De-Amalgamation of Winnipeg
What could be the possible advantages and disadvantages of a
de-amalgamated Winnipeg? Population of former municipalities currently in Winnipeg (1971, 2016, % change):
Census tracts in Winnipeg follow the boundaries of these former municipalities, which is how these numbers were determined. |
I'm hard pressed to think of any advantages of de-amalgamation beyond perhaps idealistic notions that a smaller municipal government would somehow be closer to its citizens. All I see is more administrative overhead (much like with our school boards) and a situation where there would be less integrated planning and more instances of developers playing one municipality against the others.
|
In the case of the Old Winnipeg, I was wondering if the infrastructure might be better as compared to today. Proportionally, wouldn't more money go to building suburbs and repairing streets that connect downtown with the suburbs? A de-amalgamated Winnipeg could possibly mean infrastructure spending being spread more fairly, if it isn't already today.
It seems to work well for Vancouver, each city in that CMA maintains its independence while Metro Vancouver Regional District oversees development in the region. Overall, it seems that unicity is viewed as a failure, many seem to argue that it resulted in the suburbs taking over the development of the entire urban area. |
^ I wouldn't consider unicity to be a failure. If anything, I'd say that Winnipeg should be expanded to include the lands surrounding the city which are effectively part of the urban area.
Your point about Old Winnipeg benefiting from having the largest tax base is well taken, but if anything, I think that would encourage an "anything goes" mentality in the suburbs to spur development there. Even if Winnipeg adheres to the idea pretty half-heartedly, there is at least some effort made to contain things like sprawl, suburban shopping areas, etc. However, if places like Charleswood or North Kildonan suddenly found themselves on their own, I'd imagine that they would be allowing virtually anything to get built to expand the tax base. |
Quote:
A little extra info regarding pre-unicity Winnipeg, In 1963, Old Winnipeg annexed the current Tyndall Park/Inkster Gardens area from the RM of Rosser. In 1967, the City of St. James amalgamated with the Village of Brooklands. In 1969, the City of St. James amalgamated with the RM of Assiniboia. Demographics for neighborhoods in Old Winnipeg (1971, 2016, % change)
Without the Tyndall Park area, the population decline in Old Winnipeg is much more dramatic, from 265,429 (1961) to 200,188 (2016), about a 25% decline. This is in line with many US Rust Belt cities. These neighborhoods are on the rise again, as their 2001 count was 189,801. |
Quote:
If the exurbs want to build unsustainable, third-world level serviced sprawl, that's their lookout. We're already stuck paying for the sprawl we have, why would we ever want to take on more? The damage is done; let the RMs and province deal with that mess. And we don't need pseudo-rural types voting on issues in the city, either. I don't want de-amalgamation, but I often believe we'd be better off if it never happened. |
It'd be interesting to see what Canada's urban landscape would look like without unicity, its possible that other Canadian cities would've never amalgamated with their surrounding municipalities had Winnipeg not. In that case, Montreal would still be largest (pop. 1.1 million) followed by Toronto at 800,000. North York and Scarborough would also be in Canada's top 10 largest cities, each with about 650,000. Whenever I see Mississauga listed as Canada's 6th largest city, bumping Winnipeg to 7th, I feel annoyed! Two other suburban cities would be cause for more annoyance. Ottawa would have about 330,000, Hamilton 400,000 and Halifax 130,000. Saskatoon and Regina would both be larger than Winnipeg's 200,000.
|
Maybe without Unicity we wouldn't be facing the out of control civic labour costs we are now.
|
That is a possibility. Amalgamation usually doesn't yield the cost savings people hope because wages across the board tend to rise to those of the best paying pre-amalgamation jurisdiction. In non-unicity Winnipeg's case, the police and fire/paramedics would probably be under some kind of metro jurisdiction and would have a harder time eating our lunch like they do.
|
Quote:
|
Quote:
|
Quote:
|
Quote:
Year.................2001........2006........2011........2016 Downtown......15,954 > 15,960 > 16,673 > 17,826 River Heights..60,002 > 59,897 > 59,159 > 60,661 West End........56,055 > 56,340 > 56,521 > 58,668 North End.......43,427 > 44,156 > 46,766 > 48,320 Elmwood........14,363 > 14,358 > 14,806 > 14,713 Inkster...........17,097 > 16,728 > 17,311 > 18,337 Fort Garry.........54,480 > 58,191 > 63,270 > 76,205 St. Vital............60,649 > 62,488 > 66,149 > 69,027 St. James..........62,097 > 61,095 > 61,764 > 63,061 St. Boniface.......46,318 > 49,826 > 54,201 > 59,823 North Kildonan...42,764 > 43,258 > 45,547 > 48,987 Old Kildonan......29,493 > 32,340 > 39,358 > 44,420 Transcona..........28,414 > 28,812 > 30,540 > 32,352 East Kildonan.....26,485 > 26,057 > 26,278 > 26,623 Charleswood......26,746 > 26,332 > 25,679 > 25,347 West Kildonan....20,650 > 20,794 > 21,649 > 22,391 Tuxedo..............14,550 > 16,819 > 17,946 > 18,483 Downtown had a peak population of 27,543 in 1941, the West End had a peak population of 87,294 in 1961 and the North End had a peak population of 70,912 in 1961. Winnipeg total: 2001: 619,544 2006: 633,451 2011: 663,617 2016: 705,244 Population history of the original wards of Winnipeg (Downtown, River Heights, West End, North End, Elmwood): 1871: 241 1881: 7,995 1891: 26,529 1901: 42,340 1911: 136,035 1921: 179,097 1931: 218,785 1941: 221,960 1951: 235,710 1961: 265,429 1971: 245,637 1981: 200,002 1991: 196,384 2001: 189,801 2011: 193,925 2016: 200,188 There seems to be nothing online about the demographics of the former municipalities in Winnipeg (or its very hard to find!), so at least its online now! |
On a high level if De-Amalgamation was considered it would need to look at:
Police Services Fire Services Paramedic Services Public Works (Snow clearing) Water and waste AKA it is not going to be something easily accomplished. This whole de-amalgamation angle seems to trace back to the 2014 election with the Gord Steeves campaign. It wasn't stated directly or officially but that all seemed to have a lot of "south Winnipeg isn't getting their fare share" and the north end needs to pay for themselves sentiment. De-amalgamation seems to have the potential to cause more issues than it might solve, especially if the driver is to more localize the spending of tax dollars. That is going to just widen the gap and push issues into other parts of the city. |
Quote:
If de-amalgamation ever became a campaign issue (which I don't foresee happening), the only areas that I think would potentially separate is Fort Garry, St. Vital, St. Boniface and Transcona. Everywhere else is geographically and historically more integrated with the city, St. Boniface and St. Vita have their French influence and Transcona is separated by large areas of industrial. |
Quote:
|
Quote:
|
Hopefully my last string of demographics surrounding this topic...population growth of the former city of Winnipeg vs the suburbs (11 other municipalities amalgamated in 1972) from 1901 to 2016. They are rounded to the nearest thousand because there are slight differences between some census archives (perhaps due to revisions?)
Year > Former City > Suburbs 1901: 42,000 > 6,000 1906: 90,000 > n/a 1911: 136,000 > 21,000 1916: 163,000 > n/a 1921: 179,000 > 50,000 1926: 192,000 > n/a 1931: 219,000 > 76,000 1936: 216,000 > n/a 1941: 222,000 > 78,000 1946: 229,000 > n/a 1951: 236,000 > 118,000 1956: 255,000 > 154,000 1961: 265,000 > 207,000 1966: 256,000 > 249,000 1971: 246,000 > 290,000 1976: 220,000 > 341,000 1981: 200,000 > 364,000 1986: 202,000 > 393,000 1991: 196,000 > 421,000 1996: 191,000 > 427,000 2001: 190,000 > 430,000 2006: 191,000 > 442,000 2011: 194,000 > 470,000 2016: 200,000 > 505,000 |
Quote:
In terms of operations, taxes, etc "Winnipeg" and "Not My Winnipeg" would be legally distinct cities like Grand Forks/East Grand Forks, Fargo/Moorehead or Minneapolis/St Paul. Of course any infrastructure pieces that needed to be shared like water supply would be split in such a way that they were "revenue neutral". The one downside of this split is the Brady Road landfill would be closed immediately and relocated to somewhere just north of the Perimeter. |
...
|
All times are GMT. The time now is 11:22 PM. |
Powered by vBulletin® Version 3.8.7
Copyright ©2000 - 2024, vBulletin Solutions, Inc.