[Doady]

You seriously think Toronto and Edmonton are as sprawly as Atlanta, Detroit...?

US doesn't have only one definition of metropolitan area. People confuse CSA and MSA. MSAs in US are comparable to CMAs in Canada. CSAs are not. There is no way that that the entire GGH would be considered one MSA. That's ridiculous. But even entire GGH as a CSA would be unrealistic.

I'm not sure what "hamlets" has to do with sprawl. Sprawl by definition refers to urban areas, not rural areas. Isolated hamlets surrounded by farmland are not part of US definition of sprawl or urban areas either.