British Expats - Lower Mainland Climate Info

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Lower Mainland Climate Info

I noted a few comments of late along the lines of it always rains here, worse than the UK, London gets less rainy days etc...Here are some figures that may be of interest to some heading to the Lower Mainland:

Comparisons to London (and the south east) are misleading, as there is a tendency in the UK to cite only rain fall greater than 1 mm. If one looks at the attached map from the Met Office, the driest part of the UK (south east) gets min 144 days when using greater than 0.20 mm. In the case of London, if rain fall greater only than 1 mm is used, it ends up with something like 120 days of rain if 0.20 mm is used it is around 145 days. All rain fall data for Canada uses the internationally recognized greater than 0.20 mm.

http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/climate/...ukmapavge.html

Of interest, rain fall variance in the UK tends to be an east west divide and not a north south one as many assume. In fact, much of the west coast gets rain fall higher or equal to Vancouver with higher total number of days of rain fall. Areas of the Lake District are amongst the wettest with in excess of 2000 mm and around 240 days of rain annually.

In terms of total rain days, London is about the same as Vancouver proper. In fact, areas of the city experience less rainy days than London, although total rain fall is about twice:

http://climate.weatheroffice.gc.ca/c...h1=0&month2=12

Although the southern regions of the LMD are a bit less with higher elevations north of the Fraser getting more. Rainfall in winter and late fall though is considerably heavier than the South East, although not much more frequent.

Nature of rain patterns are dissimilar, however, to the UK. With rain fall and total days of rain being heavier in late fall and winter and arid like in the summer months with regular drought conditions in the late summer months. City hall experiences around 50 plus days of rain of a total of 127 between November and February .Typically about 50 percent of all rain falls in these months for the region. Victoria, which has less annual rain than London (583 mm), has fully 60 percent of all annual rain fall between these months, with only around 300 mm falling between the start of March and the beginning of November.

Of interest, as previously noted, the area around Vancouverâ€™s City Hall gets as many as 20 plus less rain days than Coal Harbour which is only a few miles further north with only 127 days of greater than 0.20 mm, while Coal harbour is 155 days. The LMD has a very unusual weather pattern of micro climates. The further north one is, a greater volume of rain is experienced., due to higher elevations and proximity to the mountains, although the total number of precipitation days does not tend to exceed around 185 the same as Manchester in the North West of the UK), even in the wettest areas. Also being right on the coast can also result in more days with measurable precipitation, as I suspect is the case with City Hall vs. Coal Harbour (see also UBC).

Those coming to Vancouver this year would be forgiven in believing that it rains all the time, as we are in a La Nina year. Spring received 40 percent more rain, 50 percent less sunshine and about 2-3 degrees cooler temperatures than is typical. Worst recorded weather in over 50 years.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Ni%C3%B1a

As for annual sunshine, the Lower Mainland gets more than the South East, with as much as 300 hours more during the summer months. Victoria gets an impressive 2200 hours and measurable sunshine on 316 days a year, with the southern regions of the LMD likely being not far behind. As with rainfall, there is more sunshine in the summer months compared to the winter months. Roughly 15 percent of all annual sunshine occurs during late fall/winter with the other 85 percent (or around 1600 hours) occurring between the start of March through to the start of November.

The North west of England is around 1500 hours and London around 1600, but with the vast majority of the west coast getting around 1400 hours annually . The average for the west coast of Scotland is a only around 1100 hours or less per year.