Population and land area of Canada's largest cities, 1941

[hipster duck]

Originally Posted by Taeolas

Glace Bay 25,147 9.7

This boggles my mind a bit. My mom's family is nearby in Donkin, and Glace Bay always felt like a smaller town than my home town in many ways. Looking at Wiki, they lost about 6k people between the 40's and 90's, and apparently have lost a lot more since then. Which is probably why it's always felt like a bit of a 'run down' town to me. A cute town but it felt like it was bigger than its population.

Just google streetviewing around, Glace Bay has pretty terrible bones for a Maritime city that was that size in 1941. Hard to believe that this city had twice the population of, say, Charlottetown.


Then again, it really mushroomed between 1900-1920, rather than earlier, so it probably missed out on a lot of the beefy Victorian architecture that makes an impression on visitors. Its population in 1901 was just under 7,000, and in 1891 it was 2,500.

The fact that it was a working class coal mining town that wasn't even the main city in its small region probably meant that there were few locals with any homegrown wealth that would have felt that it was worth investing in any any civic grandeur.

[ConundrumNL]

1945 Newfoundland Census lists St. John's districts (East and West) of having a combined population of 65256.

St. John's City had 44603

https://publications.gc.ca/site/eng/...blication.html

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by hipster duck

Just google streetviewing around, Glace Bay has pretty terrible bones for a Maritime city that was that size in 1941. Hard to believe that this city had twice the population of, say, Charlottetown.


Then again, it really mushroomed between 1900-1920, rather than earlier, so it probably missed out on a lot of the beefy Victorian architecture that makes an impression on visitors. Its population in 1901 was just under 7,000, and in 1891 it was 2,500.

The fact that it was a working class coal mining town that wasn't even the main city in its small region probably meant that there were few locals with any homegrown wealth that would have felt that it was worth investing in any any civic grandeur.

Even nearby Sydney isn't that great either. It feels a lot like a US rust belt town that's seen better days.

[Taeolas]

Sydney and the CBRM in general have had a rough century from their heydays. Losing the coal mines, losing the steel industry, and just most of their industry in general, plus collapses in the fisheries; they were dealt blow after blow in the late 20th.

They are finally starting to turn around slowly, but they have a big deficit to overcome, even compared to the rest of the maritimes. Hopefully they can pull it off.

[MonctonRad]

Originally Posted by Taeolas

Sydney and the CBRM in general have had a rough century from their heydays. Losing the coal mines, losing the steel industry, and just most of their industry in general, plus collapses in the fisheries; they were dealt blow after blow in the late 20th.

They are finally starting to turn around slowly, but they have a big deficit to overcome, even compared to the rest of the maritimes. Hopefully they can pull it off.

Industrial Cape Breton is better off without the industry. This traditionally was all that sustained the area. All the good stuff (government, universities, cultural centres) were sucked up by Halifax. This definitely left CBRM with a rural Appalachia vibe.

CBRM however reached it's nadir about the 1990s, and is slowly starting to turn things around. We make fun of CBU, but, this institution has made a difference to CBRM, and, a satellite medical school is being developed for the campus. The Cape Breton Hospital is expanding, and the Marconi Campus of the NSCC has just opened a substantial campus on the Sydney waterfront. Tourism has gotten a big boost because of the cruise ship industry.

It will always be a fight for CBRM, but the future is a lot rosier looking now than it was 20 years ago.

[hipster duck]

Regions that specialized in heavy industry are at a huge disadvantage anywhere in the Western world, because those were industries that (a) paid well, and (b) required a lot of warm bodies. Coal and steel belts, in particular, were the first places to develop high density, little megalopoli (In 1940 the Sydney-New Waterford-Glace Bay area would have been analogous to KWC-Guelph, only on a remote peninsula 400 km away from Halifax) because of the nature and pay of the work. That's why they were the first to go during deindustrialization.

Outside of big, important cities, employment these days is either numerous but low paying, or high paying and niche. Commercial fishing is probably more the latter in the Maritimes these days, where you probably have successful fishermen making six figures but the barriers to entry are huge, and you don't need a lot of them, while the other routes to success like tourism or caring for seniors from other parts of the country are more of the numerous but low-paying variety.

There are very few coal and steel regions that successfully transitioned to another, sustainable economic model. Pittsburgh is held up as an example, but it did so painfully - the population is essentially the same as it was 60 years ago, and it's not like people who worked the shift at a steel mill ended up getting similar-paying jobs as researchers at Carnegie Mellon. There was a displacement of one population for another.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by MonctonRad

Industrial Cape Breton is better off without the industry. This traditionally was all that sustained the area. All the good stuff (government, universities, cultural centres) were sucked up by Halifax. This definitely left CBRM with a rural Appalachia vibe.

CBRM however reached it's nadir about the 1990s, and is slowly starting to turn things around. We make fun of CBU, but, this institution has made a difference to CBRM, and, a satellite medical school is being developed for the campus. The Cape Breton Hospital is expanding, and the Marconi Campus of the NSCC has just opened a substantial campus on the Sydney waterfront. Tourism has gotten a big boost because of the cruise ship industry.

It will always be a fight for CBRM, but the future is a lot rosier looking now than it was 20 years ago.

Without a major pulling up of bootstraps and a bit of luck, that could have been Moncton too, no?

[MolsonExport]

Driving through Cape Breton Island (a beautiful place, to be sure), I got the impression that it is very much the West Virginia of Canada.

[MonctonRad]

Originally Posted by Acajack

Without a major pulling up of bootstraps and a bit of luck, that could have been Moncton too, no?

Absolutely! We had our own near death experience in the 1980s (CN shops, Eaton's catalogue warehouse, CFB Moncton), but, we had visionary civic/business leadership, federal/provincial help and, and ideal location at the heart of the Maritimes. We turned things around within five years, and are now the fastest growing city in the country (proportionately).

CBRM had more of a woe-is-me attitude at first, rather than Monctonian optimism, and did everything in their power to try and retain their sunset industries (rather than plan for transition). It was a textbook example of what not to do. Being stuck on the far end of an island 400 km from the core of the Maritimes certainly did not help either.

[MolsonExport]

I recall my Dad doing a fair bit of work out in Moncton, when they were closing the CN locomotive shops. At the time, he worked in the Intermodal division of CNR (he was a CNR lifer until he got unceremoniously bounced out of a job, along with everyone else having 35+ years experience, in the early 1990s when the company was on the ropes). He talked about how the closure was absolutely devastating to the city.

[Docere]

Originally Posted by Docere

For interest, the 2001 census for selected cities in Ontario (translating to square miles to compare with pre-war cities). This is right after the Harris amalgamations. Population figures were compiled for former cities in 2001. All these cities saw significant expansion to the land area in the postwar era:

Ottawa (dissolved) 337,031 43
London 336,539 163
Hamilton (dissolved) 331,121 47
Windsor 208,402 47
Kitchener 190,399 53
Oshawa 139,051 56
St. Catharines 129,170 37
Guelph 106,170 33
Brantford 86,417 28
Niagara Falls 78,815 81
Sarnia 70,876 64
Kingston (dissolved) 54,456 11

How did London get such a large land area so quickly? It's basically the Canadian Columbus.

In 1950, I believe UWO was outside the city limits.

[Docere]

Cape Breton cities, 1941:

Sydney 28,305
Glace Bay 25,147
New Waterford 9,302
Sydney Mines 8,198

Total 70,952

[MonctonRad]

Originally Posted by Docere

Cape Breton cities, 1941:

Sydney 28,305
Glace Bay 25,147
New Waterford 9,302
Sydney Mines 8,198

Total 70,952

CBRM today is just slightly over 100,000 people. There has been virtual stagnation for the last 80 years.

[Docere]

In the 1940s, urban Cape Breton was about 3/4 the size of greater Halifax. Now Halifax has more than 4 times the population of urban Cape Breton and has about half of Nova Scotia's population.

[Taeolas]

It's not hard to imagine that if Sydney had had some visionary leadership in the 80's/90's, when deindustrialization was going on (similar to Moncton's leadership), it could be an entirely different beast today. We're seeing hints of it now, as the region is pivoting, emphasizing education and tourism and transportation and similar modern industries.

Halifax would always be the big dog in Nova Scotia, but a stronger Sydney would certainly change the provincial dynamics. Likely such a Sydney would "only" be 150-200k population wise, probably with a feeling similar to Saskatchewan with Regina/Saskatoon.

[MolsonExport]

Originally Posted by Docere

How did London get such a large land area so quickly? It's basically the Canadian Columbus.

In 1950, I believe UWO was outside the city limits.

London annexed many of the surrounding communities in 1961, including Byron and Masonville, adding 60,000 people and more than doubling its area. After this amalgamation, suburban growth accelerated as London grew outward in all directions, creating expansive new subdivisions such as Westmount, Oakridge, Whitehills, Pond Mills, White Oaks and Stoneybrook.

On 1 January 1993, London annexed nearly the entire township of Westminster, a large, primarily rural municipality directly south of the city, including the police village of Lambeth. With this massive annexation, which also included part of London township, London almost doubled in area again, adding several thousand more residents. In the present day, London stretches south to the boundary with Elgin County, north and east to Fanshawe Lake, north and west to the township of Middlesex Centre (the nearest developed areas of it being Arva to the north and Komoka to the west) and east to Nilestown and Dorchester.

The 1993 annexation, made London one of the largest urban municipalities in Ontario.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London,_Ontario

[MonctonRad]

Originally Posted by Taeolas

It's not hard to imagine that if Sydney had had some visionary leadership in the 80's/90's, when deindustrialization was going on (similar to Moncton's leadership), it could be an entirely different beast today. We're seeing hints of it now, as the region is pivoting, emphasizing education and tourism and transportation and similar modern industries.

Moncton built it's transformation on two pillars:

1) - bilingual services (government services, call centers)
2) - distribution, transportation, light manufacturing (being the "hub of the Maritimes" helps).

Unfortunately CBRM does not have a bilingual workforce, CBRM also does not have "location, location, location" like Moncton does either.

It was always going to be a much harder row to hoe than Moncton in any event. The Moncton leadership did a fabulous job identifying and building on our natural advantages. CBRM was left scratching their head.........

[Docere]

London's "gobble up the surrounding areas" approach was outdone by the Harris amalgamations of Ottawa and Hamilton which was basically the Canadian equivalent of city-county consolidations. Now both have larger land areas in London. With the Ottawa-Carleton amalgamation, the city of Ottawa's land area is now bigger than that of the infamous Jacksonville.

[MolsonExport]

Ottawa's city limits are like, near Prescott? OK, I am exaggerating, but only slightly. Driving along the 416, you see the sign for Ottawa: Canada's Capital (with a strangely exact population of 1,000,000) but then after driving for another 15 minutes, you are still surrounded by forests and the odd farm.

[Docere]

Imagine that Toronto and York Region were amalgamated into one city. That's basically what you have with Ottawa.