The idea of there simply being no demand in North America for dense, low-rise neighbourhoods is belied by the fact that those neighbourhoods are generally the most expensive places you can possibly live. No one's giving up their rowhouse in [Georgetown, Outremont, Cabbagetown, Greenwich Village, etc.] for a McMansion.
It is changing, my generation (I'm 34) that grew up in the suburbs are willing to live in the city and give up the white picket fence for all the benefits inner-city living brings. Talking with friends this weekend, people our age with the means either want to be inner-city or on an acreage.
Similar to my group of friends, same age. Almost everyone that has bought a place in the past 5 years has bought a townhouse, row or 4-plex style, in places like Killarney or West Hillhust. So not directly inner city, but everyone wanted to be as close as possible while still having their own at grade entrance and a little more space.
I think it's already changed - the diversity of what people want is greater than ever, and way more people than ever are ditching the conventional big house in the deep suburbs thinking of the 1950s - 1990s era.
I am hearing this all the time too. So many people want a ground-oriented home, but in a reasonably central location - this differs entirely from the peak-suburb thinking of North America in the 1950s - 1990s. The ongoing boom in townhomes and infills is no fluke, it's responding to real demand for that lifestyle.
This is allmost identical to my wife and I. We moved from a Beltline apartment to a townhouse in a three plex in Crescent Heights 10 years ago with a shared backyard and a garage. We don't want or need the square footage and love being closer to downtown. We even chose to have only one child partially because we don't want to move.
I agree that the SFH is now a luxury in Canada. I do wonder how much of Canada's housing costs have to do with the small number of large cities we have. Yes, you can still get a big house for cheap in Medicine Hat or Thunder Bay, but you're taking a huge hit to your quality of life in terms of limited educational, employment, health care, and transportation options. So, you're stuck with one of a handful of cities that have basically run out of space to build endless sprawl.
Good point - although I won't start a debate about how US metro areas tend to pad their stats when compared with Canadian ones! But it does result in a very limited choice for Canadians who want some measure of that "big city" experience, you basically have a half dozen places to choose from.
While I get the comparison here and they do have more choice, part of that is just being a big country. The US has about 8x our population, so their 90th largest city being our 10th, seems about right. I think we need to give more incentives for companies to relocate. Bank of America is HQ in Charlotte NC, and a big driver of the local economy. Now imagine the same where Scotiabank is based in Nova Scotia and how that would singlehandedly develop the economy of the region. Maybe that will happen over time as smaller cities start growing faster (% wise) than the biggest ones.
I agree the pure numerical comparisons don't always make sense between Statistics Canada and the US Census Bureau. That's why you have to take into account the look and feel of the city as well. Wichita has a major airport, museums, universities, major employers (Koch Industries, Boeing, etc.). It has a critical mass of "stuff" to give it it's own gravitational pull.
I agree. The US is a much larger country, and so it has more cities. But their population is also more distributed across those cities. Only 6% of Americans live in the NYC metro area. 13% live in the top 3 US metros. The UK is also a larger country than Canada, but almost 20% of Brits live in London. Canada is closer to the UK in this regard. About 17% of Canadians live in the Toronto area. 36% of Canadians live in our top 3 cities. This concentration has also been growing rather than shrinking as Canada's population has grown.