Cities that most radically depart from and most closely resemble "typical" US demos

[Docere]

Yes, German ancestry is generic American pretty much.

It's common pretty much everywhere except New England and the Deep South and especially common in the Midwest and Pennsylvania.

[ue]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

Okay, so Los Angeles, an America city, also fills in for other American cities. How does this contradict the very obvious fact that Toronto looks like an American city?

Los Angeles also will play other cities outside of the US, just as Canadian cities will. Regardless, you're really content with saying Los Angeles looks like New York or Connecticut??? I don't think being able to find a scene that could "pass" for another means that that place looks like the place it is intending on passing as, on the whole. Every city has places that can resemble other places because cites do not exist in a vacuum and not every square meter can be devoted to an extremely localized vernacular. There are parts of London that look like Boston, Toronto, Lyon, Amsterdam, Frankfurt, Sydney, etc. Does that mean London looks like an American, Canadian, French, Dutch, German, or Australian city on the whole? No.

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by ue

Los Angeles also will play other cities outside of the US, just as Canadian cities will. Regardless, you're really content with saying Los Angeles looks like New York or Connecticut??? I don't think being able to find a scene that could "pass" for another means that that place looks like the place it is intending on passing as, on the whole. Every city has places that can resemble other places because cites do not exist in a vacuum and not every square meter can be devoted to an extremely localized vernacular. There are parts of London that look like Boston, Toronto, Lyon, Amsterdam, Frankfurt, Sydney, etc. Does that mean London looks like an American, Canadian, French, Dutch, German, or Australian city on the whole? No.

Show us the part of Toronto that has no analogy in the United States.

[badrunner]

Originally Posted by ue

Toronto I would argue lacks very obvious cousins because it is the only kind of city of its size and history in that region. It has some pan-Ontario similarities with Ottawa, Hamilton, and Kitchener-Waterloo and some of the new urban forms in common with Vancouver (the glass condos and 'ethnoburbs' in particular), but it isn't like Edmonton where obvious similarities to other peer Prairie cities can be discussed. However, you could make the argument that if Ottawa was scaled up to Toronto-size, it'd probably look similar to Toronto. A Toronto sized city in Pennsylvania would not, as Philadelphia indicates.

That makes Philadelphia unique, not Toronto. If Toronto was a US city, would it really be considered all that distinctive? I guess there are some peculiar Canadian things about it but architecturally it doesn't really stand out. Its prewar core is pretty standard American fare that wouldn't be out of place in NYC or Chicago. Its suburbs are basically sunbelt suburbs. Its residential vernacular is derived from various American styles. You could say that Toronto's standout feature is that it's THE most generically North American city in North America.

[Docere]

Originally Posted by badrunner

That makes Philadelphia unique, not Toronto. If Toronto was a US city, would it really be considered all that distinctive? I guess there are some peculiar Canadian things about it but architecturally it doesn't really stand out. Its prewar core is pretty standard American fare that wouldn't be out of place in NYC or Chicago. Its suburbs are basically sunbelt suburbs. Its residential vernacular is derived from various American styles. You could say that Toronto's standout feature is that it's THE most generically North American city in North America.

A Great Lakes city that resembled Queens NY in demographics and urban form would definitely stick out in the US, yes.

Of course if it had developed in the US, Toronto's growth trajectory would have been totally different and it probably would have been more like Rochester or something.

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by Docere

A Great Lakes city that resembled Queens NY in demographics and urban form would definitely stick out in the US, yes.

Of course if it had developed in the US, Toronto's growth trajectory would have been totally different and it probably would have been more like Rochester or something.

Even for a Great Lakes city Toronto isn't remarkable. If certain Rust Belt cities hadn't let their dense cores rot beyond recognition, they would look just like Toronto.

[bilbao58]

Originally Posted by ue

Wow way to not actually read what I said. Good job!

I read exactly what you said. Saint John (NB), Winnipeg, Kelowna, and Windsor can look kind of American, Toronto, by comparison, doesn't look very American.

As someone who actually lived in Toronto, I can say that a huge amount of Toronto looks generically American. Sure, there are British colonialisms (stuff I'm reminded of when I see certain photos of cities like Sydney or even things I personally saw in Singapore and Kuala Lumpur), Canadianisms (those steep copper roofs), the formal gardens and parks are kind of British-y...but overall, the style of development is (North) American. Toronto doesn't feel nearly as American as it looks, however. But that's a different story.

[Docere]

Toronto is obviously very North American, but with a British influence. In the old core neighborhoods, the "high street" typology and narrow streets make it feel a bit different from Midwest/Great Lakes cities in the US. Typology seems more "American" after 1900 or so. Though there was also some British influence in the postwar years due to the influence of British planners (high rises outside the core and the "new town" type suburbs like Don Mills).

There's also an "Ontario" typology you can see in Hamilton, Ottawa, London etc.

[bilbao58]

Originally Posted by Docere

Though there was also some British influence in the postwar years due to the influence of British planners (high rises outside the core…).

I never realized Houston was so British!😛


NOT MY PHOTO

[wwmiv]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

Show us the part of Toronto that has no analogy in the United States.

Their suburban satellite skylines.

[ue]

Originally Posted by badrunner

That makes Philadelphia unique, not Toronto. If Toronto was a US city, would it really be considered all that distinctive? I guess there are some peculiar Canadian things about it but architecturally it doesn't really stand out. Its prewar core is pretty standard American fare that wouldn't be out of place in NYC or Chicago. Its suburbs are basically sunbelt suburbs. Its residential vernacular is derived from various American styles. You could say that Toronto's standout feature is that it's THE most generically North American city in North America.

By that token, American cities are derivative of Canadian and in some cases British cities. And within the US, cities like Cleveland are derivative of Detroit. Or the Loop looks like Manhattan.

I'm not saying there aren't overlaps between Toronto and American cities. Obviously there is influence. But I am pushing back against the idea that Toronto isn't distinctive and therefore that's why it can play any US city on the big screen. In reality, the filmmakers are deliberately scouting out locations that resemble to some extent where a film is set, and even then, it can be rather sloppy.















Again, if you really wanted to, you could see resemblances to other US cities and especially some Canadian cities, but arguably you could do that with any city. There is a distinct aesthetic to Toronto - the messy electrical and streetcar wires, the brick vaguely British High Streets, the Victorian Bay-and-Gable, the postwar white concrete slab towers, the Vancouverist condos, the utilitarian commercial buildings, the Chateau-esque railway hotel all jumbling together into a weird but interesting hodgepodge.

Originally Posted by Docere

Toronto is obviously very North American, but with a British influence. In the old core neighborhoods, the "high street" typology and narrow streets make it feel a bit different from Midwest/Great Lakes cities in the US. Typology seems more "American" after 1900 or so. Though there was also some British influence in the postwar years due to the influence of British planners (high rises outside the core and the "new town" type suburbs like Don Mills).

There's also an "Ontario" typology you can see in Hamilton, Ottawa, London etc.

This.

[JManc]

I haven't been to Toronto since I was a kid but was in Montreal not that long ago and I would be hard pressed to distinguish it from a large northern American city outside the French signage and Quebec plates.

[bilbao58]

Originally Posted by wwmiv

Their suburban satellite skylines.

Wait. What?

[bilbao58]

Originally Posted by ue

I'm not saying there aren't overlaps between Toronto and American cities. Obviously there is influence. But I am pushing back against the idea that Toronto isn't distinctive and therefore that's why it can play any US city on the big screen.

These photos, originally published in the Toronto Star, PROVE that Toronto looks just like an American city!

And, obviously, I’m joking.

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by wwmiv

Their suburban satellite skylines.

Miami? lol.

That was even a thing in suburban Detroit in the 1970s and 1980s. They didn't follow through it to quite the extent that maybe a Mississauga did, but Southfield, MI, has dozens of suburban residential towers:

https://goo.gl/maps/dwnYWzUWk59UfgeP6

https://goo.gl/maps/EtsnYbUoesLE382F6

https://goo.gl/maps/zHwLqJffvsTHtydD7

[Crawford]

Yeah, Southfield has a bizzaroland postwar Toronto feel. Kinda like if the Toronto equivalents stopped building around the late 1980's.

[bilbao58]

Originally Posted by wwmiv

Their suburban satellite skylines.

How are Toronto's suburban satellite skylines inherently any different than those of Los Angeles or Houston or Atlanta or any other major American city with multiple skylines? Serious question.

[bilbao58]

Originally Posted by Crawford

Yeah, Southfield has a bizzaroland postwar Toronto feel. Kinda like if the Toronto equivalents stopped building around the late 1980's.

This looks like North York circa 1971: https://www.google.com/maps/@42.4537...7i16384!8i8192

[MolsonExport]

departures from typical US/Canadian demos?

Well sticking with only the big cities I would say (and only for the inner/oldest parts as the burbs are largely banal like everywhere else):

Quebec City
New Orleans
Savannah
Boston
NYC
Washington
Philadelphia
Montreal
San Francisco
Chicago

And maybe
Vancouver
Toronto

Perhaps it would be helpful to catalogue a list of cities that epitomize the typical US/Canadian demos

[shappy]

It's a popular theme on this site to write Toronto off as just a generic looking American city. It reeks of a bizarre contempt and ignorance of the place.