Was it inevitable that Toronto would surpass Montreal as Canada's largest city?

[wild goose chase]

People like to talk about how Toronto surpassed Montreal because of the Anglo-Montrealers and their English-speaking businesses fleeing an ascendant Francophone identity in Quebec and setting up shop here. Yet, it's probably unlikely that that factor alone made much of a difference (though some also say immigrants favoring English-speaking Toronto over Montreal made an impact too) -- there was generally a trend anyways towards Toronto getting bigger anyways as a city as Canada's population grew westward.

New York city took over Philadelphia as the largest American city in the 1800s with the opening of the Erie Canal that provided a water route to deliver goods for American westward expansion, but New York has remained the US biggest city ever since.

In Australia, Sydney and Melbourne are known for a bit of city rivalry and they have switched status as the largest city in their country's history more than once before. Sydney is older but then Melbourne became larger than Sydney from the Australian gold rush before falling behind Sydney again at the turn of the 20th century. Nowadays, Melbourne, though the second city, is growing faster than Sydney however.

So, I wonder, how inevitable was it that Toronto would take the status of largest Canadian city from Montreal -- were the historical, cultural and economic trends really in its favor? And do you see Toronto not changing its status as largest city any time soon?

 

[King of Kensington]

I think it was pretty evident by the 1950s that Toronto was poised to displace Montreal as the preeminent city in Canada. I know a fair number of Anglo Monterealers here, but demographically they were a drop n the bucket. Contary to popular belief, it simply isn't true that the election of the PQ was the cause of Toronto surpassing Montreal.

As for other cities "catching up" - not anytime soon. Greater Vancouver has 2.5 million - less than half of the GTA - and its growth rate has slowed down. Calgary only has a little over 1 million.

 

[wild goose chase]

I think it was pretty evident by the 1950s that Toronto was poised to displace Montreal as the preeminent city in Canada. I know a fair number of Anglo Monterealers here, but demographically they were a drop n the bucket. Contary to popular belief, it simply isn't true that the election of the PQ was the cause of Toronto surpassing Montreal.

Was there a reason why Toronto became more attractive (either to inter-provincial migrants or immigrants) though by mid 20th century, or was it just the natural result of the "westward" population center shift? I know the demographic impact of the PQ was overrated but I can imagine it still made an impact on immigration attraction (eg. Toronto gets the Anglophone-oriented immigrants like postwar Italians, Jamaicans and other West Indians, East and South Asians that Montreal doesn't, though Montreal is still strong with attracting Francophones like Arabs/West Asians such as the Lebanese, Algerians and Haitians, Francophone Africans etc). Or else why would Montreal get so much of the early 20th century immigrant wave, and then Toronto gets more of the late 20th century immigrant wave? Also, did the disparate growth patterns mainly come from internal migration or immigration -- I can imagine things like Toronto attracting more people from Ontario and other English-speaking provinces, than Montreal attracting more people from Quebec and other French-speaking parts of provinces, but I don't know if its true.

A westward shift in population didn't affect New York city's status as #1 ever since the Erie canal's position favoured it and its status as financial hub allowed it to snatch the title from Philly and no one has challenged NYC ever since (it still attracts the largest absolute number and diversity of foreign-born, as well as many Americans who want to live in NYC no doubt). I don't see why hypothetically Montreal couldn't have continued to be like NYC as a hub and Toronto stayed a "second city".

 

[W. K. Lis]

On its own, Brooklyn would have had 2,621,793 people, compared with Manhattan at 1,636,268. The City of Brooklyn was annexed by New York City on January 1, 1898, which today has a total population of 8,491,079.

North York has a population of 655,913. Compared with the borders of Old Toronto with a population of 736,775. The current Toronto has a 2011 population of 2,615,060. Mississauga is Canada's sixth largest city with a population of 713,443.