Ontario Construction News staff writer
Investment in new institutional, commercial and industrial (ICI) projects has grown in the most recent quarter in Ontario, but is still lower than the same period last year, the Ontario Construction Secretariat (OCS) says in its most recent economic bulletin.
“Statistics Canada recently released Investment in Building Construction data for September, allowing us to assess ICI investment for the third quarter,” OCS says in a statement released last Thursday (Dec. 2).
“Overall, third-quarter ICI investment in Ontario amounted to $4.47 billion, down 8.7% over Q3 2020, but up slightly (+3.1%) over Q2 2021. Industrial investment in Ontario was down by 10.7% over Q3 2020, but up by 2.7% over Q2 2021. Commercial investment was down by 11.9% year-over-year, and down by 2.0% quarter-over-quarter. Institutional investment in Q3 2021 was up over both Q3 2020 (+1.5%) and Q2 2021 (+18.0%).”
ICI investment in the third quarter increased year-over-year (Q3 2021 over Q3 2020) in four of Ontario’s sixteen metro areas.
Kingston’s ICI investment rose by 18.2% compared to the third quarter of 2020, while Greater Sudbury’s rose by 15.8%, OCS reports.
Ottawa and Belleville saw slight year-over-year increases (+1.2% and +0.9%, respectively). The remaining twelve metro areas saw drop-offs in year-over-year third-quarter ICI investment: Barrie (-1.6%), Hamilton (-2.9%), Kitchener-Cambridge-Waterloo (-4.8%), Windsor (-5.8%), London (-7.5%), Toronto (-11.0%), St. Catharines-Niagara (-17.6%), Oshawa (-23.5%), Guelph (-24.9%), Thunder Bay (-25.3%), Peterborough (-38.5%) and Brantford (-54.5%).
Looking at the quarter-over-quarter data (Q3 2021 over Q2 2021) the story is inverted. Thirteen Ontario metro areas had increases in ICI investment compared to Q2, while only three saw declines.
Metro areas with quarter-over-quarter ICI investment growth were: Thunder Bay (+36.6%), Belleville (+28.3%), Windsor (+24.4), Barrie (+19.1%), Peterborough (+15.9%), Kingston (+14.0%), Kitchener-Cambridge-Waterloo (+12.1%), Greater Sudbury (+11.2%), Hamilton (+9.9%), Oshawa (+9.0%), London (+7.0%), St. Catharines-Niagara (+7.0%) and Guelph (+2.8%). The three metro areas with declining ICI investment were: Toronto (-0.4%), Ottawa (-11.2%) and Brantford (-28.9%)