I think it is a fair comparasion because you can't just compare population with population, you have to compare market sizes. When the Raiders were formed there was already an established RL market within that region, when the Storm were formed that market was close to non-existant.
The Storm have successfully continued to expand their market, increase their revenues, and enhance their brand whilst the Raiders are what? Can only draw crowds slightly bigger than the Storm, have a jersey worth around a 1/3rd of the Storms, command about 40% in Corporate Sales as the Storm, sell less merchandise yet if you were to count the RL supporting populations in the two centres, Canberra's would be about the same size.
The Storm have also been successfully in growing their support abroad, particulary in Queensland, similar to how the Swans have grown their supporter base in Victoria, they are only helping further entrench themselves within the competition.
As for your other comments, well on what grounds do you claim Seiffert is a worse ground than OP? OP is the only ground I know of where you can have the most expensive seats in the ground and have a pillar blocking half your view, Ive been to Seiffert and not seen that. Both grounds are pretty bad, and as I said before, the move to Bruce help Canberra significantly in drawing crowds just like the new OP will help the Storm.
It was your fellow Canberra fans who brought out these stats that it only took Gold Coast 1 year to get huge crowds, all I was trying to show is that it took time for even your club to establish itself.
Just in reply to your question, in 1989, Balmain, Canterbury, Manly, Parramatta and Souths all had larger crowds than Canberra, and Easts, Saints and Penrith were around the same mark, so the Raiders weren't killing it then. In 1987 Canberra's were the lowest in the league.