Are most Canadians happy with Canada?

[milomilo]

Originally Posted by stevanford1

Honestly, they are way better than anything in Vaughan.

VaughanVomit

Not sure if I'm missing something, but those houses look like palaces compared to 99% of houses in the UK.

They could do with more trees and the pink ones are a bit yuck, but what else is wrong with them?

[urbandreamer]

^Everything is wrong with them: Cheap materials, horrendous proportions, terrible architecture, awkward front and especially rear porches/decks, their entire existence is to show off their owners SUV collection, bare minimum landscaping. They're Proletarian Palaces.

What part of England are you from?

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by milomilo

Not sure if I'm missing something, but those houses look like palaces compared to 99% of houses in the UK.

They could do with more trees and the pink ones are a bit yuck, but what else is wrong with them?

They're nothing compared to a retro-shab 1000 sq ft neo-modern council house complete with an extra room under the stairs for when your annoying nephew has to come stay with you!

(Don't get me wrong BTW. I don't really have anything against the UK. But some of the comparisons on here are a bit much.)

[milomilo]

Originally Posted by urbandreamer

^Everything is wrong with them: Cheap materials, horrendous proportions, terrible architecture, awkward front and especially rear porches/decks, their entire existence is to show off their owners SUV collection, bare minimum landscaping. Designed to impress the working class immigrants who've finally "made it." What part of England are you from?

Anywhere. I guarantee you that the working class plebs in the UK would be delighted to replace their cramped hovel with something like what you posted. If they could have a big SUV or two to go along with it, even better.

Honestly I really think some people in Canada have wildly inaccurate ideas of how people in other countries live. And the standard quality of the average house.

[milomilo]

Originally Posted by Acajack

They're nothing compared to a retro-shab 1000 sq ft neo-modern council house complete with an extra room under the stairs for when your annoying nephew has to come stay with you!

(Don't get me wrong BTW. I don't really have anything against the UK. But some of the comparisons on here are a bit much.)

I am always one for honesty in discussions. There's lots of good things about the UK. But housing quality is not one of them.

[urbandreamer]

My friend owns a semi in a formerly working class neighbourhood of Toronto: it's cheaply built with poor trim and an awkward layout with a steep narrow staircase, unfinished dirt floor basement and the foundation is sinking. It was built c.1890s yet for all its flaws still has better architectural merit than anything in Vaughan.

Possibly our misunderstanding is a class thing -- although I have worked in many working class settings (construction, manufacturing) I have never felt working class nor understood working class desires for space.

[esquire]

^ You say it as though the wealthy don't desire space too?!

[milomilo]

Originally Posted by esquire

^ You say it as though the wealthy don't desire space too?!

"The wealthy" have the luxury of not having to grow up sharing a damp tiny house and a bedroom with their siblings, and can afford to buy a nice condo in a fun neighbourhood, if they choose. The less well off are quite content to move into a bigger place with stuff that works correctly and might not be too upset if the exterior cladding doesn't live up to some people's aesthetic standards.

[davee930]

Originally Posted by urbandreamer

^Everything is wrong with them: Cheap materials, horrendous proportions, terrible architecture, awkward front and especially rear porches/decks, their entire existence is to show off their owners SUV collection, bare minimum landscaping. They're Proletarian Palaces.

What part of England are you from?

Exactly. I stand by my statement that most of Canadians just don't give a fuck or know what quality is suppose to look like.

Again it's not the design that's the main problem, it's the standards. it probably bothers me more because I have to sell out my soul everyday to design cheap buildings in a well respected company.

[davee930]

Also what's with the butt ugly fake stone everywhere. Don't put it on at all! It can't even go down to grade.

[MonkeyRonin]

And herein we reach the problem in Canadian architecture & urban design: anything more than the bare minimum is considered a frou frou luxury for elitist snobs and who cares anyway when we have so much SPACE!

There just isn't a well enough developed design culture here yet to have filtered into mainstream (or even semi-mainstream) tastes.

[Architype]

Originally Posted by milomilo

Not sure if I'm missing something, but those houses look like palaces compared to 99% of houses in the UK.

They could do with more trees and the pink ones are a bit yuck, but what else is wrong with them?

Everybody knows that this kind of lifestyle arrangement is unsustainable. It's totally auto dependent, results in poor physical and mental health, socially and environmentally unfriendly, not to speak of being poorly built with cheap materials and is an ugly pastiche and mockery of real life and real architecture. Let's leave Leave it to Beaver in the 50s.

[hipster duck]

Originally Posted by MonkeyRonin

And herein we reach the problem in Canadian architecture & urban design: anything more than the bare minimum is considered a frou frou luxury for elitist snobs and who cares anyway when we have so much SPACE!

There just isn't a well enough developed design culture here yet to have filtered into mainstream (or even semi-mainstream) tastes.

I don't think that's what milo or the contrary side is arguing.

We (I'll put myself in that camp) just think it's disingenuous to post a picture of a niche development in Cambridge where homes cost £1.7 million (CAD 2.9 million) and claim that is "the norm" in other countries, and then compare these favourably against Canadian starter homes in subdivisions.

Another forumer also made the legit point that the British designs and choice of landscaping wouldn't work in our humid continental climate.

I think buildings in Canada are generally unattractive and could be made better, but I also think people overestimate the quality and architecture of homes that the average person lives in in other countries.

[SignalHillHiker]

Originally Posted by milomilo

Not sure if I'm missing something, but those houses look like palaces compared to 99% of houses in the UK.

They could do with more trees and the pink ones are a bit yuck, but what else is wrong with them?

They’re just so ugly. Cheap, gluttonous. They’re the housing equivalent of a Karen. Or a trashy mom yelling at her overweight kids in a Walmart McDonald’s.

[lio45]

One thing that fascinates me in Europe (actually, I should say France since that's where all my examples are from) is how good they are (or at least, that's my impression) at limiting sprawl compared to us.

[MonctonRad]

Originally Posted by Architype

Everybody knows that this kind of lifestyle arrangement is unsustainable. It's totally auto dependent, results in poor physical and mental health, socially and environmentally unfriendly, not to speak of being poorly built with cheap materials and is an ugly pastiche and mockery of real life and real architecture. Let's leave Leave it to Beaver in the 50s.

Ouch...….

I'm trying to decide if you're being sarcastic or not, but something tells me that you are.

Amsterdam is great, but not everyone wants to live in a small apartment on the sixth floor of a six storey walk-up. Living on a canal may be romantic, but urban congestion can get a bit tedious at times, and not everyone wants to bicycle to work all the time or be forced to take the tram during a pandemic. Children may want a backyard to play in, and it can be difficult hosting a barbeque in a downtown tenement. Sometimes a car is convenient if you have to get groceries.

In other words, a downtown lifestyle can be good if you are a young professional, or if you are single and do not plan to ever have children, or if you are an empty nester who wants to downsize, but that still leaves a lot of people who want to have a driveway, a garage, a bit of grass, and a house large enough to accommodate 2-3 kids and occasionally their friends for a sleepover. I don't think suburbia is going anywhere.

Can there be improvements in suburban architectural design - of course. Can suburban neighbourhoods be made more walkable - absolutely! Should public transit in the suburbs be improved in quality - unquestionably. Should we avoid suburban monoculture and instead promote the idea of "village nodes" around which varied housing options could be established - wouldn't that be neat.

Improvements can be made, but there are a lot of urban elitist snobs on this forum who think that anyone who does not want to live in a tiny downtown condo is nothing more than a Neanderthal and a "breeder" who should be called out and castigated within an inch of his/her life...………..

[esquire]

^ For what it's worth, there is a lot of 'in between' when you're looking at downtown Toronto massive condo towers vs. low density suburban sprawl.

A couple of years ago I stayed at an airbnb in Krakow just to the west of the Old Town... it was extremely central, but it still felt like a neighbourhood with lots of families, the elderly, park space, various amenities, etc. Kids played in building courtyards. It was in no way a yuppie playground in the way some of our downtowns and urban neighbourhoods have become. This in my view should be the long term goal.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by hipster duck

We (I'll put myself in that camp) just think it's disingenuous to post a picture of a niche development in Cambridge where homes cost £1.7 million (CAD 2.9 million) and claim that is "the norm" in other countries, and then compare these favourably against Canadian starter homes in subdivisions.

Another point that seems overlooked is that the true market share of these properties can be very different from how noticeable they are in our cities. In many Canadian cities the median newly-constructed unit isn't even a house anymore, it is an apartment or condo. But we tend to underweight those because they take up less land.

The middle range of housing in the suburban starter home to McMansion range is but one segment of the market and it's shrinking, while multi-unit and designer high-end homes have exploded in relative terms (lots of multi-unit, way more high-end as a % but still a small % of the total).

[someone123]

Originally Posted by MonctonRad

Amsterdam is great, but not everyone wants to live in a small apartment on the sixth floor of a six storey walk-up.

I visited friends who lived in the suburbs of Amsterdam and their place was basically identical to what you'd get in metro Vancouver. It was connected to the core by a highway and commuter rail which took maybe 20 minutes from Amsterdam Centraal.

I think Amsterdam's transportation (road + highway + ferry + bike + tram + metro + commuter rail) is just better than what we have in any city in Canada, and they have a lot more housing options than what you find in the older parts of town. They also have much higher quality public housing than we do. And Amsterdam is a global city with rich investment buyers; there are other cities like Utrecht or Rotterdam that might be a bit easier housing-wise (and are super easy to get to from Amsterdam or vice versa; you do not say goodbye to your friends and family when you move to another town) although I am not sure.

Another phenomenon I experienced in Amsterdam was getting "caught" taking transit around rush hour but it was really pleasant and functional compared to Vancouver or Toronto. Maybe I was there on unusually quiet days or something. Could it be that they just have enough capacity that they're not at crush loads on normal days?

[rousseau]

Originally Posted by Architype

...results in poor physical and mental health, socially and environmentally unfriendly, not to speak of being poorly built with cheap materials and is an ugly pastiche and mockery of real life and real architecture...

I'm as contemptuous of suburbia as anyone, but these are extravagant claims that are demonstrably untrue.