Canadian cities are about as dense as German cities

[Yuri]

So Milton urbanized area will fully merge with Toronto-Mississauga's? When do you guys think that will happen, will we see plots being developed there?

Originally Posted by James Bond Agent 007

And I think that's pretty typical of Canadian cities these days. It would explain why Canadian cities have become almost as dense as German ones.

Yes, they're becoming very dense. They just need to speed up construction to put prices in check.

Major German urban areas are densifying due immigration mostly, with the core gaining population. It's the "back to Downtown story" that's happening in the US, Canada, Northwestern Europe and being more limited elsewhere (e.g. São Paulo, Barcelona, etc.). Canada, on the other hand, it's also densifying by adding dense urban "sprawl".

I keep doing my tables on cities, to check densities, growth patterns, etc., and it's interesting how urbanization follow very different patterns in each European country. Spain, France, Italy, Germany, Belgium, Netherlands, Britain, they're all remarkably distinct between them.

Netherlands and Belgium are worlds apart: one follow very strict urban boundaries while other sprawls like Atlanta. Netherlands it's so funny that they put in place green belts with only few hundred meters just to pretend traditional urban areas didn't merged together. Belgium is a mix of France and Germany. Brussels more French, the others more German. Germany and Britain are the most similar pairing. Italy has those very dense "French" cores coupled with Belgian endless sprawl. Milan and Naples are the most extreme.

[Nouvellecosse]

Originally Posted by Yuri

Yeah, thinking on environment, urban efficiency, it's much better to have people living on the green space between Milton and Toronto urban areas than further away in Milton that assume it only exist as a suburb of Toronto, without an independent labour market on its own.

That can be true but isn't necessarily true. It depends on the type of development. If a greenbelt makes land near the metro's core more scarce then that can prompt denser development. There would be some "leap-frogging", but there would also be people who just wouldn't want to live as far out as Milton but who would live as far as the greenbelt at the right price. So if Milton and Mississauga were to gain density with infill, that would be better from an environmental prospective than them staying the same and having new development added in between. That's mainly because the 1st scenario preserves more land and makes it easier to serve people with rail since more people can be served by fewer stations. And you can transport people MUCH further by rail for the same amount of energy, cost, and land than you can by car.

In other words, distance is important, but density and development style are more important.

[James Bond Agent 007]

Originally Posted by Yuri

Netherlands and Belgium are worlds apart: one follow very strict urban boundaries while other sprawls like Atlanta. Netherlands it's so funny that they put in place green belts with only few hundred meters just to pretend traditional urban areas didn't merged together. Belgium is a mix of France and Germany. Brussels more French, the others more German. Germany and Britain are the most similar pairing. Italy has those very dense "French" cores coupled with Belgian endless sprawl. Milan and Naples are the most extreme.

Yes, I always find it fascinating to look at The Netherlands on Google maps (using aerial photos) and street view. It's like the whole country is this very highly organized, super-duper ultra-planned place, like Celebration, Florida or some other master-planned community, but on a national scale. Everything is so neat and tidy, very highly organized and not a square foot of wasted space anywhere.

It's a bit less true in southern Netherlands but I presume that's because it's a bit hillier. Draw a line from about Rotterdam to Nijmegen, and everything north of that is super-duper organized, and everything south of that is a little bit less so.

I never noticed Belgium to be like that, but I've noticed Denmark is also like that, to a lesser extent. Even a lot of Germany is really highly organized with its land use.

Back to Canada, it seems to be about midway between the US and Europe in this regard. A good place to examine this is to compare Michigan with lower Ontario:

https://www.google.com/maps/@42.7826393,..._ep=EgoyMDI1MDgwNS4wIKXMDSoASAFQAw%3D%3D

On the right is Ontario, and left of the river is Michigan. The Michigan side might have a bit more topography which results in more chunks of forest and woods, but it's still useful to scan around. Notice on the Ontario side most farm plots have these little sections of woods, and they're mostly lined up with their neighbor's wooded sections. So you get these "lines" of little wooded plots stretching across miles. It's not as neat and organized as in the Netherlands, Denmark or Germany, but it's much more organized than the US. On the US side of the river on my link it's much more chaotic than the Ontario side.

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by craigs

In the federal scheme, cities, counties, and other local governments are not "arbitrary," but rather, are properly seen as subdivisions of the states.

By arbitrary I mean that there is no federal definition for what is a city or county. The characteristics of a city or county are arbitrary from a federal perspective.

[craigs]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

By arbitrary I mean that there is no federal definition for what is a city or county. The characteristics of a city or county are arbitrary from a federal perspective.

From the federal perspective, a state government's subdivisions, like cities and counties, are neither arbitrary nor consistent. It is all just that given state's government.

[James Bond Agent 007]

I'm in Winnipeg right now, and in the brief time I've been here (got here around 3pm) I can definitely see why my thesis is true.

Everything is more compact here compared to US cities. All the single-family lots are smaller, even in the older neighborhoods (that I've seen so far). There are a lot of apartments and townhouses mixed in with the single-family areas (or at least close by) and there are a lot more high-rise apartments (which I think I mentioned before).

After I got out of the airport (I had the misfortune of doing so right as rush hour started), I went to my hotel to check in, and then went down to an area with large new development in the SW part of town (this area here) which I wanted to do right away to examine the statistical observation I made in this thread, but this time in person. It's one thing looking at them on Google street view, but you get a lot more "color" and "flavor" and see more details when you see these things in person.

All of these new developments I've seen are much, much denser than almost anything you'd see in the US. You would never see a corridor of apartments like this in Kansas City (that would be the domain of much larger US cities like Seattle or Chicago or LA).

One thing I was really curious about was the street widths. On Google street view it looks like the newer residential streets are about the same width as you'd see in the US, but now that I've seen them in person, that's not actually the case. At one point I drove down this one newer residential street (I think it might have been this one here) and I was like, "Oh wow, this is definitely narrower than anything you'd see in Kansas City." Or anywhere else in the US I'm sure. This was definitely a case where you can't really tell something by looking at it on Google street view. These streets don't look as narrow as some of the streets (even the newer ones) you'd see in Germany or elsewhere in Europe, but they're definitely narrower than American streets.

And the narrower streets contributes to the density.

Canadian cities truly look to be about mid-way between US and European cities, in a lot of respects.

I will probably start a 'Winnipeg observations' thread tomorrow, similar to the one I did on Chicago a couple years ago. In just what I've seen so far, I have a ton of observations to make.

[craigs]

Originally Posted by James Bond Agent 007

I'm in Winnipeg right now, and in the brief time I've been here (got here around 3pm) I can definitely see why my thesis is true.

Everything is more compact here compared to US cities. All the single-family lots are smaller, even in the older neighborhoods (that I've seen so far). There are a lot of apartments and townhouses mixed in with the single-family areas (or at least close by) and there are a lot more high-rise apartments (which I think I mentioned before).

After I got out of the airport (I had the misfortune of doing so right as rush hour started), I went to my hotel to check in, and then went down to an area with large new development in the SW part of town (this area here) which I wanted to do right away to examine the statistical observation I made in this thread, but this time in person. It's one thing looking at them on Google street view, but you get a lot more "color" and "flavor" and see more details when you see these things in person.

All of these new developments I've seen are much, much denser than almost anything you'd see in the US. You would never see a corridor of apartments like this in Kansas City (that would be the domain of much larger US cities like Seattle or Chicago or LA).

One thing I was really curious about was the street widths. On Google street view it looks like the newer residential street are about the same width as you'd see in the US, but now that I've seen them, that is not actually the case. At one point I drove down this one newer residential street (I think it might have been this one here) and I was like, "Oh wow, this is definitely narrower than anything you'd see in Kansas City." Or anywhere else in the US I'm sure. This was definitely a case where you can't really tell something by looking at it on Google street view. These streets don't look as narrow as some of the streets (even the newer ones) you'd see in Germany or elsewhere in Europe, but they're definitely narrower than American streets.

And the narrower streets contributes to the density.

Canadian cities truly look to be about mid-way between US and European cities, in a lot of respects.

I will probably start a 'Winnipeg observations' thread tomorrow, similar to the one I did on Chicago a couple years ago. In just what I've seen so far, I have a ton of observations to make.

The hubs' uncle, who lives here in LA, was born and raised in Winterpeg. He headed to Toronto for college and then ultimately to the US to work as a writer in Hollywood. He and the hubs' aunt are toying with the idea of spending the rest of their retirement in Winnipeg, as he has family there and it's relatively affordable. As I understand it, the biggest hurdle is that Manitoba won't grant healthcare until after they establish a certain residency period, and they are both in their 70s now with medical conditions. Anyway, I've seen a lot of photos and have done the usual Google Maps exploration, and it seems like a great little city. The uncle describes it as Canada's early Chicago, in that it was where the nation's two great railway networks met up.

[Yuri]

Originally Posted by James Bond Agent 007

I'm in Winnipeg right now, and in the brief time I've been here (got here around 3pm) I can definitely see why my thesis is true.

Everything is more compact here compared to US cities. All the single-family lots are smaller, even in the older neighborhoods (that I've seen so far). There are a lot of apartments and townhouses mixed in with the single-family areas (or at least close by) and there are a lot more high-rise apartments (which I think I mentioned before).

After I got out of the airport (I had the misfortune of doing so right as rush hour started), I went to my hotel to check in, and then went down to an area with large new development in the SW part of town (this area here) which I wanted to do right away to examine the statistical observation I made in this thread, but this time in person. It's one thing looking at them on Google street view, but you get a lot more "color" and "flavor" and see more details when you see these things in person.

All of these new developments I've seen are much, much denser than almost anything you'd see in the US. You would never see a corridor of apartments like this in Kansas City (that would be the domain of much larger US cities like Seattle or Chicago or LA).

One thing I was really curious about was the street widths. On Google street view it looks like the newer residential streets are about the same width as you'd see in the US, but now that I've seen them in person, that's not actually the case. At one point I drove down this one newer residential street (I think it might have been this one here) and I was like, "Oh wow, this is definitely narrower than anything you'd see in Kansas City." Or anywhere else in the US I'm sure. This was definitely a case where you can't really tell something by looking at it on Google street view. These streets don't look as narrow as some of the streets (even the newer ones) you'd see in Germany or elsewhere in Europe, but they're definitely narrower than American streets.

And the narrower streets contributes to the density.

Canadian cities truly look to be about mid-way between US and European cities, in a lot of respects.

I will probably start a 'Winnipeg observations' thread tomorrow, similar to the one I did on Chicago a couple years ago. In just what I've seen so far, I have a ton of observations to make.

I have this impression Anglo-Canadian cities are "uglier" compared to the US ones. I don't know, the suburbs look greyer and central parts are full of not good looking towers hiding the old architecture.

Of course, it's only an impression.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by James Bond Agent 007

Canadian cities truly look to be about mid-way between US and European cities, in a lot of respects.

From a Canadian perspective, Winnipeg is one of the most "American" cities. For example, the structure of the downtown and the way it relates to the surroundings are a bit more like what's common in the US (prominent taller office towers in a "CBD", relative low income adjacent to downtown and higher income farther out, etc.). But of course the US has a lot of regional variety too and Winnipeg does not have a large freeway system.

I have not been there but I get the feeling Winnipeg's seen less infill in recent years than some other cities (like Toronto for example, even in relative terms). That recent construction is causing US and Canadian cities to drift apart more.

[Denscity]

Originally Posted by James Bond Agent 007

I've been spending a lot of time looking at Canadian and German cities on Google maps lately, and I've noticed that, in spite of their obvious auto-centric-ness, Canada's cities are actually pretty dense.

So I browsed through Wikipedia and came up with these. This is all data within city limits:

CANADA LARGEST CITIES (sort table by population density):
Toronto: 4,427.8 people/sq km
Montreal: 4,833.4 people/sq km
Calgary: 1,592.4 people/sq km
Edmonton: 1,320.4 people/sq km
Winnipeg: 1,623.3 people/sq km
Mississauga: 2,452.6 people/sq km
Vancouver: 5,749.7 people/sq km
Burnaby: 2,750.6 people/sq km
Brampton: 2,469.0 people/sq km

GERMANY LARGEST CITIES (data from individual city Wiki pages. numbers obviously rounded off):
Berlin: 1,250 people/sq km
Frankfurt: 3,000 people/sq km
Hamburg: 2,600 people/sq km
Munich: 4,800 people/sq km
Cologne: 2,500 people/sq km
Dusseldorf: 2,800 people/sq km
Stuttgart: 3,000 people/sq km
Bremen: 1,800 people/sq km

For metros I'll just do the biggest metro in each country:

Metro Toronto: 6,202,225 people and 5,902.75 km2 = 1,050.7 people/sq km (Note: Data is from City of Toronto page. Greater Toronto Wiki seems to have different numbers)

Rhine-Ruhr metropolitan region: 11,300,000 people and 7,110 km2 = 1,589.3 people sq/km

Within city limits, Montreal is about as dense as Munich, and Toronto is catching up. Winnipeg is almost as dense as Bremen. And the mega-suburbs of Mississauga, Burnaby and Brampton are roughly as dense as Hamburg and Dusseldorf.

Who woulda thunk?

Vancouver is the densest city in Canada shown here. What's it's German city equivalent?
Also check out New Westminister BC the second densest city in Canada.
Cheers!

[Wigs]

James Bond, how long are you in Winnipeg?
Are you travelling throughout the Prairies?
Enjoy your trip and take lots of photos to make a thread to post

[Docere]

The most "American" city in Canada is Windsor. Hamilton also seems more "American" in form than nearby Toronto (the Buffalo of the Golden Horseshoe?)

[Yuri]

Originally Posted by Denscity

Vancouver is the densest city in Canada shown here. What's it's German city equivalent?
Also check out New Westminister BC the second densest city in Canada.
Cheers!

German cities have plenty of rural areas inside their municipalities, even the biggest ones. They cannot be directly compared to Canadian ones which are all urbanized.

Urbanized area inside Berlin city proper is only 597.4 km² for a 3,570,860 population (Census 2022). Toronto had 2,794,356 people inside 631.1 km² (or 2,778,579 and 582.9 km² excluding the northeast and northwest tips and the islands).

[shappy]

Originally Posted by Yuri

German cities have plenty of rural areas inside their municipalities, even the biggest ones. They cannot be directly compared to Canadian ones which are all urbanized.

Urbanized area inside Berlin city proper is only 597.4 km² for a 3,570,860 population (Census 2022). Toronto had 2,794,356 people inside 631.1 km² (or 2,778,579 and 582.9 km² excluding the northeast and northwest tips and the islands).

Toronto's population is 3,025,647 as of July 2022 (link). I don't think that makes any difference in your city ranking though.

[Yuri]

Originally Posted by shappy

Toronto's population is 3,025,647 as of July 2022 (link). I don't think that makes any difference in your city ranking though.

I preferred to use Census numbers for both countries to keep consistent as they have very generous population estimates. Toronto didn't grow 10% in one year.

[MonkeyRonin]

Originally Posted by someone123

From a Canadian perspective, Winnipeg is one of the most "American" cities. For example, the structure of the downtown and the way it relates to the surroundings are a bit more like what's common in the US (prominent taller office towers in a "CBD", relative low income adjacent to downtown and higher income farther out, etc.). But of course the US has a lot of regional variety too and Winnipeg does not have a large freeway system.

I have not been there but I get the feeling Winnipeg's seen less infill in recent years than some other cities (like Toronto for example, even in relative terms). That recent construction is causing US and Canadian cities to drift apart more.

That was my impression from a brief stop in Winnipeg a few years ago too. It's an interesting city that's got a lot going for it, like its heritage building stock; but it's also a bit of an outlier amongst Canadian cities of its size in that it hasn't seen much residential infill (though that which it does have also seems nicer than most other cities), and fewer modern urban improvements. It's also the only city in its size range without rail transit either existing or planned.

To that extent, it does feel somewhat more stereotypically "American" (or at least, Midwestern American) in many ways, good & bad - it's got an older-than-average housing stock for a Canadian city (and it's actually affordable!), some impressive old commercial buildings and well-preserved pre-war towers; but also less newer development, not many residential high-rises, a ring of surface parking around the CBD, higher crime (also primarily in the inner city rather than in the suburbs), wide roads & one-way streets, etc.

[MonkeyRonin]

Originally Posted by Yuri

I preferred to use Census numbers for both countries to keep consistent as they have very generous population estimates. Toronto didn't grow 10% in one year.

Fair enough to use comparable censuses for all parties, though the Canadian census estimates are usually more accurate than the actual census is, since of course, not everyone actually fills out their census forms (no idea how the German one compares). The 2021 census data was particularly bad though, as it was conducted during the height of the pandemic; but it also doesn't take into account the years of record population growth that followed. Toronto's 2024 population estimate stood at 3,273,119 - nearly half a million higher than the 2021 census - due to a mix of census undercount and 3 years of crazy growth.

[Docere]

Luckily Canada does a census every 5 years.

[lrt's friend]

Winnipeg went through several years of stagnation that limited infill etc. Winnipeg is now growing faster again.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by MonkeyRonin

Toronto's 2024 population estimate stood at 3,273,119 - nearly half a million higher than the 2021 census - due to a mix of census undercount and 3 years of crazy growth.

Canada as a whole was growing at 3% a year at one point. I know SSP often has these debates about comparability of data but the issue in this case is more that due to the building boom and pace of population growth, 2021 is out of date already in some places. Not many countries in the developed world have cities going through this kind of transformation.