Single and looking? Try Alberta

OTTAWA – It’s a regular complaint uttered from the lips of
many a single women: finding a man in their city is near impossible.

But according to 2011 census data released Tuesday,
that complaint is a horrible truth in some of Canada’s biggest cities where
women outnumber men.

The census release, which details the distribution of the
sexes, confirms there are slightly more men than women across the country until
the age of 25.

After that, the pattern reverses and generally widens with
time. The proportions can spell a dating drought for women who are single and
looking in female-heavy cities like Vancouver, Toronto and Winnipeg.

They simply outnumber the men. In Vancouver there are just
97 men for every 100 women.

Rachel Greenfeld knows how tough Vancouver’s dating scene
can be, where there are 97 men for every 100 women. The entrepreneur ran a
social club called Campoverde in the city’s hip Kitsilano neighbourhood for
seven years in an effort to help people meet friends and potential partners.

“Many people leave Vancouver because it is so difficult to
find a mate,” she said.

Those joining the exodus may do well to head over the Rockies
to Alberta where there are several cities boasting a stronger male to female
ratio.

Calgary is split evenly down gender lines, while single
women have a slight advantage in Edmonton.

The real difference comes in towns like Wood Buffalo, Fort McMurray
or Cold Lake where the resource industry or the Canadian Forces lure male
residents. Men outnumber women 100 to 83 in Fort McMurray.

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The census showed there are also more working-aged men than
women in Alberta, Saskatchewan, the Northwest Territories and Nunavut, where
populations tend to be younger and full of male migrants.

But women shouldn’t assume moving to a small town with a
male majority will mean love will be easy, said Sarah Gooding, a product
manager at Plenty of Fish, an online dating site.

“Generally speaking, cities that have high concentrations of
men or women tend to be small towns that are either very transient
(resource-based towns) and/or occupied by a lot of people you probably already
know,” she said. “These two factors can make it difficult when you’re trying to
meet someone special.”

Gooding also cautioned about searching for love in
male-dominated communities from afar.

“When we look at people who are going out on dates, location
is really a big factor. People that are more than 60 kilometres between each
other the likelihood of them going on a date is very low.”

Gooding’s observations point to the fact that the census
numbers are only one piece of the puzzle when it comes to how hard or easy it
is to find love in Canadian communities.

The raw numbers don’t show how many of those men and women
wear wedding rings, how many are gay and how many are looking for love.

For example, a man looking for love may think White Rock,
B.C., which is 54.8 per cent female, is a good place to meet someone.

And it is, if they are looking for someone over the age of
65. The cities reporting the highest concentration of women in the 2011 census
are all known retirement areas.

While the proportion of women plays a role, for Greenfeld,
the culture of the city has more of an impact on finding love.

“What we are witnessing in Vancouver is a perpetual youth
syndrome, with no pressure,” she said. “They are not necessarily surrounded by
people who are getting married and having children like there are in Toronto.”

Greenfeld now lives in Toronto where she works as a business
coach for high-performance clients.

Dating in Hogtown, where the ratio of men to women is
similar to Vancouver, is a completely different ball game, according to
Greenfeld.

“(In Toronto) the culture is different. When you meet a
single man here the likelihood is high that he doesn’t want to be single, he’ll
tell you and he’ll do something about it,” she said.

A survey done recently by Lavalife, an online dating
company, suggests that no matter where people are looking for love, many don’t
see their current home base as the place to find it.

Two-thirds of Lavalife users, both men and women, qualified
their cities as a “black hole” in an informal survey last week.

“Even in cities where there is the biggest concentration of
people, it’s going to be like: ‘No, no my city is a black hole,’” said Lavalife
spokeswoman Kim Hughes.

Hughes said the distribution of men and women matters, but
not as much as being proactive about love.

“You only need one single person to find someone. So it’s
really not so much a numbers game, it’s how you are projecting out there,” she
said.