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Both cities saw breakneck growth, especially in the suburbs, outpacing rural areas and some inner-city neighbourhoods.

“There’s kind of a doughnut effect,” said Laurent Martel, a Statistics Canada demography director. “The suburbs are growing much faster than the core.”

In Calgary, established neighbourhoods like Sundance, Signal Hill and Scenic Acres are slowly seeing their population decline. Meanwhile, new communities in the city’s deep south such as Auburn Bay and Chaparral have doubled their populations, as has Evanston on Stoney Trail’s north flank.

Calgary’s metropolitan area — defined as communities where half of residents commute into the city — excludes Okotoks, which is also growing.

That contrasts with declines from Drumheller east to the Saskatchewan border, and the areas surrounding Rocky Mountain House and Pincher Creek.

Divvying the province into three zones, Calgary has the highest population, followed by residents outside the two major cities, and then Edmonton. Trends suggest Edmonton will outgrow the rest of the province by the 2021 census.

These findings are expected to inform the Alberta Electoral Boundaries Commission, as it redistributes provincial ridings ahead of the 2019 election. The commission could fix a discrepancy where a resident in Calgary’s southeast corner counts for just a third as much as someone in Fort McMurray.

But rural representatives are worried about losing sway at the legislature, if their ridings dissolve or amalgamate to make room for Calgary and Edmonton.