours of sun annually, Victoria is one of the sunniest places in British Columbia, and gets more sunshine than most other cities in Canada except those in the southern Prairies. Often there is a break in the clouds over the Victoria area. Pilots use this "hole in the clouds" as a navigation aid, referring to it as the "blue hole".
| Colourful flowers bedeck the genteel "Garden City" downtown |
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| Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | Year | | Average daily maximum | °C | 7.0 | 8.6 | 10.6 | 13.1 | 15.9 | 17.9 | 19.8 | 20.1 | 18.5 | 13.8 | 9.4 | 13.5 |
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| Average daily minimum | °C | 3.0 | 3.7 | 4.5 | 6.0 | 8.2 | 10.0 | 11.3 | 11.7 | 10.7 | 7.9 | 5.0 | 3.2 | 7.1 |
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| | Average precipitation | mm | 94.3 | 71.7 | 46.5 | 28.5 | 25.8 | 20.7 | 14.0 | 19.7 | 27.4 | 51.2 | 98.9 | 108.9 | 607.6 |
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| Average total snow | cm | 9.7 | 3.5 | 1.1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 4.1 | 7.8 | 26.3 |
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| Average Sunshine | h | 78 | 102 | 150 | 205 | 267 | 271 | 331 | 303 | 222 | 148 | 81 | 65 | 2223 |
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| Data [3] |
Victoria's equable climate has also added to its reputation as the "City of Gardens" . With its mild temperatures and plentiful sunshine, Victoria boasts gardens that are home to many plant species rarely found elsewhere in Canada. Several species of palms, eucalyptus, and even certain varieties of bananas can be seen growing throughout the area's gardens. The city takes pride in the many flowers that bloom during the winter and early spring, including crocuses, daffodils, early-blooming rhododendrons, cherry and plum trees. Every Februrary there is an annual "flower count" in what for the rest of the country and most of the province is still the dead of winter.
Due to its Mediterranean-type climate, southeastern Vancouver Island is also home to many rare native plants found nowhere else in Canada, including Quercus garryana (Garry oak), Arctostaphylos columbiana (Hairy manzanita), and Canada's only broadleaf evergreen tree, Arbutus menziesii (Pacific madrone). Many of these endangered species exist here at the northern end of their range, and are found as far south as Central and Southern California, and even parts of Mexico.The landscape of Victoria was molded by water in various forms. Pleistocene glaciation put the area under a thick ice cover, the weight of which depressed the land below present sea level. These glaciers also deposited stony sandy loam till. As they retreated, their meltwater left thick deposits of sand and gravel. Marine clay settled on what would later become dry land. Post-glacial rebound, which is still in progress, let the present-day terrain be exposed to air, with beach sand and gravel deposits in many places. The resulting soils are highly variable in texture, and abrupt textural changes are common. In general, clays are most likely to be encountered in the northern part of town and in depressions. The southern part has coarse-textured subsoils and loamy topsoils. Sandy loams and loamy sands are common in the eastern part adjoining Oak Bay. Victoria's soils are relatively unleached and less acidic than soils elsewhere on the British Columbia coast. Their thick dark topsoils denoted a high level of fertility which made them valuable for farming until urbanization took over.The following is a list of neighbourhoods in the City of Victoria. For a list of neighbourhoods in other area municipalities, see Greater Victoria, or the individual entries for those municipalities.
* Chinatown
* East Burnside-Gorge
* Fairfield
* Fernwood
* James Bay
* North Jubilee
* South Jubilee
* North Park
* Rockland
* Downtown
* Oak Bay | British Columbia Parliament Buildings in Victoria. |
| Victoria's skyline in May 2006. |
| One of the stone lions that guards the gate of Chinatown in Victoria. |
| Totem pole on the inner harbour. |
According to Statistics Canada, Victoria's crime rate in 1999 was the 2nd highest in the country (11,865 crimes per 100,000 population). By 2002, Victoria was ranked 5th for overall crime (10,146 crimes per 100,000 population). These figures, however, represent the skewing effect of considering crimes committed in "downtown" Victoria in relation only to the "downtown" population. The Greater Victoria area comprises 13 separate municipalities (total pop. 335,000 {CMA}). The City of Victoria (pop. 74,100) acts as "downtown" for all of the outlying municipalities, hence the counter-intuitive, inflated crime figures.Victoria is also home to the psychedelic rock blues band Hey Marmaduke, as well as former alternative rock/grunge band Wire In My Cereal.
The oldest (and most intact) Chinatown in Canada is located within Victoria. In the heart of downtown are the Parliament Buildings, the Fairmont Empress Hotel and the acclaimed Royal British Columbia Museum, with large exhibits on local Aboriginal peoples, Natural History and Modern History. In addition, the heart of downtown also has the Royal London Wax Museum, Victoria Bug Zoo, The BC Experience at the Crystal Garden and the Pacific Undersea Gardens, which showcases the Giant Pacific Octopus, the Wolf Eel and other marine life of British Columbia. North of the city on the Saanich Peninsula are the Butchart Gardens, one of the biggest tourist attractions on the island, as well as the Dominion Astrophysical Observatory, Victoria Butterfly Gardens and Centre of the Universe planetarium[4]. There are also numerous National Historic Sites, like Fisgard Lighthouse, Craigflower Manor and Schoolhouse, Hatley Castle and Hatley Park and Fort Rodd Hill, a coastal artillery fort built in the late 1890s, located west of the city in Colwood. Also located west of the city you will find Western Speedway, a 4/10th-mile oval and the largest in Western Canada. Beacon Hill Park is the city's main urban green space. It comprises more than 620,000 square metres along Victoria's southern shore, and includes numerous playing fields, manicured gardens, exotic species of plants and animals such as wild peacocks, and a petting zoo. The park also includes a few areas of natural Garry oak meadow habitat, an increasingly scarce ecosystem that once dominated the region. Each summer, Beacon Hill Park plays host to several outdoor concerts, and the popular Luminara Community Lantern Festival. The Victoria Symphony, led by Tania Miller performs at the Royal Theatre and the Farquhar Auditorium of the University of Victoria from September to May. Every BC Day weekend, the Symphony mounts "Symphony Splash", a popular outdoor event, including a performance by the orchestra while on a barge on Victoria's Inner Harbour. Streets in the local area are closed, as each year approximately 40,000 people attend a variety of concerts and events throughout the day. The event culminates with the Symphony's evening concert, with Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture as the grand finale, replete with cannon-fire, a pealing carillon and a fireworks display to honour BC Day.The only Canadian Forces Primary Reserve brass/reed band on Vancouver Island is located in Victoria. The 5th (British Columbia) Field Regiment, Royal Canadian Artillery Band traces its roots back to 1864, making it the oldest, continually-operational military band west of Thunder Bay, Ontario. Its mandate is to support the island's military community by performing at military dinners, parades and ceremonies, and other events. The band performs weekly in August at Fort Rodd Hill National Historic Site where the Regiment started manning the guns of the fort in 1896, and also performs every year at the Cameron Bandshell at Beacon Hill Park.Victoria is served by Victoria International Airport and ferry terminals to Vancouver, the Gulf Islands, and Washington state. Victoria serves as the western terminus (Mile Zero) for Canada's Trans Canada Highway, the longest national highway in the world.For over 10 years, the Hempology 101 non-profit society has gathered weekly in Victoria to openly defy prohibition laws and promote the legalization of marijuana. This group has involved itself with city politics in an attempt to increase its support.[5][6][7]Also Notable people born in Greater Victoria include:
*Emily Carr
*Russ Courtnall
*Geoff Courtnall
*David Foster
*Hey Marmaduke
*Nelly Furtado
*Carolyn Mark
*Michael D. Moore
*Rich Harden
*Nell Shipman
*Cliff Thorburn
*Ian TysonNBA star Steve Nash, although born in South Africa, grew up in Victoria, BC.Victoria has four Sister Cities:*Victoria Salmon Kings (ECHL)
*Victoria Grizzlies (British Columbia Hockey League)
*Victoria Shamrocks (Western Lacrosse Association)
*Victoria Vikes teams at the University of Victoria
*The Victoria Cougars are perhaps the most famous sports franchise the city has known, winning the Stanley Cup as members of the PCHA in 1925. They exist today in the form of a Junior 'B' team playing in the Vancouver Island Junior Hockey League.
*NASCAR driver Rick O'Dell is from the city.PrintVictoria Times-Colonist
Monday Magazine
The Martlet - UVic student newspaperAM radio*AM 900 - CKMO, Camosun College campus radio
*AM 1070 - CFAX, news/talkFM radio*FM 90.5 - CBCV, CBC Radio One
*FM 91.3 - CJZN (The Zone @ 91-3), modern rock
*FM 92.1 - CBU-2, CBC Radio Two
*FM 98.5 - CIOC (Ocean 98.5), soft adult contemporary
*FM 100.3 - CKKQ (100.3 The Q!), active adult rock
*FM 101.9 - CFUV, University of Victoria campus radio
*FM 103.1 - CHTT (Jack FM), adult hits
*FM 107.3 - CHBE (Kool FM), hot adult contemporaryTelevision*Channel 6: CHEK (CH)
*Channel 53: CIVI (A-Channel)
*Cable 11: "Shaw TV", Shaw Communications community channel*List of mayors of Victoria, British Columbia
*Canadian cities
*School District 61 Greater Victoria
*Victoria Official Tourism Website
*Victoria BC Travel & Tourism Information
*Victoria BC Lodging Directory
*Gulch Budget Travel Guide to Victoria, BC
*Hatley Castle Official Website
*Ocean Island Hostel's guide to Victoria
*Victoria Official website
*Photos of Victoria - Terra Galleria
*Live Victoria events calendar
*Bellingham to Victoria Passenger Ferry
*VIATeC: Technology Association and Job Links
*Victoria Sports Authority Discussion Forum
*Extensive weather station network in the Victoria area
*University of Victoria
*A History of Victoria 19th century Victoria
*Victoria Photos — Categorized photos of Victoria and region
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