As spring and summer weather brings Vancouver warm sunny days, locals are once again flocking to the beach.
But which beach are Vancouverites spending their summers in?
While many publications have rated Kitsilano Beach highly, even calling it one of the sexiest beaches in the world at one point, it didn't take top spot when V.I.A. polled local readers.
Instead the top beach, by a large margin, according to locals, is the Locarno Beach and Spanish Banks stretch. In our poll, more than 40 per cent of locals and 36 per cent of all readers said it's the best.
Kitsilano was second, but a distant second, with only 15 per cent of locals calling it the best. Readers outside of Vancouver seem to have a soft spot for Kits, as they bumped that up to almost 18 per cent.
English Bay and Jericho beaches finished third and fourth, respectively, each with around 13 per cent of the vote.
Third Beach wasn't too far behind, either, with around 11 per cent of the poll.
Sunset Beach lagged behind, with only around 5 per cent saying it's the best.
Solidly in last place was Second Beach.
Some beaches had a significant difference between how popular they were with locals and the overall V.I.A. readership. For example, first place Locarno/Spanish Banks had an almost four per cent difference, with locals choosing it more often.
The reverse of this was Kitsilano, with a difference of more than 2.5 per cent, suggesting people from outside Vancouver much prefer the famed Kitsilano to the larger (and free to park at) section of coast further west.
Sunset and Second beaches were similar, with out-of-towners really pulling up their numbers compared to locals.
Vancouver Is Awesome polled 727 readers and asked the question: What's the best beach in Vancouver?
The poll ran from 4/23/2023 to 4/29/2023. Of the 727 votes, we can determine that 404 are from within the community. The full results are as follows:
Results are based on an online study of adult Vancouver Is Awesome readers that are located in Vancouver. The margin of error - which measures sample variability - is +/- 3.63%, 19 times out of 20.
Vancouver Is Awesome uses a variety of techniques to capture data, detect and prevent fraudulent votes, detect and prevent robots, and filter out non-local and duplicate votes.
