Northern Rockies economic profile for 2012 on the web

The Northern Rockies Regional Municipality has published its economic profile for the fourth quarter of 2012.
In 2012 the municipality completed a host of projects including road rehabilitation, storm and sidewalk installations, streetlight installations, water treatment plant upgrades, reservoir maintenance and the start of a new RV sani-dump.
The airport washroom retrofit is expected to be completed in February with the official opening later this month. The airport water system has been upgraded and runway rehabilitation is underway.
Concrete tables and benches have been assembled throughout the community trail, and lighting improved on the trail.
A community and tourism marketing review has been conducted, and the second edition of the Northern Rockies hiking guide published. Northern Rockies also hosted the 70th anniversary of the Alaska Highway that took place in the summer as well as the 2012 shale gas symposium.
The municipality has been busy collecting data on water use in the Horn River and Liard River basins. The municipality encourages citizens to exercise their right to obtain factual information regarding the use of water fracturing in the region. The municipality shares the concerns of all residents regarding the water use in the region. “At the same time we want to progress economic development, such as shale gas extraction, in an environmentally responsible manner using scientifically proven technological advancements that measure and quantify water volumes and industry accountability,” the report notes.
The report notes that oil and gas jobs, required to develop and operate the shale gas basins from 2013 to 2015 will mean that a total 1,681 jobs will be available: 51 in gas plant construction, 64 in plant operations and 1,566 field drilling completions and operations.
It is expected that from 2016 to 2020 jobs in the patch will rise to 3,953, due mainly to oil drilling completions and operations.
Business licences dropped from 2011, 616 licences active to 2012 when there were 573 active licences.
Fort Nelson Real Estate
In 2009, 90 units were sold with a value of $20 million; in 2010 and 104 units were sold with a value of $29 million; in 2011 132 units were sold within an increased value to $34 million.
Last year 101 units were sold with a value of $29.2 million. Half of the 40 single family homes in 2012 sold for less than $309,000, as well as 13 parcels of vacant land, 13 manufactured homes in parks and 15 manufactured homes on residential lots.
There are 439 rental units available in Fort Nelson, about 80% of these were surveyed and the vacancy rate was 21.7%. Monthly rental rates averaged between $612 for a one-bedroom or bachelor apartment, to between $1,000 and $3,000 for three bedrooms monthly rent for residents.
The overall decline in the end these figures from 2011 to 2012 tracks the price of natural gas.
Forest activity in the Fort Nelson district
There were 69 applications made for the development of wells, pipelines, and other foreign oil and gas related work. About 467 hectares were cleared.
Other tenure holders applied for 34 licences clearing an area of 1,024 ha.
From 2011 to 2012 total construction fell from $25,000,000 to $20,000,000 largely due to a drop in commercial industrial construction values from $20,000,000 to $8,000,000. There was a slight rise in residential construction values from $5,000,000 to
$8,000,000 million.
The 11-page economic profile is available from the Northern Rockies Regional Municipality website.

Follow

Comments

comments