PART I: SETTING THE CONTEXT
1.2 LOOKING BACK
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or nearly three decades, Toronto has occupied a special place among North American cities as “the city that works.” Peter Ustinov’s oft-quoted description of Toronto as “New York run by the Swiss” captures the city’s unique dynamic of cosmopolitan excitement wedded with order.Our success cannot be explained solely in terms of wise decisions. The Toronto urban region has also benefited from a number of local and historical advantages.7 We owe our early prosperity to a variety of circumstances, including:
• the discovery of Northern Ontario’s mineral wealth by Toronto-based railway companies;
• our proximity to major population centres in the United States;
• our emergence as Canada’s premier head office location, as well as its financial services and business heartland;
• a consistently high volume of immigration, which boosted housing demand and contributed to the entrepreneurial energy of the region;
• the continuing presence of middle and upper income families living in the h e a rt of the city and maintaining an ongoing stake in its high quality of life; and
• the signal advantages we have enjoyed because as a Canadian city we participate in the nation’s social welfare programs.
Our Good Fortune
7 Andrew Sancton, “Introductor y Material for GTA Task Force Report” (July 17, 1995).
31 Some have suggested that the Toronto urban region owes its success largely
to a time-lag.8 Because we developed later, and in some cases more slowly, than many American cities, we were able to learn from their experiences and ultimately make more informed choices for our own city-region.9 But the region’s success cannot be explained solely in terms of good fortune or circumstances that caused us to develop later. Both the city and the Province made many deliberate choices that enabled us to do things right.
The creation of Metro Toronto, North America’s first and most admired system of metropolitan government was a bold and far-sighted move. It established a regional body responsible for planning, funding, and implementing re g i o n - w i d e i n f r a s t ru c t u re and services, and it provided for access to the City of To ro n t o ’s then-rich tax base to help finance much needed infrastru c t u re in the adjoining suburbs.
Metro Toronto has been hailed as “a jewel in the crown among metro authorities around the world.”10 It was founded on sound basic principles:
t e rritorial comprehensiveness, fairness, eff i c i e n c y, local responsiveness, and continued provincial government direction on major region-wide policy issues.
These same principles drove the establishment of the GTA’s four other regional governments between 1971 and 1974. Embedded in these principles are some lessons worth reapplying as we rethink Greater Toronto today.
Municipalities across the GTA have always demonstrated a willingness to evolve in order to address changing conditions and anticipated problems. The boundaries and powers of the municipalities in the Greater Toronto Area have been revised several times since 1953. In 1967, the 13 area municipalities comprising Metro were consolidated into six, while the neighbouring regional governments of Durham, Halton, Peel, and York were established in the early 1970s. The experience of the last 40 years demonstrates the re g i o n ’s responsiveness to change and underscores the merit of making forward-looking change at a manageable pace.
A strong commitment to planning and timely infrastructure investmentis also embedded in the region’s history. During its first eight years, Metro constructed almost 200 miles of trunk sewers and water mains, two new sewage treatment plants (and remodeled five others), 133 new schools, 85 miles of arterial roads, and 101 new bridges. During the 1970s, Durham, Halton, Peel, and York began
What We Did Right
8 James Lemon, “Toronto Among North American Cities” in Victor L. Russell, ed. Forging a Consensus: Historical Essays on Toronto(Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1984), p. 341.
9 Toronto’s experience with inner city expressways is perhaps the best example of this. While expressways were part of Toronto’s Official Plan since 1943, they were not scheduled to be built until the late 1960s. By then, the adverse effects of inner city freeways on cities in the United States were becoming apparent, and citizen groups, such as the Stop Spadinalobby, were able to mobilize successful campaigns against expressway expansion.
10 L.J. Sharpe, Is There A Case For Metropolitan Government?(Paper presented at the Conference on
“Urban Regions in a Global Context” at the University of Toronto, October 18-20, 1995).
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building their servicing infrastru c t u re on a similar scale. These infrastru c t u re p rojects made possible To ro n t o ’s systematic outward expansion during the period f rom the 1950s to the 1970s. In the past decade, however, infrastru c t u re development of this scale has not been undertaken, and the urban region as a whole has begun to suffer as a re s u l t .
T h e re has also been a strong commitment to sharing social costsin the re g i o n . This commitment began with the distribution of social housing across Metro , s p reading the welfare burden more evenly between the downtown core and the s u rrounding suburbs. In 1967, Metro assumed responsibility for such community services as homes for the aged, childre n ’s services, and welfare . Similar provisions for the sharing of social costs and responsibilities were put in place across the GTA with the establishment of regional governments in Durh a m , Halton, Peel, and York. How best to share these costs equitably on a city-re g i o n basis is one of the challenges we now face.
To ronto is unique among North American cities for its sustained commitment to public transitas a transportation mode of choice for all residents, rather than as a social service for the less advantaged. To ro n t o ’s transportation policies have historically balanced the need for roads and transit. In the surrounding re g i o n s , a reas like southern York Region and Mississauga established their own transit systems when they achieved the population densities necessary to make this a viable option. While U.S. cities became increasingly freeway and automobile-dependent, our capital investment in transit remained roughly equivalent to our investment in freeways and suburban roads. Unfort u n a t e l y, our public investment p a t t e rn over the past decade has shifted to favour roads over public transit.
A healthy respect for neighbourh o o d shas been a hallmark of communities acro s s the GTA. In the City of To ronto, neighbourhood pre s e rvation has been an off i c i a l planning policy since 1972, when Mayor David Crombie was elected on a platform that saw a new central area plan created, limits on high-rise densities imposed, n e i g h b o u rhoods pre s e rved, and mixed-use development encouraged downtown.
This commitment to maintaining and renewing old neighbourhoods was matched by a willingness to create new neighbourhoods, such as the St. Lawre n c e N e i g h b o u rhood, which houses some 10,000 people on reclaimed industrial land.
Communities like Markham, Richmond Hill, Oakville, and Burlington have successfully regenerated their historic downtown cores by reviving old main streets or restoring villages like Bronte Harbour. This commitment to p re s e rving and regenerating urban neighbourhoods, no longer as strong as it once was, needs to be re d i s c o v e red and applied across the GTA .
33 Provincial interest and timely interventionshave been instrumental in shaping
the urban re g i o n ’s post-war development. Deliberate and compre h e n s i v e initiatives like the Parkway Belt Plan, the establishment of the Niagara Escarpment Commission, and the Provincial Greenlands Strategy that led to the protection of the Oak Ridges Moraine have all had a significant impact on the region. Interventions include the decision to halt the Spadina Expressway, the establishment of a commission and the Waterfront Regeneration Trust to examine waterfront development, and periodic attempts to redevelop Toronto’s railway lands.
The Province’s direct investment in institutions like Ontario Place, the Science Centre, the Ontario Agricultural Museum, the Art Gallery of Ontario, the McMichael Gallery, the Convention Centre, and SkyDome has enhanced the vitality and attractiveness of the entire region.
The Province has played, and should continue to play, an important role in helping to shape and sustain the city-region in the future.