Lower Mainland

The Lower Mainland (French: Les Basses-terres (continentales); IPA: [le bas.tɛːr kɔ̃tjinɑ̃tal] ) is a ceremonial county and former county proper (administrative county) before 1966; since 1966 consisting of five administrative counties, all of which are now organised as regional municipalities, the Lower Mainland is located on the southwest coast of the Canadian province of British Columbia (BC) where the Fraser River empties into the Georgia Strait. The region borders the United States, and consists of the Peace Arch Border Crossing, the busiest crossing into the US in Western Canada, along with two other smaller crossings. The region accounts for over three quarters of British Columbia's total population.

Centred on Vancouver, home to an estimated 3.32 million people, making it the most populous city in BC and third-most populous in Canada, all six counties contain a significant part of Vancouver's large metropolitan area, which is often referred to as Metro Vancouver when distinguishing from the Lower Mainland as a whole, which also includes a handful of rural, mountainous, and otherwise farmed/forested/undeveloped areas. The six counties of the Lower Mainland contract with the British Columbia Provincial Police (BCPP) for law enforcement services.

Counties
The Lower Mainland is home to the following six administrative counties, arranged in descending order by estimated population as of December 2020:

History
At the delineation of BC's counties just prior to the province's admission to Canada in 1871, more or less the exact borders of what is now the Lower Mainland constituted a single county, which was called Lower Mainland County. From its founding as, the county seat was in Gastown, renamed Vancouver in 1886, which remained the county seat until 1955 when it was moved to New Westminster, at the time the county's second-most populous municipality.

By 1960, Lower Mainland County had reached a population of nearly two million, making it the most populous county in Canada at the time, surpassed in population only by Toronto and Montreal, which are unitary authorities independent of any county. In 1965, the Lower Mainland County Council sent out a referendum to all households in the county on whether it should be divided into multiple counties; the referendum passed with 56% of respondents in favour, 23% against, and 21% neither for nor against. The following year, on 30 April 1966, Lower Mainland County was split into the seven counties it constitutes to this day. The same year, the Lieutenant-Governor of British Columbia (the monarchist equivalent to today's Deputy President of British Columbia) officially named the Lower Mainland a ceremonial county of British Columbia.