Canadian cities American counterparts

[trofirhen]

Originally Posted by MonctonRad

As far as the Maritimes are concerned:

Halifax - Boston
Saint John - Portland (Me)
Moncton - Bangor (Me)
Fredericton - Augusta (Me)

Regarding a couple of your other comparisons:

Montreal I have most commonly heard being compared to NYC
Toronto is Canada's Chicago ( this is a no brainer)

Wheeeew !!! Tell that to someone from Toronto !!!

[caltrane74]

Toronto has a Midtown (Yorkville) and an uptown (Yonge Eglinton) so yes, I would say Toronto is kinda like Canada's New York City. (And to top it off, the distance separation is almost exactly the same in both cities)

[hipster duck]

This thread is a blast from the past!

There has probably never been a time in our collective history (e.g. from 1867 to now) when Canadian cities and American cities have been so different, especially demographically.

For example, Canada has 380,000 people of Latin American descent. That's equivalent to the number of Hispanics in Sacramento, CA.

Meanwhile, even cities that are not considered to be particularly Chinese by Canadian standards have more people of Chinese descent than American cities that are seen by Americans as Asian magnets. For example, the Montreal CMA has 1/3 more people of Chinese descent than the City of Los Angeles! Both of these places are roughly the same size (4 million).

[FFX-ME]

Originally Posted by caltrane74

Toronto has a Midtown (Yorkville) and an uptown (Yonge Eglinton) so yes, I would say Toronto is kinda like Canada's New York City. (And to top it off, the distance separation is almost exactly the same in both cities)

Montreal culture and food is much more NYC than Toronto is. Although Toronto has the stock exchange and big firms I guess.

[niwell]

Originally Posted by FFX-ME

Montreal culture and food is much more NYC than Toronto is. Although Toronto has the stock exchange and big firms I guess.

Neither are, really. IMO Montreal and Toronto are much more similar to each other in terms of food / culture (anglo culture) than they are to NYC. I suppose you could make the argument that parts of Montreal look somewhat like parts of Brooklyn, but even then it's not that close. Similarly parts of Toronto look a bit like parts of Queens.

[Cyro]

Chicago - Winnipeg

Sky Rise Cities
Cityscape: Winnipeg's Historic Exchange District as the Chicago of the North

1400 kilometres north of the Windy City, Winnipeg is home to an impressive collection of commercial architecture from the turn of the last century that has won 'The Peg' the somewhat lesser-known designation of 'Chicago of the North. Winnipeg's 'Chicago of the North' moniker serves its city more faithfully, as the architecture in Winnipeg's historic Exchange District is inextricably linked to the worldwide influence of the Chicago School of Architecture. This edition of Cityscape will explore the intricate architectural connection between Winnipeg's Exchange District and the set of architectural guidelines and philosophy that have become synonymous with Chicago.


nitially the site of the Winnipeg Grain Exchange, which operated for nearly a century from its establishment in 1887 to its dissolution in 1986, what is now known as the Exchange District was once the centre of Canada's grain industry. It was also the financial heart of Western Canada throughout the heyday of Winnipeg's late-nineteenth-to-early-twentieth-century boomtown years. From the end of the nineteenth century to the First World War, Winnipeg, similar to Chicago to the south, was one of the fastest growing cities in North America........

Con't..@ http://skyrisecities.com/news/2016/0...-chicago-north

Excellent piece, Posted by a Winnipeg Forumer..

The photos included are quite good...

I hear comparisons to Detroit's core, all the time..don't see it personally..

[brightlite]

Originally Posted by Andy6

I'd say Boston is a lot like Halifax in many ways. Just more of it. Both have a lot of colleges, both are maritime cities with long histories. There are bits of them that look fairly similar. There are many historical connections between the two. People are just harrumphing because there's such a fixation on the forum about population figures, and cities that happen to have fewer people in them (no matter how interesting and full of history and other significance) are supposed to know their place and not claim any impressive characteristics (such as comparability to a prestigious U.S. city like Boston).

There are definitely some similarities between Toronto and Atlanta, notably the odd ahistoricality of both of them -- they are both cities where 'now' is everything and where relatively few people have any deep roots. They're both rather plain-jane aesthetically, although Toronto seems to me to be much more interesting (having only been to Atlanta once). But in North American terms, if Canada were to be thought of as just a region comparable to the U.S. South, it would not be hard to see Toronto and Atlanta as occupying rather similar places in their very distinctive regions. Both are latecomers in their regions and, perhaps for that very reason, able to escape the parochialness and inwardness of those regions better than other cities (and therefore to grow very large and prosperous).

Originally Posted by ue

American and Canadian cities are pretty different in general. Both fit under the North American (you could include Australia and New Zealand in this) style of cities, but they are still both different and distinct. Calgary is usually considered one of the more "Americanized" cities in Canada, but it looks very Canadian to me. No city in the U.S. could come up with the density of suburbs, commercial job density, LRT ridershop, or slab apartments with just 1.2 million people. I can see the small connection between Boston and Montreal (some similar architecture, university towns, historically significant, vibrant) but they're still obviously different. Vancouver and San Francisco? Nah, they somewhat comparable politically (both very left leaning) but they look nothing alike. Architecture is completely different, geography/climate, and the Bay Area sprawls out way more (for it's size, if Vancouver were San Francisco's size, I doubt it would sprawl as much). Edmonton to Houston? Minneapolis or Denver make more sense (even though they're still quite different). Houston is far, far sprawlier and far more conservative. And maybe it's just me, but I hear more about Houston than Dallas, making it get more attention, unlike Edmonton. Toronto to Atlanta? Are you kidding me? Toronto's skyline is far more massive, Toronto itself has much more historical architecture, played a bigger role in it's respective country's history, more liberal, different climate, etc. Toronto is Canada's top tier immigration, business, and media centre. Atlanta is not to the U.S.

I know I'm very late to this thread, and created an account partially to respond to these allegations, but please forgive me-

To call Atlanta "ahistorical" when it was pivotal in the American Civil War, typified the ethos of antebellum society (and the eventual "New South"), and was also pivotal to the civil rights movement, is clueless, dumb and borderline offensive. I can only imagine this is coming from Canadians who don't know a lot about American history.

Atlanta has a much more culturally distinct identity than Toronto, on top of that, and is a major metropolitan hub for a more culturally distinct region - think southern accents and a more distinct cuisine - it has an Olympic history, is a huge media center, has a noted music history in regards to alternative, new wave, and punk (nearby college town Athens provides it with a lot of musicians), and is THE foremost center for hip hop culture in the world, alongside being a major filming hub.

Sure, in part due to Sherman's march, it's city center is heavily modern and not the most charming as far as architecture goes - but I'm not sure that Toronto is really any better for it's size. TO is actually architecturally uglier than Atlanta is IMO, which is just very bland and modern. Toronto does NOT have "much more historical architecture" than Atlanta. Both have some token pre-wars, but not so much in the way of neighborhoods built in an entirely pre-war vernacular. They're both 1 cities, as far as architecture goes.

Atlanta has more impressive historic residential architecture outside of the city proper than Toronto does, though.

And to the rest of your claims, Atlanta is a huge business hub in America. It does play a relatively important role in America's history, and I'm not sure what crucial historical elements shaped Toronto that can compare to the historical tumult that Atlanta faced. Canada, overall, has a much more attenuated history than the US does, and that certainly is true of the Atlanta/Toronto comparison. Outside of historical events that occurred before Canada became self-governing, I fail to think of anything that shaped Toronto, as a distinctly Canadian city, the same way the civil war and the civil rights movement shaped Atlanta.

Lastly, your characterization of specific American cities as "conservative"/"liberal" doesn't make much sense here - they're all run by leftist individuals, and they vote heavily Democrat. And don't try to claim that "Democrats in the US are right wing in Canada", because that's simply not true.

[kool maudit]

This won't go well. Canadians typically don't know a lot about the US South and are mildly hostile to their idea of it. Southerners, for their part, don't tend to be very informed about Toronto and English Canada either.

In both cases, what might appear to a local as a cornucopia of historical significance and local peculiarity will seem anodyne and anonymous to the foreigner.

We may as well join forces to attack the lack of distinctive qualities in Auckland or Harbin.

Blind leading the blind.

[brightlite]

Originally Posted by kool maudit

This won't go well. Canadians typically don't know a lot about the US South and are mildly hostile to their idea of it. Southerners, for their part, don't tend to be very informed about Toronto and English Canada either.

In both cases, what might appear to a local as a cornucopia of historical significance and local peculiarity will seem anodyne and anonymous to the foreigner.

We may as well join forces to attack the lack of distinctive qualities in Auckland or Harbin.

Blind leading the blind.

I think anyone could admit that Atlanta, following Harbin, are both cities with more tumultuous histories than either Auckland or Toronto.

[wave46]

Originally Posted by brightlite

I think anyone could admit that Atlanta, following Harbin, are both cities with more tumultuous histories than either Auckland or Toronto.

What version of Atlanta are we talking about here? Or Toronto, really?

Are we talking about the facades of glass and steel that dominate these cities today? The ones that dominate over the history of the places and are more representative of modern thinking?

In modern context and view, these cities are not terribly different, accent aside. They represent a particular nexus of each country's development. Toronto is modern day Anglo-Canada - its hopes, dreams and flaws in animate and inanimate form. It embraces the new and throws out the old without care.

Atlanta is the South meeting the 21st century. Ted Turner and Coca-Cola, with a Delta connection at the airport. You do a better job of capturing historical Atlanta than I ever could.

Each has its history. Toronto, with its vestiges of Orange Order Anglo power fading from memory; its English version of orderliness with a North American twist. Not the scene of passionate mobs or flashpoint of cultural tensions, but a stolid perseverance. Bill Davis, but in metropolis form. It became America sans Americans sometime in the 1980s-2000s.

[hipster duck]

Because America is such a global hegemon in terms of culture and economics, American cities are much more storied even if they're "thin on the ground" in terms of the kinds of things that really appeal to lovers of cities.

Detroit is a classic example. It rightfully holds the title of the birthplace of the modern middle class, it birthed a number of prominent musical genres ranging from Motown to Techno, it even has some unique architectural gems, like Moorish and Egyptian-inspired Art Deco apartments, and probably the 3rd best pre-war skyscraper collection in America. Historians will be talking about Detroit long after they've stopped talking about Toronto.

But is Toronto more interesting for people who like to explore cities than Detroit? Yes. Would I rather live in inner city Toronto than Detroit? Absolutely.

There are other cities like this that fire up the imagination because of their outsized contribution to world history, but probably aren't going to be places a lot of people aspire to visit or live: Manchester, Shenzhen, etc. Anybody up for a trip to Kaliningrad to walk amongst the ghosts of Kant and Hannah Arendt?

[Curmudgeon]

Montreal reminds me more of Philadelphia than it does New York. Though it is Canada's financial centre, a role assumed by New York in the U.S., and even more dominant in the Canadian economy than New York is in the U.S., Toronto is distinctly Great Lakes and Midwestern (which includes Western New York) and is by appearance and culturally more similar to Chicago than to New York, though with a decidedly British flavour, esp. in the inner parts of the city. The Great Lakes feel is even more pronounced in Hamilton.

Halifax and Boston, definitely. Winnipeg, though called the Chicago of the North is closest in feel to Kansas City, Calgary is a much colder Houston, although many people say Dallas or even Denver, but to me Edmonton is more similar to Denver. Vancouver is a tougher call, as it is similar to San Francisco in many ways though climatically and in terms of flora it is much more a twin to Seattle, though Seattle always has seemed much more gritty and less international, almost like a giant New Westminster.

Quebec City is entirely unique with no real comparison in the United States as it is really nothing like New Orleans and it is far too geographically and climatically different to be able to see similarities with places like Savannah or Charleston. Hard to compare Ottawa as well, as although like Washington it serves as the national capital, it has a totally different feel from Washington. Maybe one of the upstate New York cities (Albany?) might be comparable.

[shappy]

Atlanta and Toronto both have a Cabbagetown neighbourhood, so there's that...

[Razor]

While maybe a fun and thought provoking thing to do, I just think that it's fruitless to find a U.S counterpart to any Canadian city, and why would you really want to?.Way different histories and the ways they generally operate (CBD's, transit acceptance , etc.) For starters, Toronto is just soo much more dominating to Canada as NYC is to the U.S. Okay, I guess you can loosely compare the heavy free way traffic to L.A .I really tried hard to compare Montreal to Philly after our trip to Philadelphia, but aside from a signature sandwich, they are entirely different.On the ground, is Calgary REALLY that similar to Denver? Washington just has so much more history and historical neighbourhoods then Ottawa, + it's much larger..Maybe the vibe of being a civil servant town is similar don't know.As a side note, I once asked a co-worker who was a temp from France if Montreal reminded him of any European cities, and he said "naaah, it's pretty North American".

[Chadillaccc]

Yes, Calgary "REALLY" is that similar to Denver. Virtually identical feel in the inner cities, except Calgary's river frontages on the Bow and Elbow are far better than those of the South Platte near downtown Denver. Even the historic built forms (though being considerably older, Denver does have a bigger stock). I'd say if there's any nearly identical cities between the two countries, it's those two. Christ, even the geography and topography are essentially identical, even regionally... grasslands, semi-arid, one is 20 km from the front ranges, the other is 45. The next closest comparison would be Toronto and Chicago.

[rousseau]

Originally Posted by Chadillaccc

The next closest comparison would be Toronto and Chicago.

Yeah, no. We've done this before. Toronto and Chicago are not alike at all. Seattle and Vancouver would be the next closest comparison, I would think.

[GreaterMontréal]

Montréal and Philadelphia are somewhat similar in aerial shots but that's it. Long straight lines , triplex, rowhouses, etc.. Montréal and Phily were the same size up until the end of 2010. Montréal (city) is now larger and growing faster.

[someone123]

What I find interesting about the Halifax-Boston stuff is how much it has changed over the past 20 years. I clearly remember how projects like the Big Dig, Boston office towers, or Providence's river developments seemed in the early 2000's. They were much nicer than anything happening in Halifax, and the more modest planning happening in Halifax back then was often patterned off of the New England cities.

But these days it's possible Halifax has more construction cranes up than Boston. Boston has a lot of strict historic preservation whereas it's anything goes, for better or worse, in Halifax. Architecture has shifted from conservative neo-historicism that drew on the period when the Northeast was all fairly similar to much more eclectic modern styles that New England doesn't seem to have taken to. The Big Dig does not look so good in the rear view mirror and Cogswell, the local answer to Northeast US style urban freeway development, is likely to turn out better, not just in terms of end result (actual construction of functional city blocks, not just park) but management and cost-benefit (will pay for itself, not cost billions).

This does not change that Boston is the much bigger and wealthier city but it's becoming less and less influential in the Maritimes over time. In retrospect there was a time of peak affinity that ran from maybe around 1880-1970 and slowly faded in later decades. Consider how Canadians would have looked at American infrastructure in 1965 vs. today. It's hard to identify a modern American transportation project that Canadians would want to copy. Whether that's because they don't exist or because they're not so well known here, it's a change either way.

[TorontoDrew]

Originally Posted by FFX-ME

Montreal culture and food is much more NYC than Toronto is. Although Toronto has the stock exchange and big firms I guess.

I've never found similarities foodwise or culture wise between Montreal and NYC. I love both those cities and visit whenever I have the chance and, but i've never found them to be remotely a like.

Also who started saying Toronto is like L.A? There is literally nothing about them that they have in common aside from both cities having a 401 hwy.

[Doady]

Originally Posted by TorontoDrew

I've never found similarities foodwise or culture wise between Montreal and NYC. I love both those cities and visit whenever I have the chance and, but i've never found them to be remotely a like.

Also who started saying Toronto is like L.A? There is literally nothing about them that they have in common aside from both cities having a 401 hwy.

Toronto: Los Angeles of the North by Wendell Cox