The Canadian Urban Environment over the past few decades

[AnarchoSocialist]

After spending a hot weekend listening to great music (Metric, Wintersleep, Tokyo Police Club....and Rush) and relaxing in parks and on patios here in Ottawa it got me thinking about how Canadian cities have changed over even just the past decade, but even more dramatically since the 80's and 90's.

Ottawa is a perfect example. When I lived in Ottawa for the first time 10 years ago there was some marginal urban development taking place and neighborhoods were no longer in decline, but certainly not growing (even Westboro which was hyped at that time was just that...all hype). Toronto and Montreal, not surprisingly were well ahead of Ottawa by a decade at least in terms of development but even comparing those cities over the past decade reveals a lot of differences.

Now, Ottawa is really starting to come around. There is a lot of urban development, both smaller infill projects, and larger condo projects. Westboro is growing, but other neighborhoods, such as Hintonburg, the Byward Market, and Lebreton Flats, not too mention Centretown are seeing much more development than the once lauded Westboro Village. Add on all the new businesses opening up in these neighborhoods, renovations of older buildings, and even a slowly improving Hull and you have a city which has in 10 years become a far more exciting city to live. It is not Toronto or Montreal, nor will it ever be, but, being fun and urban does not mean a city has to be massive either.

So my question is, how has everyone else viewed changes to Canadian cities in the past decade (or for even more dramatic comparisons you could head back to the 80's and compare it to now, which I could write about at great length). Has it been the decade with the most change to urban environments (in terms of reurbanizing them)? And what do you see happening during the next decade?

 

[LAz]

In Toronto I'd say that an insane disaster has happened. Development went beyond the regional government. We used to have closely coordinated transit with growth. But then in the 1980s suburbs beyond the regional government started killing that. So what I see going on is unplanned growth. I see sprawl. I am disgusted.


We were among the best cities in 1980. Now we can only dream to be where we were.





edit:
To quote nikki sixx...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SSyMSkbIHiA
"I don't want to die out here in the valley
Waiting for my luck to change
And I just want my dad to know
That I finally made it..."


I don't want to die out here in the exurb. I don't want to spend my life rotting away in this bleak monstrosterous landscape. I finally made it out. You should make it out of the exurban valley too.

 

[AnarchoSocialist]

In Toronto I'd say that an insane disaster has happened. Development went beyond the regional government. We used to have closely coordinated transit with growth. But then in the 1980s suburbs beyond the regional government started killing that. So what I see going on is unplanned growth. I see sprawl. I am disgusted.

We were among the best cities in 1980. Now we can only dream to be where we were.

I remember the Toronto of the 1980's (well at least most of the 80's) and I would not have called it one of the best cities. Better managed maybe, but it was not without its share of problems.

I do agree that sprawl has created its own set of problem and wastelands to deal with. But suburbs are a fact of life. People have always, and will continue to like that way of living. You can't stop them and though it is unfortunate in some ways that the growth had to take place beyond Toronto's boundaries in a semi-free-for-all zone. But there are bound to be side effects of success when a region like the GTA has grown as much as it has.

Don't forget that in spite of continued sprawl, in spite of adequate (or in some cases even any) transit investment, the inner city of Toronto (and other cities) not only stopped declining but turned around in a rather remarkable way. Not only are older buildings and neighborhoods seeing new live and vitality, but new buildings and residences are appearing everyday (in Toronto's case that is almost a literal truth.....think of how many new projects the city sees every year).

And yes...there are even some small glimmers of hope in Vaughan and Markham as the attempt to develop city centres (whether they are successful is another issue but time will tell with that). And even places like Collingwood are getting into the game of redeveloping their urban centres.

Not too say there are not problems because there are. And I have a cautious optimism about the next 10 years since a lot of the continued success will depend on cities finally starting to make the transit investments they need to (In Ottawa the LRT network, in Toronto subways, streetcars, but probably most important turning GO into a regional rail network, just as a few examples).

At least in the inner city I see the past decade having been about trying to fix the mistakes of the past few decades (Regent Park in Toronto, The Rideau Centre area in Ottawa, The Ville Marie Expressway in Montreal) with infill and other projects where ever they might happen to fall. If this decade can correct the transit mistakes then a lot of cities should be in pretty good shape (with the exception of some suburban areas and satellites but their time will come).

 

[LAz]

I really ask myself what kind of anarchosocialist are you. You sound like a rubber stamp for the engines of the free market.

But suburbs are a fact of life. People have always, and will continue to like that way of living. You can't stop them and though it is unfortunate in some ways that the growth had to take place beyond Toronto's boundaries in a semi-free-for-all zone. But there are bound to be side effects of success when a region like the GTA has grown as much as it has.

Whoa whoah whoah on there. So you are suggesting that it is inevitable? *throws up*
Oh sorry did that fall on you? Intended actually.

The fact is that suburbs do not have to be unplanned sprawling monstrosities. That is what should be stopped. Suburbs can be good if they are well planned. But supposedly planning is bad because the free market knows best - and we all know how the unmanaged free market continually fails, because of its greed.

Don't forget that in spite of continued sprawl, in spite of adequate (or in some cases even any) transit investment, the inner city of Toronto (and other cities) not only stopped declining but turned around in a rather remarkable way. Not only are older buildings and neighborhoods seeing new live and vitality, but new buildings and residences are appearing everyday (in Toronto's case that is almost a literal truth.....think of how many new projects the city sees every year).

Think about where the former residents go. Do they remain in their homes or do they get priced out.
Development in the capitalist world in the last few decades is about money and nothing but money. The goal is to just maximize profits and the human element is ignored - in fact all other elements are ignored.

And yes...there are even some small glimmers of hope in Vaughan and Markham as the attempt to develop city centres

Why didn't they do that way in advance? Oh yeah, because it was inevitable to not plan, as you like to say.

Regent Park in Toronto,

Dense highrise building is not necessarily bad. It might not be bad at all.
You are looking at a symptom and not the actual cause. That is where the problem is with your philosophy.
The problem at the very foundation with public housing in north america is the lack of investment in it. They build them and let them rot.

 

[AnarchoSocialist]

LAz: I am definitely not a free market cog. I believe in strong labour unions, in universal health care, more investment in transit and public housing, in stronger protection and measures for the poor and especially the mentally unhealthy (who have been left to rot after the Harris reforms). I think Places to Grow should be expanded to include anyplace within an hour and a half or a two hour commute to Toronto.

But I also think that it has to be balanced with personal freedom and individual rights to choose how the live their life. If someone wants to live in the suburbs, then they should be able to. However....I do also think the should be offered the choice of well designed suburbs that support transit, and pay the real costs of all the roads and infrastructure that are required to create these places. I also think that they should not just be allowed to be homogenous, middle and upper class neighborhoods. They should have to share the same burdens offer parts of the city do, such as social and public housing, and services for those who are not well off.

I dont like most of the suburban development that has been built in the past 30 years. That is why I would never live there. And I think there is a lot about those developments that needs to change. But what is built is built and to be honest so much of todays suburban landscape is disposable enough that knocking down big box power centres and replacing them with something more sustainable and transit oriented is not a big task. Might not happen tomorrow but the same thing that is happening to 60's motel and car dealership and retail strips in the inner ring suburbs will happen in the outskirts sooner rather than later.

Canada spent decades building car dependent cities. This is something that has only recently changed. It isn't just changing the form and shape of the city, its a change in how people live. This isn't going to happen overnight. The past generation has seen a lot of change and it will take another generation to really make urban, transit oriented, sustainable and healthy development a way of life for the majority (maybe even a bit longer depending on what happens in the world).

So even though I don't like most of the suburban development, I also don't have to live there and instead of getting livid and angry about the suburbs, which is totally unproductive and a waste of useful energy, I'd rather just sit back and let society work its self out. Personally I see more and more people viewing car-centric living in a negative light so I'm not too concerned that things won't change in the long term.

 

[kettal]

Don't mind LAz. His only knowledge of history comes from archival subway maps.

 

[LAz]

I dont like most of the suburban development that has been built in the past 30 years.

But you said it's inevitable?

If someone wants to live in the suburbs, then they should be able to. However....I do also think the should be offered the choice of well designed suburbs that support transit, and pay the real costs of all the roads and infrastructure that are required to create these places.

Those should go to the developer. Thanks to the entrenched free market and this idea that private interests > public interests, developers more often than not do not need to pay these additional fees for building out in the cornfields.
Hence we need to address these structural problems.

Sprawl can be prevented. It requires heavy regulation. Something like a ground boundary that does not expand, combined with a strong regional government. But that's too "commie"ish.

Canada spent decades building car dependent cities.

Call it whatever you want to call it, but the fact is that Canadian cities are much less car dependent than American ones. We are not a disaster like US cities and should not be compared to them. We need to look to something better, not something lower and say "uh duh yeah it's inevitable".




All in all your post was neutral, not really saying much, some sort of exit strategy.
Nothing wrong with that, but what bothers the hell out of me is that there is a lack of criticism of things going on in the last 30 years, as to me they seem to be done primarily for the accumulation of wealth and whatnot. Heck, even those guys who build high density - why the hell do they go and build it out in the cornfields? They build it segregated from lower classes, and they in effect promote sprawl often. It outright bothers me.

Don't mind LAz. His only knowledge of history comes from archival subway maps.

Dude, didn't you know that life emanates from the Subway? Subway = the source of life. True story.

 

[Second_in_pie]

Ignoring LAz, I'll just pop in here and give my 2 cents on the whole suburban phenomenon.

I will agree that the suburbs are an inevitable phenomenon. But that's based off of my interpretation of the suburbs.
To me, the suburbs are regions that aren't a central business region. And I think that it's perfectly reasonable for people to live in those kind of regions. The problem is with people living in sprawley giant houses with big box and strip mall retail in a car-centred culture. I very firmly believe that people would be totally alright with living in mid-rise apartment/condo strings with units maybe half the size of a modern suburban house. And from there, you can go places. Turn the suburbs into a still bedroom-centred region that is instead filled with townhouses like we see in the newest suburbs today (without the wide avenues and still prevalent strip malls and big box plazas,) and 4-8 storey housing units, with small businesses that you could just walk to. It maintains the suburban ideal of having more space than downtown and not being the centre of bustling activity, but gives you density to have some life in the "suburbs."
If you ask me, you could easily integrate this kind of building into most of Toronto. And the places that it just wouldn't work, it's reasonable to have huge houses and backyards open to those who want them. With declining house values in the inner suburbs, there are probably a lot of places that could just (as terrible as it sounds) be leveled to the ground and have higher density built up on top of it, perhaps as more of a slow wave similar to how other high density cities developed in the past. And the outer suburbs, with their crazishly wide arterials but denser homes, could instead have little high density corridors and nodes within the existing suburbs.

The broad point I'm trying to hit is a combination that the representation of the suburbs is already well oversaturated, and that suburban living isn't as much living in a huge house with a backyard and a quiet street as much as it having your own space and being away from the hustle and bustle of the big city. Give people the opportunity to have a large and still quiet family-friendly house in a higher density situation, and I'm sure many people would take it. I like to take the large apartment clusters that exist throughout the city as an example. While many of them have much lower income populations, there are still a lot that attract very similar demographics to the regular suburbs. It's because the units are big, they're set apart from the crowded busy atmosphere of the downtown areas, and they have their respective greenspace and maintain a quiet atmosphere.

 

[AnarchoSocialist]

But you said it's inevitable?

I said suburbs are inevitable. And yes, suburban areas are inevitable. I never said the auto-centric version we have seen since the 1970s are inevitable. Just that people will always like the suburban ideal.

should go to the developer. Thanks to the entrenched free market and this idea that private interests > public interests, developers more often than not do not need to pay these additional fees for building out in the cornfields.
Hence we need to address these structural problems.

Sprawl can be prevented. It requires heavy regulation. Something like a ground boundary that does not expand, combined with a strong regional government. But that's too "commie"ish.

I don't disagree. I do think there needs to be more regulation. But, Canada is not a socialist state...it isn't even social democratic. It is a liberal democratic country and like it or not free market ideals make up a large put of how its run. Making solutions that would work for a more socialist country just doesn't make sense. I don't like heavy handed free market ideals, but I also know that any solutions to sprawl will have to be developed within that context. (You can only regulate so much before cries of the "nanny state" start to emerge).

Call it whatever you want to call it, but the fact is that Canadian cities are much less car dependent than American ones. We are not a disaster like US cities and should not be compared to them. We need to look to something better, not something lower and say "uh duh yeah it's inevitable".

Not sure I compared them directly to American cities, but, yes, they are more car dependent. Doesn't mean we can ride a high horse of urbanism either and sustainable development either. Anytime I post I almost always use European cities as models for transportation or urbanism, but also know that not all of their ideas or going to work in Canada either.

in all your post was neutral, not really saying much, some sort of exit strategy.
Nothing wrong with that, but what bothers the hell out of me is that there is a lack of criticism of things going on in the last 30 years, as to me they seem to be done primarily for the accumulation of wealth and whatnot. Heck, even those guys who build high density - why the hell do they go and build it out in the cornfields? They build it segregated from lower classes, and they in effect promote sprawl often. It outright bothers me.

The whole point of this thread was not a grocery list of what is wrong with the suburbs. I've spent the last 10 years studying and researching urban and suburban issues. I could spend days...probably weeks writing about what is wrong with suburban and urban development since the 1970's. Ripping on the suburbs gets tiring quickly, and doesn't really result in anything constructive. Yes it is important to know what the mistakes have been, but only so that we can learn from them and think about what to do next.

The post was not an exit strategy. Auto-centric suburban development has already been ripped to shreds. I don't need to do it again. I'd rather focus on what good things have been done recently and what else can be done in the future to avoid those mistakes...in the context of a country which is highly liberal democratic (I might not agree with it a lot of times but it's not an aspect that is going to change anytime soon).

Second_in_pie:

Your pretty much right in that you could built much more sustainable suburbs that would probably also be much more charming and livable then what is currently built. It is also a matter of someone making that first radical step and actually doing it. It would probably only take a few communities with well thought out and efficient urban design and use of space that also supported transit and walking to get people to see what suburbs could be like. How to get those first few examples is another questions, and be damned if I know how to get that underway.

I also think retrofitting existing suburbs is hugely important. I've seen some student and architect offices put together interesting ideas. Probably not quite the time for that yet, but I'm sure its not that far away. Yet another example of just getting someone to make that first leap to show what can be.

Edit: One more thing. If people who are strongly opposed to suburban living want to do something that could be beneficial it should be this: stop being dicks. Stop trashing the suburbs and be an ambassador for urban living. Righteousness is obnoxious. But, act like an unselfconscious urbanite and you might influence more than a few suburban kids to try city living. Think about this. If every urban dweller managed convince just one suburbanite to try city living, how quickly would urban centres boom and suburbs find themselves losing people? Just a thought.

 

[junctionist]

With declining house values in the inner suburbs, there are probably a lot of places that could just (as terrible as it sounds) be leveled to the ground and have higher density built up on top of it, perhaps as more of a slow wave similar to how other high density cities developed in the past. And the outer suburbs, with their crazishly wide arterials but denser homes, could instead have little high density corridors and nodes within the existing suburbs.

The broad point I'm trying to hit is a combination that the representation of the suburbs is already well oversaturated, and that suburban living isn't as much living in a huge house with a backyard and a quiet street as much as it having your own space and being away from the hustle and bustle of the big city. Give people the opportunity to have a large and still quiet family-friendly house in a higher density situation, and I'm sure many people would take it. I like to take the large apartment clusters that exist throughout the city as an example. While many of them have much lower income populations, there are still a lot that attract very similar demographics to the regular suburbs. It's because the units are big, they're set apart from the crowded busy atmosphere of the downtown areas, and they have their respective greenspace and maintain a quiet atmosphere.

Inner suburb house prices are declining? When did that trend start? I think we need to move away from these "quiet suburbs" which inevitably seem to mean dead streets that are empty throughout the day. I don't consider apartment-in-the park neighbourhoods more pleasant than ordinary subdivisions. The density may be higher but it's still dull and boring. Inevitably, these are "grey" areas that lose their appeal. I think that house prices in these areas are not declining but not increasing that much. (If they decline, there will be a correlation with overall market trends.) The same thing could happen to more recently developed 905 suburbs.

The streets could definitely be quieter than downtown but a goal should be to maintain a level of vibrancy as well perhaps through a mixed-use model of community building.

 

[Second_in_pie]

The streets could definitely be quieter than downtown but a goal should be to maintain a level of vibrancy as well perhaps through a mixed-use model of community building.

In case you haven't noticed, that's exactly what I suggested.

And really, you can't have your vibrant downtown neighborhood + quiet suburb. You can have a suburb that has people frequently going around it buying bread at the local bakery and whatnot, combined with an unhurried, quiet atmosphere. Something like the Beaches or Bloor West do an alright job at this. And if you were to just take High Park and add bakeries and grocers on the bottom levels of the apartment buildings, it'd be able to achieve it as well.

Whether house prices are falling or not, the inner suburbs are the least prosperous parts of the GTA, making them the best place to redevelop if you want to introduce real mid-density development. And I think that could work very well.

 

[allabootmatt]

I think it is important to remember in this debate that perhaps 'unplanned' isn't the best word to describe North American suburbia. The debate often gets framed as suburbs=free market and sustainable cities=commie dirigisme, or similar. But that's not really the case at all. Lots of suburban areas have TONS of sprawl-inducing zoning rules: minimum parking requirements, maximum densities, separation of uses, etc. Suburban land use patterns in the North American context are a product of specific policy inputs, not some eternal notion of what the free market 'wants.' in other places with different policy inputs the outcomes were very different despite many of the same economic and demographic pressures in the great postwar suburb-building era.

 

[Second_in_pie]

The problem is that after decades of the government trying very hard to push suburban living (it's even worse in the US than here,) the market's developed around suburban living. What may seem like "what the free market wants" is in fact momentum from a time when sprawley suburban living was heralded as the greatest way to live.

 

[AnarchoSocialist]

Don't forget the context in which the suburbs (or at least the iteration we are familiar with) came about. In the 50's and 60's Canada was still very much trapped in between being a British country and developing its own identity (though by the end of the 60's it was far more Canadian than British). It also was not as economically strong as the United States which emerged from the war as the clear powerhouse (I think it almost being taken for granted now that before the 1990's Canada did not have the economy and strength it does today). And there was also the massive influence of American media at the time (which would have been far more dominant than it is today, with CanCon rules and the growth of Canadian culture and content doing a lot to offer an alternative).

And don't forget that many cities were still very industrialized at the time. Take a look at photos of Toronto's waterfront in the 50's and 60's....it was still highly industrialized and a much different place then what exists today, and continues to emerge. While government policies obviously do play a role, these were just as much a reaction to what people wanted, and people at that time would have seen the suburbs as a much better life (whether or not that turned out to be the case).

The same thing happened in the 80's and 90's when people started moving back to the city. It wasn't a grand government policy that started the trend. If anything most governments could be seen as anti-urban. In large part, people grew tired of the suburbs, wanted a more urban life, and moved. It hasn't been until recently, and even the extent of which is still debatable, that policies are starting to be steered towards encouraging and helping those that want to live in a more urban environment do so.

Obviously policies do play a role, and sometimes consumers (or homeowners in this case) are fed what developers want them to buy as opposed to what they might like (auto-centric, sidewalk free, cul-de-sac infested suburbs versus more traditional planning). But, in Canada at least (the US is somewhat different), peoples own free choice and preferences has had just as much to do with the development of the suburbs since the 1960's as policies and corporate/developer agendas.

 

[junctionist]

Whether house prices are falling or not, the inner suburbs are the least prosperous parts of the GTA, making them the best place to redevelop if you want to introduce real mid-density development. And I think that could work very well.

I would introduce "real mid-density" development on greenfields near higher quality transit. Without a precedent in terms of new community development on greenfields, those displaced by community demolition will likely move into cheap new low density and car-oriented communities in the new "outer suburbs". There's only so much you can do in the inner suburbs; there are plenty of affluent neighbourhoods there as well.