Index · version 1.0
Filing Momentum Index
Each municipality's annual development permit filings indexed to its own 2015 total at 100, so a city is compared with its own past rather than with a larger or smaller city.
Abbreviation
FMI
Method version
1.0
Unit
Index, 2015 = 100
Municipalities included
2
Excluded
1
Base period
2015
Our analysisThis index is a construction of this platform, computed from fields the municipalities publish. No municipality publishes, reviews or endorses it.
Standings
Our analysisA higher value is a larger number, not a better outcome. More filings is not the same as better development.
The full series
Our analysisEach municipality indexed to its own base period, so the shapes can be compared even though the levels cannot.
Show the underlying data table
| Category | FMI |
|---|---|
| 2015 | 100 |
| 2016 | 100.8 |
| 2017 | 105.4 |
| 2018 | 123.2 |
| 2019 | 100.9 |
| 2020 | 104.8 |
| 2021 | 142.8 |
| 2022 | 129.3 |
| 2023 | 131.8 |
| 2024 | 136.8 |
| 2025 | 131.4 |
Show the underlying data table
| Category | FMI |
|---|---|
| 2015 | 100 |
| 2016 | 117.8 |
| 2017 | 113.1 |
| 2018 | 111.8 |
| 2019 | 93.3 |
| 2020 | 79.6 |
| 2021 | 96.9 |
| 2022 | 83.2 |
| 2023 | 84 |
| 2024 | 85 |
| 2025 | 101 |
Method
Our analysisVersion 1.0. The version changes when the formula changes, never when the data refreshes.
Question. Is development filing activity rising or falling in this city, against its own record?
Calculation. Count development permit filings by the calendar year of the application date, or the issue date where no application date is published. Divide each year by the municipality's own 2015 count and multiply by 100. A value of 130 means 30% more filings than that city recorded in 2015.
Who qualifies. A fixed 10-year window ending at 2025, the last complete calendar year. A municipality qualifies if it recorded at least 100 filings in the 2015 base year. The window is fixed in advance so that a late-starting dataset cannot shorten it for everyone else.
Municipalities not included
Our analysisNamed with the threshold each missed, because an index that quietly omits its awkward cases is not checkable.
- Ottawa — 3 filings recorded in the 2015 base year, below the 100 required. A series that begins in single or double digits measures a dataset being published, not development activity: this municipality's record reaches 143 filings in its strongest year, and indexing that against 3 would report a boom that did not happen.
Exclusion is a statement about a dataset’s comparability over this window, not about the municipality or about development in it.
What this number does not say
Our analysisPublished with the index rather than beneath it, because a figure quoted elsewhere arrives without its page.
- This is not a rating of any municipality. It measures a published dataset, not a city's performance, and a municipality may hold a field internally without publishing it.
- This is not a rating of any development. No index here scores, ranks or grades an individual application, project, site or firm — they operate on aggregates only.
- This is not a per-capita measure. Population has not been ingested, so cities are compared only with their own past, never with each other's level.
- A filing is not a building. The index counts applications made, not construction started or completed.
- Counts cover this platform's in-scope corpus, which excludes single homes, secondary suites, signs and routine relaxations.
- A municipality that changes what it publishes will move this index without anything changing on the ground.
- Edmonton publishes a usable date on 73.7% of its development permit records, so its series is built from that share. Whether the undated remainder is spread evenly across years cannot be determined from the published record.
Citing this index
Our analysisThe form that stays correct after the data refreshes.
Filing Momentum Index (FMI) v1.0, DevelopmentApplications.ca, Calgary 131.4 (2015 = 100). Computed from municipal open data.
Cite the municipality as the source of the underlying records and this platform as the source of the index. The two are different claims and should not be merged.
Questions about the Filing Momentum Index
Answered from the index definition and its current standings.
- What is the Filing Momentum Index?
- The Filing Momentum Index (FMI) is a measure published by DevelopmentApplications.ca, currently at method version 1.0. Each municipality's annual development permit filings indexed to its own 2015 total at 100, so a city is compared with its own past rather than with a larger or smaller city. It is this platform's own construction computed from fields municipalities publish — no municipality publishes, reviews or endorses it.
- What are the current FMI standings?
- Measured in index, 2015 = 100: Calgary 131.4, Edmonton 101.0. A higher figure is a larger number, not a better outcome — the index counts filings made, and more applications is not the same as better development or a better place to build.
- How is the FMI calculated?
- Count development permit filings by the calendar year of the application date, or the issue date where no application date is published. Divide each year by the municipality's own 2015 count and multiply by 100. A value of 130 means 30% more filings than that city recorded in 2015. A fixed 10-year window ending at 2025, the last complete calendar year. A municipality qualifies if it recorded at least 100 filings in the 2015 base year. The window is fixed in advance so that a late-starting dataset cannot shorten it for everyone else.
- Why is Ottawa not in the FMI?
- Ottawa did not meet the stated threshold: 3 filings recorded in the 2015 base year, below the 100 required. A series that begins in single or double digits measures a dataset being published, not development activity: this municipality's record reaches 143 filings in its strongest year, and indexing that against 3 would report a boom that did not happen. Exclusion describes how comparable a published dataset is over this window. It says nothing about the municipality or about development activity there.