460 
UrbanToronto tends to measure Toronto's success by how many cranes we can count standing high over the city's skyline at any one time... but there's another crane in Toronto that we haven't included in our overall count, which is at a site that continues to evolve and grow each year…
…and that's the one pictured above, within the Little Toronto landscape at Little Canada at Dundas and Yonge. The attraction that first opened in August, 2021 is part model railroad, part tribute to Canada's cities, landscapes, and peoples, and it's all fun. Created by Jean-Louis Brenninkmeijer and his growing team of modellers, Little Canada is maintained by staff that oversee train departures and miniature car, bus, or truck runs on the highways, and who put anything right again when batteries run low or a wheel jumps a track, and it's interpreted by friendly tour guides who can tell you about any of the massive number of vignettes that have been packed into each destination. Little Canada arrived with five destinations for visitors to marvel at — Little Niagara, Little Toronto, Little Golden Horseshoe, Little Ottawa, and Little Quebec City — and as of today has seven — Little East Coast was added in 2023, and today marks the grand opening of Little West Coast.
If you haven't been yet, this latest addition that stretches the coverage to Canada's scenic Pacific coast makes a great reason to dive into this ever more impressive mini-world. Your visit will give you a chance to see why Little Canada has garnered Best Indoor Attraction three years in a row now from the Ontario Choice Awards and been lauded by Tripadvisor's Travellers' Choice Awards, among others. If you have been before, you already know why the accolades are pouring in, but you may have missed mini-expansions that started to appear not long after the attraction itself first opened.
In Little Toronto, a whole new "island" has been added since the initial opening. While we haven't included a shot of the bulk of Toronto in this article (you can get a good look at all of the original destinations in our story from Little Canada's initial opening in 2021 here), pictured directly above and below is Toronto's new section that packs a pile of local landmarks into a small area — Little Canada always plays with geography: don't expect the streets or relative locations to conform to real world coordinates from block-to-block — including the ROM, OCAD University, City Hall, and most amusingly, the recently rebranded "The Tenor" building across from Sankofa Sqaure where Little Canada itself it housed...
...and at where you'll see a Little Little Canada recreated!
Other expansions since opening have included a whole Gatineau Hot Air Balloon Festival scene added to the already crazy-impressive Ottawa display (DO NOT MISS the nighttime display at the Parliament Buildings — nighttime lighting at Little Canada cycles on for several minutes every quarter hour — the "nightly" show is possibly the best thing in the entire attraction), and of course, as mentioned, Little East Coast was added in 2023. Its display brings chunks of all four Atlantic Provinces together in one room…
…spanning from St John's, Newfoundland and Labrador (a small bit of which is pictured below), to Green Gables and more in Prince Edward Island, to Magnetic Hill and the Bay of Fundy's tides in New Brunswick, to memorable scenes from Halifax and across Nova Scotia. If you're a Maritimer or a Newfoundlander, you'll find piles of references to life in Atlantic Canada packed into this room, and if you really want to dig into the Easter Eggs that pop up throughout Little Canada, you can look for a really well-hatched one here where puffins are the stars of a fun little show.
I'll skip straight across the country now to Little Canada's new really big deal: Little West Coast. Today's opening covers the Rogers Pass to the Okanagan, puts Vancouver in a starring role of course, and then skips across the Salish Sea to Victoria and Tofino and Haida Gwaii.
While the new destination adds more upthrust landscape than ever before along with a massive 8,000 trees, you'll also find more ephemerality here than in the previous destinations, or more "animations" to be more technical. In the case of the Rogers Pass landscape (most of the details of which, like a helicopter rescue, I'll leave for you to discover on a visit), you'll see mist rolling down the sides of the mountains from time to time. It's a fleeting effect, but a beguiling one that's indicative of the care taken to enrich the experiences across our big Little country.
Next to the Rogers Pass, the landscape moderates for the more built-up areas of the Interior, like the Okanagan where wineries hug lakeside hills, and where there's a reminder that we haven't exactly tamed nature; a forest fire-ravaged hillside is regenerating a year later, where the husks of burnt tree trunks are surrounded by new, flowering shrubs on the woodland floor.
A waterscape crossed by the Lions Gate Bridge suggests the Burrard Inlet. Here the water divides what is mostly the BC Interior from Vancouver's high-rises and Stanley Park, even if the BC Interior suddenly sprouts a couple of other Vancouver references close to the visitor railing, including an Easter Egg in the form of Ryan Reynolds' boyhood home from the Arbutus Ridge neighbourhood of Vancouver! It's pictured below... ask a Little Canada tour guide about it, and other nearby stories that have been set into the landscape.
Vancouver is dominated by its skyscrapers, while fleshed out through depictions of Gastown including the steam clock and a flowering Dr Sun Yat Sen Garden, Granville Island and its many shops and eateries converted from warehouses, while the geodesic dome of Science World — the former Expo Centre from Expo '86 — rises beside False Creek. 3D-printed and hand-painted boats bob up-and-down in the waves here.
Vancouver's iconic SkyTrain plies a curving section of its elevated guideway and representative station. The trains here are modelled on the network's Canada Line rolling stock.
When nighttime comes to the Little East Coast, Vancouver's skyscrapers and streets light up…
…as does BC Place. As opposed to both the Rogers Centre and Scotiabank Arena in Little Toronto which is and packed with thousands of little people figurines, BC Place in Vancouver is — so far — sparsely attended. This gives Little Canada the opportunity to gradually fill the stadium over the coming years with Littleizations — figurines of Little Canada visitors who would like to be immortalized in 3D-printed miniatures. A "Littleization Station" on the lower level near Little Ottawa can capture anyone in 3D who wants to participate. For a fee you get to take home a palm-sized figurine of yourself, while a thumbnail-sized version of you is then added somewhere in the displays, with BC Place providing opportunities for thousands of mini-yous to attend a Vaisakhi Night event in perpetuity. This is a spring harvest celebration, primarily from Punjab and Northern India, with a dance depicted, one of many events restaged in Little Canada that cover a huge number of communities from Canada's immense diversity of contributing peoples. So far, over 5,000 visitors have had themselves added to various scenes across Little Canada.
Nighttime in Vancouver is a good time to visit the Vancouver Aquarium in Stanley Park as well, its fish tanks appropriately lit to replicate the teaming waters off the coast.
The return of day-lighting to the destination presents an opportunity to explore many of the other attractions of British Columbia. Below, the Capilano Suspension Bridge and its associated Cliffwalk perch little visitors above the rapids of the Capilano River at the bottom of the gorge below.
Across another stretch of water is Victoria, with sections of the provincial capital's quaint downtown and its Legislative Assembly building among the models. A kayaking festival fills the Inner Harbour.
Another Vancouver Island vignette centres on Tofino and Long Beach. Here, replicas of the Ocean Village Resort, the Whale Centre, and Wildpod Glamping all reflect the flavour of this surfing and hiking destination.
Finally (but not finally — there is no way to describe even a tenth of everything that is packed into this incredible, still-growing attraction), Haida Gwaii makes an appearance before the background paintings take us off into the endless expanses of the Pacific Ocean. Haida Gwaii provides a perfect opportunity to talk about Little Canada's efforts to reflect Canada's Indigenous roots. Here, on the beaches of Haida Gwaii, the Little Canada team is waiting for permission to replicate in miniature the world-famous totem poles of the Salish peoples. Since Little East Coat was added last year, several scenes have been added or enhanced that tell the stories of Canada's Indigenous peoples.
There's already more than you can take in on one visit to Little Canada, whether you're skimming it all or digging in to particular destinations on multiple visits, but there's still lots more to come. A couple of final touches were not yet in place when we visited earlier this week, like dolphins jumping through the Inside Passage waters — let us know if that's happening yet when you visit — while the modelling team is working hard to get all of that done. As the Little West Coast work wraps up, the team works on small enhancements here and there to existing destinations, but is also already studying and planning their next destination, another display to open, probably this time next year. Still to come are four more major destinations — Little Prairies, Little Rockies, Little Montreal, and Little North — but the modellers are sworn to secrecy as to which one will open next.
At the same time, Jean-Louis Brenninkmeijer told us that he is aiming for his team to create a special portable scene depicting the liberation of the Netherlands from Nazi occupation by Canadian forces in 1945, in time for 80th anniversary celebrations in April, 2025, which he hopes to tour with the Vimy Ridge model that was created earlier this year, on display now at Little Canada.
You can't cover all of Little Canada in one story... but you can drink in as much of it as you like in multiple visits. The official website is here. If you'd like, you can also visit our dedicated thread for the building, or leave a comment in the space provided on this page.
* * *
UrbanToronto has a research service, UrbanToronto Pro, that provides comprehensive data on construction projects in the Greater Toronto Area—from proposal through to completion. We also offer Instant Reports, downloadable snapshots based on location, and a daily subscription newsletter, New Development Insider, that tracks projects from initial application.
