The Westmount of Toronto (M4V)

[Denscity]

I wonder how "wild west" West Vancouver was. It was mostly just forest before the Guinness family bought it up and built the Lion's Gate Bridge.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by esquire

Winnipeg too... the best-known posh area in town, Tuxedo, is named after Tuxedo Park, NY.

I have sometimes heard out of towners express mirth at Tuxedo's name... I get the impression that some think it is named after the type of clothing, which would be pretty funny I admit.

Even before I went to Winnipeg I thought Tuxedo was a cool name.

And I fully expected it to be the posh part of town. I would have been shocked had it not been.

[niwell]

There's a Tuxedo Park in Calgary which is decidedly not posh, though it does some have some higher end infill now. It was primarily built up in the late 40s - 50s, but I'm fairly certain the land was platted out and put up for sale as part of the 1912 real estate boom. Most of these areas sat fallow for decades, so I do wonder if the naming falls inline with Andy6's theory above.

[Rico Rommheim]

I`d really like to know why on earth there`s a West Vancouver Park on Nun`s island, actually.

[hipster duck]

Originally Posted by niwell

There's a Tuxedo Park in Calgary which is decidedly not posh, though it does some have some higher end infill now. It was primarily built up in the late 40s - 50s, but I'm fairly certain the land was platted out and put up for sale as part of the 1912 real estate boom. Most of these areas sat fallow for decades, so I do wonder if the naming falls inline with Andy6's theory above.

You might be aware that there's also a Tuxedo Court (aka: "Tux Court") in Scarborough.

It's probably even less posh than Calgary's Tuxedo Park, as evinced by the fact that it has an entry in Rap Dictionary that contains a surprising amount of social statistics for a user-generated site of hip hop neologisms.

[Andy6]

Originally Posted by niwell

There's a Tuxedo Park in Calgary which is decidedly not posh, though it does some have some higher end infill now. It was primarily built up in the late 40s - 50s, but I'm fairly certain the land was platted out and put up for sale as part of the 1912 real estate boom. Most of these areas sat fallow for decades, so I do wonder if the naming falls inline with Andy6's theory above.

It was probably inspired by Winnipeg's Tuxedo, which was designed by the Olmsted company that was responsible for some of the most exclusive "city beautiful" suburbs in the U.S. People in Calgary in 1912 would in many cases have been living in Winnipeg a year or two earlier and would already have associated the heavily marketed "Tuxedo" name with high quality. The amount of marketing that went into the subdivisions of that time makes today's efforts look very lame in comparison.

[Docere]

Originally Posted by Andy6

I guess it could be ... not really as distinct a place though. Probably more lower-income people in M4V than in Westmount to bring the average income figure down, since M4V appears to have a much higher number of apartment-dwellers (79% vs. 59%).

True, but similar population, similar demographics, basically identical incomes. Both are affluent "uptown" enclaves with some very wealthy "mansion districts" but with a real mix of housing.

Montreal being more of a low-rise city has fewer high rise apartments.

[Docere]

Deer Park/Summerhill/Rathnelly = Lower Westmount

Forest Hill around UCC = Upper Westmount

[urbanroo]

Originally Posted by Rico Rommheim

I'd actually like to know why there's an affluent neighbourhood in Edmonton called Westmount.

Or some fancy school in Calgary called Westmount, or for that matter, a neighbourhood in West Van called Westmount. I've got some many questions.

The Westmount in Edmonton was most likely named after the Montreal neighbourhood as a marketing ploy to attract affluent families when it opened to development before WWI. Today it is one of the nicest, most historic areas of the city; some of its streets comprise the protected Westmount Architectural Heritage area.

https://www.google.com/maps/@53.5534...7i13312!8i6656

[Andy6]

Looks like various neighbourhoods in Winnipeg, except with smaller trees.

[Architype]

Originally Posted by Rico Rommheim

I`d really like to know why on earth there`s a West Vancouver Park on Nun`s island, actually.

Canada is so rife with cultural appropriation it's embarrassing, we shamefully have Quebec and Ontario Streets in Vancouver too.

[Rico Rommheim]

^That's fine and not surprising. Montreal has Ontario and Ottawa streets (named after the lake and the river), but does Vancouver have a Montreal-Ouest Park?

[Andy6]

Originally Posted by Rico Rommheim

I`d really like to know why on earth there`s a West Vancouver Park on Nun`s island, actually.

Maybe West Vancouver contributed a gift to Montreal for Expo’67? Toronto donated all the park benches, some of which we later got back; the ones with the pyramid-shaped concrete bases.

[Acajack]

My guess is that the former city of Verdun, of which Île-des-Soeurs was a part, was "twinned" with the city of West Vancouver at some point.

Cities often will name something for their "twin" in order to underscore their relationship.

Ottawa has been twinned with The Hague in the Netherlands for quite some time. Hence it has a street named Den Haag Drive. Thankfully it's not 's-Gravenhage Drive!

Gatineau has a street called Rue d'Edmonton which is a holdover from when the old city of Hull was twinned with the Alberta capital.

[Martin Mtl]

Originally Posted by Docere

Deer Park/Summerhill/Rathnelly = Lower Westmount

Forest Hill around UCC = Upper Westmount

What kills me in these posh Toronto areas is that they never bothered to bury the hydro lines.

To me, these places have more in common with Ville Mont-Royal than Westmount.

[WhipperSnapper]

It's a weird one. There was one Rosedale developer, for example, that buried the wires but, all the others Rosedale developments went overhead.


This is the neighbourhood

https://www.google.com/maps/@43.6791...7i16384!8i8192

It's not cost effective to bury an existing overhead grid. We'll see more and more buried in neighbourhoods as the grids require expansion. Most will never be buried.

[niwell]

The roads in Rosedale are also in surprisingly poor shape, as I learned the hard way after deciding to bike through recently. It does fit the anglo trend of hiding ultra rich areas away and making them inaccessible instead of being showcases.

[MolsonExport]

Don't ever try to drive/rollerblade through NDG in Montreal. The roads are cratered.

[MonkeyRonin]

Originally Posted by niwell

The roads in Rosedale are also in surprisingly poor shape, as I learned the hard way after deciding to bike through recently. It does fit the anglo trend of hiding ultra rich areas away and making them inaccessible instead of being showcases.

Always thought the Caribou Park area was a bit of an odd one as well - multi-million dollar mansions and they haven't even got curbs! https://goo.gl/maps/3tomYNdqGhnbWVRb7

(seems the streets have at least been repaved since the last time I went through there)

[JHikka]

Originally Posted by niwell

Rosedale if you include the Yonge st strip and higher density areas that bleed towards Yonge/Bloor and Yonge/St. Clair I'd say. So Rosedale plus Summerhill? Definitely not a perfect match by any metric though.

Rosedale gets my vote as well but it's far from a perfect, identical match.