Canadian cities that should have been bigger than they actually are?

[giallo]

Kamloops and Prince Rupert in BC. Both were set up to be the regional hubs.

Kamloops has the railway, Hwy 1 and was gifted some crown corporations like the BC Lottery, but Kelowna pulled away in the new millennium, and that's that.

Prince Rupert was to be the biggish city in Northern BC, and has the bones to prove it, but it just never took off after WW2. I blame its relative stagnation on there being no quick way to get there by car or rail. As the crow flies, it's only 700km from Vancouver, but it takes over sixteen hours to drive there. BC has no north/south Pacific highway system.