It's time to end our obsession with bloated big cities, like Vancouver and Toronto. Douglas Todd: The future of housing affordability in Canada lies in providing support to mid-sized centres, such as Kamloops and Kitchener-Waterloo Vancouver Sun By Douglas Todd Jan 30, 2025 For a vast country like Canada, the second largest in the world by land mass, we are a strangely urban place. Still, Canadian policymakers have for decades pushed for our big cities to become even bigger, denser, wealthier and more powerful, leading to Metro Vancouver (population 3.1 million) and Greater Toronto (6.7 million) expanding more rapidly than elsewhere, almost entirely because of international migration. This has also led to Metro Vancouver and Toronto having the most unaffordable housing in North America. That’s not to mention how our big cities are increasingly stressed by traffic congestion, overcrowded schools and hospitals and inadequate sewer and water systems.
What’s to be done? While some city dwellers are drawn to the idea of slower living on a farm or in the forest, not many can afford it. Jobs and educational opportunities are more plentiful in urban centres — and remote work by the internet has not taken off like many hoped. However, a new breed of economists and other policymakers think there is a middle way. They say we must put more emphasis on mid-sized cities. Their arguments counter the recent trend of recent years, in which influential people like Edward Glaeser, a Harvard economist, produced best-selling books with titles like Triumph of the City: How Our Greatest Invention Makes Us Richer, Smarter, Greener, Healthier and Happier. Even though Glaeser is a free-market libertarian who opposes most zoning rules and promotes highrises, the enthusiasm he embodies is often shared by people on the left. That includes B.C.’s NDP government, which is drastically increasing density within Metro Vancouver.
The new studies, however, argue big cities are overrated. as many claim, say Matthew Turner and David Weil, both of Brown University in Rhode Island. Megalopolises are not as economically efficient as many claim, say Matthew Turner and David Weil, both of Brown University in Rhode Island. Their study concluded that, if supersized cities like New York and Miami hadn’t existed in the past century and no U.S. centre had a population over one million, the American economy would have done virtually as well as it has, and business inventiveness would have continued apace. Their study concluded that, if supersized cities like New York and Miami hadn’t existed in the past century and no U.S. centre had a population over one million, the American economy would have done virtually as well as it has, and business inventiveness would have continued apace. Another study arguing that policymakers have overemphasized big cities also came out in January from Canada’s C.D. Howe Institute. It’s co-written by the institute’s Jeremy Kronick and Vancouver School of Economics professor Paul Beaudry.
The authors maintain Canada cannot solve its housing affordability crises by adding more dwellings to big centres like Vancouver and Toronto. Instead, Kronick and Beaudry recommend politicians target a certain number of mid-sized cities — like Kamloops and Kitchener-Waterloo, Ont. — to support them in becoming larger, thriving hubs that can “meaningfully reduce housing costs nationwide.”Statistics Canada confirms the majority of migrants to Canada, including temporary workers and students, move to its biggest cities, where they find more job possibilities and often a critical mass of people from their ethnic group. But the C.D. Howe report wants to see more people disbursed to smaller centres. Strengthening certain mid-sized Canadian cities, Kronick and Beaudry, would “reduce in-migration into our big cities, mitigate price pressures there, and help lower costs for everyone.” Still, Canadian policymakers have for decades pushed for our big cities to become even bigger, denser, wealthier and more powerful, leading to Metro Vancouver (population 3.1 million) and Greater Toronto (6.7 million) expanding more rapidly than elsewhere, almost entirely because of international migration. Strengthening certain mid sized Canadian cities, Kronick and Beaudry, would “reduce in-migration into our big cities, mitigate price pressures there, and help lower costs for everyone. Their 28-page report, titled Making Housing More Affordable in Canada: The Need for More Large Cities, says Metro Vancouver and Greater Toronto have gone far beyond the threshold of affordability: Despite an oversized amount of construction in each metropolis, the report says, housing prices still run far ahead of wages.....read on https://vancouversun.com/