Toronto's Future Population

[tkip]

And I know people where they have several kids still living at home with the parents and granparents. Obviously you can have too many people in a home or condo. However.

I just roll my eyes when we create bylaws to somehow force fewer and fewer people living in a house. And absolutely bang on about economic hard times forcing people to live together and share resources. I had this discussion with this idiot woman from some small town where she hated the immigrant family on her street because "they had the whole family" living there instead of only just parents and kids.

And I told her very plainly that there was nothing wrong with family and some extended family sharing the same home. She of course, wasn't interested in this. Only parents and kids should live together.

 

[TrickyRicky]

^Another angle on this is the insurance industry. If you actually pay attention to their occupancy stipulations for some home insurance policies, having a non-family member residing in your house is not allowed. Infact, sometimes a family member as far away as a cousin is too far out.

On population and standard of living: There is a difference between living in an exciting or dynamic city and discussing standard of living. I believe that living in a large city is by definition a compromise in standard of living. You will never see New York or London top a list of cities with the highest standard of living. A large city is instrinsicly a competitive environment and the larger the city the more competitive it is. Cities offer amazing opportunities for the wealthy and the competitive (competitive in all senses not just materially) but they tend to suppress the potential of average people. That is people who have more average levels of success or who are good at a wide variety of things but only to an average level. The amazing thing about Toronto and a few other cities like it mostly in the anglo-american world is that they have retained high standards of living for almost all while growing to a fairly large size. However, I think Toronto is transitioning away from this. You might not see it this way, but all these condo towers and streetscape intiiatives etc. that we talk about on this forum are symptoms of this transition. A transition of Toronto away from a kind of grey middle-class normalcy and towards the more highly competitive winner/loser dynamic that seems to be the natural order of human civilization.

 

[Hipster Duck]

^That's an interesting argument, Tricky, and I'm inclined to believe it. Toronto is certainly becoming a much more competitive, elite sort of place joining cities like New York or London that have a low standard of living for industrialized countries, but a great deal more opportunity for people who occupy competitive positions. It is a sign that Toronto is becoming more mature, but I would not misconstrue it as a sign that Toronto is increasing in population; I don't think that population plays that large a role in cementing this sort of natural stratification and trend toward elitism.

For example, Phoenix is nearly as large as Toronto and certainly larger than cities like Seattle or Vancouver where professional competition and elite capital accumulation is pretty entrenched. A blue collar worker can afford a decent bungalow in just about any part of Phoenix, despite the metropolitan area having over 4 million people. However, Phoenix is an overgrown small town, not just in terms of its built form, but in its outlook. There is no "there" there, so the benefits of accumulating capital in a centralized spot are not up for grabs; the result is a pretty uniform sprawl of bungalows and strip malls radiating out from a very feeble downtown. What came first: a small town outlook toward settlement or the sprawl, is sort of a chicken and egg question. They reinforce one another; the small town outlook contributing to a lack of interest in making a viable downtown, and the disinterest in centralizing contributing to a reinforcement of small town values. This is great for the average person, but a pretty lousy sell for somebody who values competition and cutthroat creativity. Edmonton and Calgary play a similar role in Canada. They are both about the same size, but Calgary is much more of an elite place, with a downtown that has an incredible concentration of valuable real estate and a surrounding residential area that attracts a professional and privileged creative class. Edmonton is a city with a rather undifferentiated downtown that is surrounded by grey areas or modest working class bungalows that pretty much anybody can buy into - of course, the dynamism of this area that sits barely blocks away from city hall is no different than an outer suburb. Living in a central spot in Edmonton or Phoenix confers none of the benefits of living in a centralized spot in Calgary or Toronto. Living in central Edmonton or Phoenix is probably best summed up in the words of Joy from the 'View': "So what? Who cares?"

So, while population growth has some effect on producing this kind of professional competition, I think it's really a combination of population growth with a natural tendency toward accumulating talent and capital in the central city that cements this sort of urban trend.

 

[TheTigerMaster]

Based on population growth expectations from the Government of Ontario and Government of Quebec, the Greater Toronto Area is expected to match and exceed population of the Province of Quebec, sometime in 2041/2042. This is also when Toronto will become larger than any province in Canada (when not including Toronto Area in the Population of Ontario)

2041
Quebec: 9,560,000
GTA: 9,507,944
Ontario: 8,440,964

Sourced from:
Ontario Population Projection: http://www.fin.gov.on.ca/en/economy/demographics/projections/table2.html
Greater Toronto Area Population Projection: http://www.fin.gov.on.ca/en/economy/demographics/projections/table10.html
Quebec Population Projections: http://www.stat.gouv.qc.ca/statisti...aphie/perspectives/population/popqcade_14.htm

 

[Johnny Au]

Based on population growth expectations from the Government of Ontario and Government of Quebec, the Greater Toronto Area is expected to match and exceed population of the Province of Quebec, sometime in 2041/2042. This is also when Toronto will become larger than any province in Canada (when not including Toronto Area in the Population of Ontario)

2041
Quebec: 9,560,000
GTA: 9,507,944
Ontario: 8,440,964

Sourced from:
Ontario Population Projection: http://www.fin.gov.on.ca/en/economy/demographics/projections/table2.html
Greater Toronto Area Population Projection: http://www.fin.gov.on.ca/en/economy/demographics/projections/table10.html
Quebec Population Projections: http://www.stat.gouv.qc.ca/statisti...aphie/perspectives/population/popqcade_14.htm

That would make a great case for making the Greater Toronto Area (or the Golden Horseshoe) an independent province.

 

[TheTigerMaster]

That would make a great case for making the Greater Toronto Area (or the Golden Horseshoe) an independent province.

I wonder how many other countries have cities that are larger than all of their states/provinces.

 

[rbt]

I wonder how many other countries have cities that are larger than all of their states/provinces.

France is one. Metro Paris is 12 million and Île-de-France (largest province, happens to contain most of Paris) is 11 million.

England is another for similar reasons. The largest region (London) is only part of the London Metro.

 

[TheTigerMaster]

France is one. Metro Paris is 12 million and Île-de-France (largest province, happens to contain most of Paris) is 11 million.

England is another for similar reasons. The largest region (London) is only part of the London Metro.

If I understand their geography correctly, Greater London is a Region of England and Paris is a Department. Both are roughly equivalent to what we'd consider a Province or State here in Canada and in the United States.

 

[W. K. Lis]

At one time, ancient times, the city was a city-state and ruled the country surrounding it. See link.

Historically, this included famous cities like Rome, Athens, Carthage, and the Italian city-states during the Renaissance

 

[wild goose chase]

Based on population growth expectations from the Government of Ontario and Government of Quebec, the Greater Toronto Area is expected to match and exceed population of the Province of Quebec, sometime in 2041/2042. This is also when Toronto will become larger than any province in Canada (when not including Toronto Area in the Population of Ontario)

2041
Quebec: 9,560,000
GTA: 9,507,944
Ontario: 8,440,964

Sourced from:
Ontario Population Projection: http://www.fin.gov.on.ca/en/economy/demographics/projections/table2.html
Greater Toronto Area Population Projection: http://www.fin.gov.on.ca/en/economy/demographics/projections/table10.html
Quebec Population Projections: http://www.stat.gouv.qc.ca/statisti...aphie/perspectives/population/popqcade_14.htm

How accurate have population projections been in predicting city growth? I know future predictions can be hard when you get even more than a few decades into the future, because of unforeseen circumstances (for example, the Rust belt US cities that were powerhouses before de-industrialization hit in the 70s, or Sydney and Melbourne's alternation in dominance as Australia's biggest city in history and predictions of when or if the next switch will happen). I know cities can boom or decline in population on those timescales much more or less than anticipated (though I don't foresee any single competitor to Toronto in at least the near future).

 

[Johnny Au]

How accurate have population projections been in predicting city growth? I know future predictions can be hard when you get even more than a few decades into the future, because of unforeseen circumstances (for example, the Rust belt US cities that were powerhouses before de-industrialization hit in the 70s, or Sydney and Melbourne's alternation in dominance as Australia's biggest city in history and predictions of when or if the next switch will happen). I know cities can boom or decline in population on those timescales much more or less than anticipated (though I don't foresee any single competitor to Toronto in at least the near future).

A century ago, one would have to be a lunatic to believe that Toronto would out-populate Chicago within their respective city limits, and now, Toronto managed to out-populate Chicago within their respective city limits.

Who knows if Toronto would out-populate the five boroughs of New York City within the foreseeable future or if Toronto were to depopulate like Detroit?

 

[builddown]

I wonder how many other countries have cities that are larger than all of their states/provinces.

Buenos Aires, Argentina has a population of about 14 000 000. The country has about 43, 000 000. But the city is technically a federal district, like a separate province, and the suburbs (and some other cities) are part of BA province. The city proper has a population of close to 3 000 000 and BA province has about 16 000 000.

The next biggest province by population is Cordoba at 3.3 million.