For large regions such as provinces or countries, it is often possible to get reasonably accurate near-term economic forecasts. Governments, banks, and private companies all work with their own sets of assumptions and unique models to project the economic future in terms of gross domestic product, inflation, energy prices, and so on. At the city-scale, it is important to have a reasonable forecast for the growth of the community. Community growth is often measured in terms of population, new housing starts, and new non-residential structures. By understanding how the community will grow in the near-term, a city administration can optimize their business planning and projects to ensure the best service possible is provided to residents and businesses. Forecasting growth is no easy task; any number of outside factors can influence a community's growth. These outside factors include global energy prices, shifting migration patterns, global financial markets, weather, and shifting international relationships.

At the City of St. Albert, administration utilizes a population and employment projection model to forecast upcoming growth in terms of the change in the number of residents. The Economic Development Division at the City of St. Albert recently entered into a consulting project partnership with the University of Alberta School of Business to create a model for forecasting municipal growth in terms of new housing starts, commercial building space, and industrial building space. This project involved hiring a student consulting team for a semester to tackle this analytics challenge. Three students, Mark Nassar, Evan Cherniawsky, and Yamei Wang formed the team "Lionheart Consulting" that was tasked with creating a forecasting model for administration. 

After four months of crunching the numbers, Economic Development was delivered a model that served two important purposes. First, the model identified which high-level economic indicators (Canadian household consumption, crude oil prices, Edmonton housing starts, etc) were effective predictors of St. Albert's municipal growth. Second, the model was able to forecast the near-term growth of the community, given input assumptions about the near-term growth of the high-level economic indicators (which have readily available forecasts). This municipal growth model will be a powerful tool for city administration in the years to come, as it can be leveraged to create the most effective and efficient project plans and strategies needed to achieve the community's long-term vision. Final results of this forecasting model will be released in the coming months. 

For a brief results-teaser of the model, see the St. Albert Gazette article below.