Fredericton, NB, City, pop 46 507 (1996c), 46 466 (1991c), 44 352 (1986c), area 129.58 km2, inc 1848, is the provincial capital.

The city is located in central New Brunswick, just below the head of tide on the SAINT JOHN RIVER, 135 km inland from the Bay of FUNDY.

Economy
Fredericton today is also a city of the move. The city is becoming a centre for information technologies and telecommunications in part by utilizing its bilingual workforce.
The University of New Brunswick, NB Tel, the provincial government and private entrepreneurs have combined to strengthen and nurture growth in this sector of the economy. The 2 major employers in the Greater Fredericton region are GAGETOWN CFB and the provincial government; these are followed by the Dr Everett Chalmers Hospital, the federal government and the University of New Brunswick.
Fredericton has one of the highest per capita incomes for a community in its population range in Canada. This is reflected in its rate of retail activity, which in 1996 was the second highest in Canada.

Cultural Life
SAINT THOMAS UNIVERSITY broadened the city's educational sector in 1964 by moving to the University of New Brunswick campus from CHATHAM. Also present is the New Brunswick College of Craft and Design. Theatre New Brunswick, the province's only professional English-language theatre, is based in The Playhouse but also performs throughout the province.
The Beaverbrook Art Gallery has in its permanent collection many works of Atlantic Canada and other Canadian, as well as British, artists.
Fredericton remains much as its founders would have wished: small, intimate and personal, cultured, refined and with an air of prosperity and importance in the midst of New Brunswick.