Quesnel, British Columbia
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British Columbia · Civic arena

Quesnel

Quesnel drinking water hardness is 179 mg/L on OpenStats, plus City Score rankings and local readings.

Civic arena · hometown HUD

Quesnel

Census_agglomeration23k pop
38XP
#327

#327 of 343

38% City Score XP

RisingGroundwater
City Score XP

6/8 pillars on the board

38%#327

Decade trail

Quesnel packs 6 of eight open-data pillars into its composite standing. Tap a rival below to see how the hometown stacks up head-to-head.

Quesnel drinking water

Regional estimate from nearest municipal sample

Hardness, pH, and lead from municipal reports on the OpenStats water atlas. This page uses a regional estimate — open the water atlas for method notes.

Hardness
179 mg/L
hard
pH
7.7
Lead
0.3 μg/L

Full Quesnel water quality report →City Score rankingsCompare cities · vs Nelson · vs MerrittHardness guide

Watershed to tap · system map

How Quesnel's water works

Source, treatment, and distribution for Quesnel from municipal and provincial water records. Open the animated map for the full watershed-to-tap diagram — no nested topic navigation here.

Local numbers for Quesnel

Permits, tax, internet, radon, hazards, drinking water, and sports rankings where a CHL hometown applies.

How Quesnel scores

Rising+13

Quesnel sits at City Score rank #327 with a standing of 38%, from 6 of 8 open-data pillars (tax, construction, connectivity, indoor air, water, seismic hazard, growth, safety). Missing pillars score at median standing so thin coverage cannot inflate the rank. Rising 13 places versus 2022 (#340 → #327).

Latest owned placements: indoor radon rank #110 of 327 at 112 Bq/m³ survey mean. Full tables and method notes live on each study edition; atlas readings for the same slug open from the topic buttons.

Against the national corpus, Quesnel carries a City Score standing of 38% (rank #327 of 343) with 6 of 8 pillars observed. That sits 10 points below the British Columbia peer average across 58 ranked cities. Within British Columbia, Quesnel ranks #54 of 58 on City Score.

The strongest signal in the current chart is seismic hazard (standing 87%, rank #300 of 343, raw score 0.026). The weakest observed pillar is police-reported crime severity (standing 3%, rank #3 of 102, 253.7 CSI). Crime severity uses the Statistics Canada police-service CSI mapped to Quesnel, British Columbia, Royal Canadian Mounted Police, municipal (table 35100063), not a regional proxy.

Drinking-water hardness on the water atlas reads 179 mg/L as CaCO₃ for Quesnel. Compare that figure to the hardness pillar on the chart and to the national hardness guide on the hub.

#327
Arena rank (of 343)
38%
City Score
6
Pillars observed
Rising+13
vs 2022
#340 → #327

Arena loadout

Topic XP bars

Arena rank #327 of 343

City Score

6/8 pillars · main XP bar

38%#327
Drinking water

Pillar avg · hardness #149

50%
Building permits

No placement

—
Internet

Rank #305

11%
Radon

Rank #110

34%
Hazards

Rank #300

87%
Property tax

No placement

—

Quesnel pillar standing

Eight equal-weight City Score pillars, 2025 panel year.

TaxPermitsNetRadonWaterHazardsGrowthCrime

Source: OpenStats composite / study editions

City Score standing trend

Standing percentage by panel year (higher is better).

Years: 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024, 2025

Source: OpenStats composite timeseries

Achievements

Rising +13Groundwater supply

Hometown notes

City profile

Older hometown notes stay on the desk archive (noindex) — this section shows recent highlights only.

Quesnel in brief

Quesnel orients around the Fraser River. Downtown meets West Quesnel across the Fraser River Footbridge, the wood Howe truss that began as a 1929 traffic span and now anchors the Riverfront Trail as a pedestrian landmark. Heritage pages still point to Carson Avenue and Front Street on the east bank and North Fraser Drive on the west. When Moffat Bridge took vehicles in 1971, the old deck stayed as the town's favourite crossing, complete with programmable lights for holidays when the array cooperates and the river below stays in view.

July belongs to Billy Barker Days at LeBourdais Park, a multi-day stage and midway weekend the Observer covers like civic weather. The 50th annual festival in 2026 keeps the third full weekend of July marked on every fridge magnet in town, from parade chairs on Front Street to Kids Day in the park. Quesnel and District Museum and Archives keeps Mandy the Haunted Doll and early photo collections in the same heritage conversation as the walking bridge and the old horses-must-not-exceed-walking-pace sign lore.

City headlines toggle between Johnston Bridge rehabilitation and Vaughan Street construction while summer wildfire desks fill the Cariboo Observer. Fire season is not abstract here. Regional blaze coverage sits beside hospital auxiliary volunteer drives and parade photos from Billy Barker weekend. Locals still give directions as Downtown or West Quesnel side, then ask whether you are walking the Riverfront Trail or driving Moffat across the Fraser. Construction season on Johnston Bridge is another reminder that crossing the Fraser still shapes the week.

Drawn from City of Quesnel - Fraser River Footbridge, City of Quesnel - Fraser River Walking Bridge, Billy Barker Days, Quesnel Cariboo Observer.

City Score over time

City Score from 2016–2025 across eight open-data pillars. Individual study placements are listed in the panels below.

0%25%50%75%100%2016201720182019202020212022202320242025
OpenStats City Score

Rankings for Quesnel

Each study below is its own ranking. Where a study has more than one edition for this city, the chart shows standing across those years only.

Connectivity · OpenStats

OpenStats Broadband Download Speeds

OpenStats

Cities ranked by household-weighted maximum advertised download (Mbps) from ISED National Broadband Data hex ISP rows, with hex-to-city assignment by population-weighted gravity. The headline 2025 score is the dwelling-weighted mean of per-hex technology ceilings (fibre and cable at 1 Gbps, DSL lower). Household-weighted 50/10 availability (%) is stored on atlas rows as avail_5010_pct. Earlier panel years backcast along a national speed curve with city-specific fiber and availability paths.

10 editions · 2016–2025

#305
Latest · 2025 · of 343
Score 95.3

Composite · OpenStats

OpenStats City Score

OpenStats

Dimensional average of OpenStats open-data pillars for each panel year 2016-2025: tax, construction, connectivity, indoor air, water, seismic hazard, population growth, and crime severity. Each series is scored 0-1 within its edition; series in the same pillar are averaged, then all eight pillars are averaged with equal weight. Missing pillars score at median standing (0.5). Crime severity uses StatCan police-service CSI only (Tables 35-10-0026-01 and 35-10-0063-01); cities without a police-service match take median standing on the safety pillar. Growth uses StatCan CSD estimates; construction uses verified municipal building-permit value per resident (population field on each city record, 2021 Census vintage); mill rates and broadband use live rows plus documented year-varying estimates where needed. Radon, water, and PGA may be survey/model vintages carried forward and are flagged when static for more than two years. External commercial livability lists are never inputs.

10 editions · 2016–2025

#327
Latest · 2025 · of 343
Score 0.377

Safety · OpenStats

OpenStats Crime Severity Index

OpenStats

Communities ranked by Statistics Canada Crime Severity Index at police-service grain (Tables 35-10-0026-01 and 35-10-0063-01 for British Columbia). Rank 1 is highest CSI (worse). Cities without a police-service match are not listed; the safety pillar scores at median standing on City Score. Hometown pages name the police service and reference year.

CSI from Quesnel, British Columbia, Royal Canadian Mounted Police, municipal (2025, Table 35-10-0063-01).

10 editions · 2016–2025

#3
Latest · 2025 · of 102
Score 253.71

Water · OpenStats

OpenStats Drinking Water Hardness

OpenStats

Communities ranked by municipal drinking-water hardness (mg/L as CaCO₃). Hardness changes slowly; the atlas vintage is carried across panel years and flagged when static for more than two years.

10 editions · 2016–2025

#149
Latest · 2025 · of 343
Score 179

Health · OpenStats

OpenStats Highest Indoor Radon

OpenStats

Communities ranked by Health Canada survey mean indoor radon (Bq/m³). Rank 1 is the highest mean. Decade panel years without a new survey carry the CMA survey vintage forward; they are not annual retests.

10 editions · 2016–2025

#110
Latest · 2025 · of 327
Score 112.3

Growth · OpenStats

OpenStats Population Growth

OpenStats

Cities ranked by year-over-year population growth from Statistics Canada annual CSD estimates (Table 17-10-0155-01). Rank 1 is fastest growth. A few places without a clean CSD match use a provincial-path estimate anchored to seed population.

10 editions · 2016–2025

#286
Latest · 2025 · of 343
Score 0.000195102916788606

Hazards · OpenStats

OpenStats Seismic Hazard (PGA)

OpenStats

Communities ranked by NRCan peak ground acceleration (higher = stronger shaking hazard). Rank 1 is highest PGA. The seismic model is multi-year; values are carried across the City Score panel and flagged as static until NRCan publishes a new generation.

10 editions · 2016–2025

#300
Latest · 2025 · of 343
Score 0.026

Livability

Maclean's Best Communities

Maclean's

Successor-style municipal livability ranking published by Maclean's for 2019 and 2021 (no 2020 edition).

Single edition · 2021

#100
Published · 2021 · of 415

Only one published edition places Quesnel in this study so far. Open the edition for method notes and the full table.

Original source · Full edition

Worth knowing in Quesnel

Distinctive local notes and places, each linked to its source.

Places to see

Fraser River Footbridge

Wood truss pedestrian span and Riverfront Trail centerpiece between Downtown and West Quesnel. Night lighting marks holidays when the array cooperates.

LeBourdais Park

Home ground for Billy Barker Days stages, midway, and Kids Day. July weekends in Quesnel usually start here.

Follow Quesnel by email

When Quesnel moves in a ranking, posts new permit figures, or lands in a study, get a short note. A few sends a year, only when something changes.

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