Alberta hasn’t seen a voter turnout this high since the 1980s. That according to initial numbers from Elections Alberta.

Based on the unofficial results from election night, voter turnout has been pegged at around 70 per cent.

Deputy chief electoral officer Drew Westwater said the unofficial turnout was 69 per cent. In 1982 the turnout was 66.0 per cent.

“We’re absolutely thrilled and excited that so many electors across Alberta chose to come out and choose their Alberta for the future,” said Westwater.

The highest ever voter turnout in Alberta was on August 22, 1935, when 81.8 per cent of Albertans voted. The lowest voter turnout was 40.6% on March 3, 2008.

Westwater said they were expecting to see a high turnout on election day after seeing nearly triple the number of ballots cast during the advance polls compared to 2015.

“We experienced almost triple turnout at the advance polls leading up to election day, we also saw an increase in voter turnout as well,” Westwater stated.

The voter turnout numbers are not official at this point and are still being calculated.

In Airdrie-East the initial vote count shows 20,715 people voted. In Airdrie-Cochrane 26,536 ballots were cast.

Elections Alberta is still tabulating the results from the ‘vote anywhere’ ballots cast during the advance polls. Westwater said those results should be in by Saturday afternoon at the latest.

All of the results from election night including the turnout numbers remain unofficial until a final report is released on April 26th, 2019.

 

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