Toronto

Ontario Land Use Policies Make Housing Unaffordable

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A poll by highly respected IPSOS, released by BILD-GTA, shows a strong awareness of the Greater Toronto Area’s severely unaffordable housing.  read more »

Cities Have to Expand for House Prices to Fall

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The Ford government’s plan to expand the land supply available for housing has evoked the usual dog whistles about “urban sprawl” by interests apparently unaware of the strong connections between an organically expanding city, housing affordability and upward mobility.  read more »

The Rural Character of Canada's Metropolitan Areas (CMAs)

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There is considerable confusion with respect to the terms of urban geography, not only among the population in general, but also among the media, and sadly, among academics. Perhaps the greatest confusion is between the terms “metropolitan area” and “urban area.”  read more »

Densification in Toronto: The Evolving Urban Form

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Like many of the world’s largest cities (Note 1), public policy seeks to densify Toronto, which is already the densest urban area (the international term) or population centre (the Canadian term) in North America (as used here, north of Mexico). An urban area is continuously built up urbanization and is routinely at the core of a metropolitan area (in Canada, a Census Metropolitan Area, or CMA).  read more »

Deteriorating Housing Affordability in Canada

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The Frontier Centre for Public Policy has released the 2022 edition of Demographia Housing Affordability in Canada.  read more »

Suburbanizing Canada: The 2021 Census

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Canada continues to move to the suburbs, as the 2021 census data shows. This is based on a Statistics Canada analysis on metropolitan (Census Metropolitan Areas, or CMAs) population and change since the 2016 Census.  read more »

Unacceptable Views

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“Canada will always be there to defend the right to peaceful protest” – Justin Trudeau, in a reference to protests in India…

Asked why he supported some protests, but was determined to crush the trucker convoy, Justin Trudeau answered without hesitation  read more »

Demographia International Housing Affordability – 2022 Edition Released

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Demographia International Housing Affordability rates middle-income housing affordability in 92 major housing markets in eight nations: Australia, Canada, China, Ireland, New Zealand, Singapore, the United Kingdom and the United States).  read more »

Toronto Solidifies Highest Density Ranking in North America

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Toronto seems guaranteed to retain its position as the densest urban area in North America (Canada and the United States), based on 2021 Census data recently released by Statistics Canada. The Toronto population centre (urban area) has grown at a rate of 0.8% annually since the 2016 census, while increasing its urban density to 3,088 persons per square kilometer.  read more »

Canada: Suburbs Dominate Growth - 2021 Census

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Canada has released early results of the 2021 Census, with a detailed analysis of growth in Census Metropolitan Areas (CMAs). Among the 41 metropolitan areas, 77% of the population growth between the 2016 and 2021 censuses was in the suburbs, with 23% in the urban core (Figure 1). The suburbs have 78.5% of the total CMA population, with 21.5% in the urban core (Figure 2)  read more »