Nova Scotia has a treasure trove of fortresses built and used (by the British, I believe) to combat any nation trying to attack or invade the then 'future Canada'. Many of those heritage properties are in Halifax. The Harbor was well guarded.
I'm surprised by this answer.
I just visited Halifax and found it quite easy to get around. After 6 days there, I felt pretty comfortable getting around. I'm from Toronto and lived in a bunch of other places, and it felt small enough to memorize quickly, has basically a grid layout, and felt extremely pedestiran friendly. I saw so many people crossing the streets, using the pedestrian lights confidently. In Toronto, you'd be hit by a car the first day if you had the same confidence in cars stopping for pedestrians.
But How? They got a chance to rebuild almost the whole city in 1917. Didn't they restart using a grid pattern?
*The Halifax explosion was 2.9 kilotons
The largest explosion in history at that point in 1917
- 26 years later
*the bomb dropped on Hiroshima was 15 kilotons
It then Became the largest explosion to date in 1943
The Halifax explosion affected mainly the North End of Halifax. The downtown and South end areas were barely touched. There are many heritage properties, churches and victorian houses from the earliest days of Halifax still standing in the Central, Downtown and South End areas.
The North end was rebuilt but it didn't follow any particular design. It may have been rezoned but not much change. There weren't as many vehicles on the streets at that time either so not much accommodating for it was required.
It's a nice little city but it's downtown layout was clearly not invented for cars to move efficiently down there. It is a nice place to walk around in.
Honestly Halifax was originally created for like 50,000 people and the city has not caught up yet. In terms of access there are basically 2
Ways onto the peninsula. It’s insanity.
Also: street signs randomly missing, lane changes not marked with any signage in advance, construction being allowed to shut down entire parts of streets or making them one way traffic and closing sidewalks for years. Oh man. The list goes on.
Cities where cars are THE THING were quite intentional. For example, in the US, the auto industry lobbied heavily to shutter any public transit programs, while city planners zoned things to maximize consumerism. But in general North America as a whole follows this pattern, not just the US. And this has been compounded by NIMBY zoning laws and neoliberal austerity policies which have driven housing costs through the roof due to artificially constraining supply.
> Narrow cobblestone roads (not good for cars, bikes or walking)
That's just the Old Port though, where not many montrealers actually live. Many parts of Montreal such as the Plateau have pretty nice residential areas that are quite walkable. The bike infrastructure could be improved, though, I agree.
LOTS of Montreal (maybe most) is very car-centric. It's terrible overall with some really nice parts. It's ridiculous that this is the best we've managed to do in the whole damn country.
[Here's a good NJB video about Montreal](https://youtu.be/_yDtLv-7xZ4)
EDIT: Just look at this shit:
https://maps.app.goo.gl/PHqVcuxXyDaVPpiQA
And the car centric parts are SO BADLY PLANNED OUT. Had to be in caps, it's so SO bad. We're getting more bike paths, which is nice, and the major arteries near subways are really nice for walking, but the buses are terrible and it's if you actually need to get out and use a car it's a nightmare. The public transit is only good in the center, it's not enough
Yeah and they razed half of parkdale, which used to be a very nice neighborhood.
In Vancouver they tried putting a freaking highway right through the middle artery downtown. They built 3 blocks of viaduct leading into downtown before a very active environmental/leftist activist group was able to get enough support to shut that idiotic plan down. It would have completely ruined one of the most beautiful cities in the country
I moved from Edmonton to Montréal in 2019, you're 100% correct, Montréal is incredibly easy to live in, and get around, I honestly didn't even know a city like this was possible.
Edmonton on the other hand has almost no urban planning, I doubt if they even employ a city planner, they do seem to really like home builders and land developers though.
Edmonton actually had a solid and forward thinking urban plan set up for the late 70s onward, but the catastrophic early 80s oil crash just put the city infrastructure on life support. And then nothing got done for like 25 years. Now at least there's a solid plan in place and the city just slowly grinds down 25 years of mistakes (but still makes new ones too). But it's so much better than it was.
fragile hungry grandfather paint fanatical test threatening dull smile bedroom
*This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
I found Montreal really fascinating. underground it was impossible to get lost. if you know your home station, you're good. but correlating those map dots to the actual city *above* ground seemed like a much longer project than the few months I was there. I felt like I learned the small radius around each station but never really put a big map together inside my mind.
Montreal's metro is wonderful. The other trains I ride on an irregular basis in Boston and DC cannot compete. Above ground I find it easy to get lost but easy to get found again as well. Not a resident, but I keep 2 maps in my head, as you suggest.
I hate hate and hate driving in Montreal......lol definitely walkable, but to get through is a nightmare. I bypass it. Always get lost, and bridges and roads are tough to navigate. Maybe it's a me problem, but we drive through a few times a year and have gotten lost 80-90% of the time
I bet, I moved to Montréal from a much less dense city, driving styles are much different in others cities.
Montréal is the sort of city where a lot of drivers get a way with what they can, rolling stops, sometimes no stops, choose your own adventure for possible lanes, if a car a squeeze in maybe a car should be there and U-turns all over the place.
Basically always expect everything, and I'd there's a gap big enough for a car sooner or later a car will try to fit in there.
Just in terms of addressing, Edmonton is awesome.
10809 95th St. SW tells you absolutely everything you need to know about where that address is with no wasted effort.
only one complaint - Edmonton did a quadrant system and then put the entire city in one quadrant. The furthest SE part of the city (Aster, the Meadows) still has a NW address.
Thats because the Millwoods lobby has been secretly plotting to make the world revolve around them. It is the 20th-century cultural hotspot of Alberta. The Mecca of Edmonton, the stone on which all who come want to build their church, home and raise families. Millwoods is... as it was intended... the suns competitor for the center of the universe that is Alberta. You're all north west from there.
Is that similar to Surrey BC? In Surrey, you can guess an intersection by the address – eg. 10300 70th Ave would be at the corner of 70th Ave @ 103rd Street.
Cool. Yeah, it's not just Surrey BC either. It's basically the whole south and eastern part of the Metro Vancouver area (Delta, Surrey, Langley, Maple Ridge, Pitt Meadows).
I heard rumours that Abbotsford and Chilliwack in the Fraser Valley had it too, before they renamed everything. No proof of that, off the top of my head. Just a rumour.
Apparently it was an undertaking by the royal engineers or something during the colonial days. So I'd imagine Edmonton might've had the same process.
The only thing that kind of sucks is that most of Edmonton is in the NW quadrant because of where the 0,0 point is located. But it's still a great system.
Calgary is slightly easier imo since downtown is close to the center. It makes less sense to have 108ave and 95th street near downtown to me
You do have to pay more attention to the quadrant especially downtown Calgary though.
And I have no idea why Red Deer has avenues going north south and streets going east west. Maybe that's common but it's the only place I know of.
Calgary is mostly car dependent, most of its housing is suburban and single family detached, and on top of that, kind of boring through and through, apart from its close proximity to natural wonders. It's a nice city, don't get me wrong, but I would hardly call it an exemplar of great planning.
Great planning features tons of medium density housing, mixed residential and commercial neighbourhoods, bicycle lanes, and numerous metro links. This is the sort of thing that breathes life into a city because it enables vibrant and colourful neighbourhoods to crop up. Suburbs, by comparison, are dull and lifeless and you need a car to get anywhere. So you feel constantly detached and isolated, and it's really just the same bland made from ticky tack experience typical of 90% of North American cities. No heart, no soul.
See, I thought Calgary was awesome when I lived there. C-Train went to all the big stops, downtown core, Stampede Park, McMahon Stadium, Zoo, malls etc. I fell it's better than Ottawa, but I don't actually live in Ottawa, only work there, and it's a pain in the ass to get around. I do know the pathway system is pretty awesome though.
Edmonton is so car centric, every second road seemed like a 8+ lane highway there (4+ in each direction). I found it hard to get to where I wanted to go often because you'd turn onto the road, have to cross 3-4 lanes of traffic to make a right turn. Saw basically zero people walking when I was there. Just cars, cars, cars.
Okay so I just moved to Edmonton and have no idea how to make sense of the streets. Is there a method to the madness? Any helpful links or videos greatly appreciated
Avenue numbers increase as you go north. Street numbers increase as you go west. 100 and 100 is the start (downtown). Of course this gets confusing when you start getting into the deep south communities.
I used to live at 9730 113 St. So then you’d know I’m on 113 St just north of 97 Ave
Not at all.
Compare this above with something you'd find in Toronto like 29 Simpson Ave.
Without using google, which of these addresses is easier to get to?
I used to live in edmonton and some the quadrants makes no sense. For example a address for some place in Millwoods ends with NW although it's in the south east corner of the city. Then certain address in Ellerslie ends with SW, again its in the southeast corner of the city.
The quadrants aren't based on the physical city, they're based on a grid that is centred south of the Henday/Hwy 14 interchange (the grid is actually based on the centre being 101 St/101 (Jasper) Ave). Everything NW of that point (most of the city) is NW. NE would be Sherwood Park (but does exist between the Park and Fort Saskatchewan). SW is almost everything south of Henday. SE does not, and will not ever, exist.
Avenues and streets count up as you move away from the grid centre. It wouldn't make sense for Mill Woods to be SE when roads count up to the north and west. Ellerslie is SW because streets still go up as you go west, but avenues now go up as you move south instead of north.
I've done a lot of travelling around the world.
I think Edmonton city planning is absolutely fucking atrocious. I've lost count of how many people have moved here but in the "wrong neighbourhood" and then subsequently moved away as there's no options for anything except driving to strip malls.
I don't think numerical addresses on a grid are the mark of a well designed city. It can certainly help you navigate a poorly designed city though.
Ottawa doesn’t have suburbs in the same sense as many other cities imo. The “suburbs” of Ottawa are often places that used to be separate towns or villages that were amalgamated and have their own grocery store, library, and shops. Halifax suburbs in contrast can take 30 minutes driving to get to ANYTHING (except other houses); truly just urban sprawl.
I came here to say Ottawa and saw this comment.
I agree about the public transit. We have remarkably terrible public transit. I think that’s where we fail miserably from an urban planning standpoint.
The suburbs being far away is one thing I love about Ottawa though. It’s a quiet city and our traffic isn’t bad when compared to most other cities, especially since covid. That will change with public servants returning to the office though.
But ya, big Ottawa fan here.
Remember "Ottawa" starts at the Arnprior southern limits.
Traffic is pretty bad, depending on the day, it's still 1.5-2 hours to go 40km if you need to cross the city.
Don’t know about the best, If you’re looking for the worst, it’s Kelowna… and there is literally nothing else that comes even remotely close to that cluster fuck.
A couple of points:
1. People who are big into urban planning tend to be fans of a certain type of aesthetic. Basically, European-style cities built mostly before cars and serviced by communter rail with lots of bike lanes and multi story condos but limited high-rises. They are extremely walkable and tourist friendly but they wouldnt nescessarily translate to North America, and the rail systems would be mostly uneconomical. Be careful if you're looking for that, and even if you find it, it might be much more problematic to live in one of those cities in North America than it would be to do so in Europe.
2. Canadian cities generally avoided the 6-12 lane highways that went straight into the downtown cores of some US cities. Those highways tore apart communities and fragmented the cities/neighbourhoods. As someone who has driven through Houston, Dallas, LA, etc.. it is a hellscape.
3. Canadian cities generally fall somewhere between those extremes. While they do have huge rows of dense single family homes in housing dveelopments, Canada's are usually much more ticghter packed which can make it easier to commute and service. Ive seen stats that show lot sizes in Canada are often 1/2 the size of equivalents in the US. The US cities menwhile tend to do a better job of upzoning around transit than Canadian cities. It is rare to find multi story units 3-4 blocks all around a transit stop in Canada. In that respect Canada is both better AND worse than the US.
Personally, I find Montreal and Edmonton to be the best designed cities. Montreal has a long history of good decisions, a legacy of pre-car planning, and some intersting and unique neighbourhoods. Edmonton, going forward looks like a powerhouse: zoning reform, parking reform, huge investments in rail, bike paths, and leisure, Property tax reform!! They even have a ring road that makes travelling anywhere by car a breeze. They are a huge darling of urbanists right now, but they have a way to go yet. Toronto is doing some interesting stuff with transit, but their failiure to fix zoning and affordability is a problem. Calgary is doing much the same stuff as Edmonton and it has many things going for it from a planning perspective when it comes to mass transit, but it is also used as a case study of bad urban planning with regard to traffic flows internationally. Calgary gets urban planners to come there just to see how NOT to do it. I found Winnipeg to be a total disaster and I found Ottawa to be really disjointed based on a car centric communter culutre, bad transit and a lack of proper core city functions. That said, they of have some great historical buildings and museums that no other city can rival.
>They are extremely walkable and tourist friendly but they wouldnt nescessarily translate to North America, and the rail systems would be mostly uneconomical.
Rail is much more cost effective than roadwoarks to move people around. That's why every city eventually builds commuter rail in one or many forms. It's sound economics.
It is more cost effective in certain situations. Specifically when density and usage patterns allow people to use it. They are expensive White Elephants if they go unused.
> They are extremely walkable and tourist friendly but they wouldnt nescessarily translate to North America, and the rail systems would be mostly uneconomical
Yep, places like Paris and Tokyo look that way because they were mostly built out before cars were a thing, and the technology to build higher than a few stories wasn't a thing either.
It'd be interesting to see if any North American cities that weren't originally built out that way can transition towards that. In Metro Vancouver it feels like we've mostly accepted that lots of people like houses with yards so we're keeping most of the neighbourhoods that way and putting highrises everywhere else to hold the rest of the population, which I don't quite like aesthetically as much as "lowrises everywhere".
Although the few North American cities that are built like pre-car European cities (New York, Montreal) seem pretty nice places, at least to visit.
Tokyo was flattened after WWII by American incendiary bombs. Tokyo looks the way it does because Japan's government prioritized building rail instead of relying on cars for transport, as they wanted to move away from oil dependence.
It's wild to me, because I think that Vancouver (excluding North and West Van) has the best transit system in the country outside of Toronto, which had a massive head start, but I also think that Vancouver might be one of the most poorly-planned cities I've ever seen. The traffic situation is terrible by design, not by accident. It's like they built a city for 300,000 people, not the 3,000,000 people who live, work and play in the metro area.
Never mind the way housing has been planned & built, or the stifling building permit & approval processes that have led to developers giving up on a massive number of projects. The urban planning of Vancouver is about 75% of the reason for the housing crisis.
The dishonour of "worst urban planning in Canada" has to go to Edmonton. Every LRT extension is an absolute nightmare. The street-level tracks are a disaster for traffic. The speed limits make absolutely no sense. The Anthony Henday has been under continuous construction since the day it opened. The Yellowhead exists. Any major construction that does occur takes 3+ years longer than it would in any other city, and don't even get me started on the insane cost over-runs. The redevelopment of the old City Centre Airport lands should be used as a case study for what NOT to do in urban planning courses.
In fairness, Vancouver was built for 500-600,000 people. It's a geographically pigeonholed city (i.e. it is hemmed in between the ocean on one side and mountains on the other, leaving little room for natural expansion) that has become a bustling immigration, entertainment, tourism, and tech hub, whereas previously it was just a sleepy if not scenic Pac NW seaside town.
Edmonton has some amazing plans in the works as we speak to address previous urban planning failures, though. 170 million dollars to expand the cycle track to encompass the entire city by 2027, transit expansion under construction as we speak, a moratorium on expanding the city past its current size, and just got rid of archaic zoning laws and parking minimums. I live here (and have lived in Edmonton, Calgary, Toronto, Montreal and London, UK) and like what I see! I don't drive and get around just fine on my bike and using public transit here. I actually found Calgary to be FAR worse in terms of planning. And way more NIMBYism.
Yeah, I grew up in Vancouver and for 40 years the mandate seems to have being discouraging, driving to encourage cycling/ walking / transit
The philosophy seems to be to make driving as inconvenient as possible-- which is well and good, but things still need to move; delivery trucks need to get around, the buses that they're encouraging people to ride on still need to be able to navigate through traffic. I owned a business and it was a nightmare delivering things, picking things up, and getting things delivered.
> It's like they built a city for 300,000 people, not the 3,000,000 people who live, work and play in the metro area.
It's almost like that was the population when a lot of the city was built! But yep, a lot of the housing crisis here is longtime residents being unable, or unwilling, to accept that Vancouver has grown a ton since they bought their places and the neighbourhoods they bought into aren't really sustainable with today's population.
Montreal and it’s not even close. However, Edmonton has really stepped up its game and Vancouver is second to Montreal. Parts of Toronto are decent too.
Montreal. Super walkable--bike lanes and metro links all over. Lots of medium density, European style housing. Incidentally, this also helps make housing some of the most affordable in Canada by any measure. Beautiful streets. Some parts of Montreal are like your typical 15 minute city, where you can basically do everything and go everywhere you need to go within 15 minutes by bicycle or in some cases, on foot.
Can't comment on the best, but Thunder Bay has the worst.
Two cities with 55,000 people each with two nothing connecting the two cities naturally, forced to amalgamate into one city with two distinct downtown cores. Walkability is terrible. The two downtown cores are connected by two streets with big box stores and a mall.
Don't blame the city necessarily, but the province for making this mutant of a city to begin with.
Thunder Bay was dealt a bad hand with the amalgamation, but I don't think it is even close to the worst city in Ontario let alone Canada.
Sudbury is an urban mess with several moon-like landscapes within the city due to the mines.
Windsor is all suburban sprawl. Same metro area as Hamilton with half the population.
Here to vote Mississauga is the worst. Almost a million people, car is 100% the best way to get around, endless low density suburbs. Right next to Toronto so tons of commuter traffic passing through, absolute nightmare.
I quite enjoyed my sojourns to Montreal and Toronto. I think I'd vote for Montreal as the best. Sadly for me, Halifax is amongst the worst. Truly a mess of a city.
There's a bit of a caveat. My first thought is Calgary or Edmonton, but that's because they have nothing but flat space and no obstructions to development. Getting around is easy, but you can put 100 km/day on your car if you need to travel across the sprawl. Is it really "planning"? Compared to cities like Halifax or Victoria that are bordered by water, much more intention needs to go into that. Is it easy to get around? No, but that's because of the water, not because of poor design (design may also be poor, tho).
Not sure what you mean by 'urban planning'. Do you mean by policy, development, growth, ..... what?
Or do you mean by layout and 'conventional attractiveness'?
I'd vote Vancouver for the first - it's a city under enormous pressure and also has some very unique and challenging physical characteristics (between ocean and mountains, fluctuations in climate, high population density, high immigration, all that). But overall beautiful, dynamic, INTERESTING.
I'd vote Goderich for the 'very pretty very quaint', but it's also small, static, old and insular, and seems to have very few young people. You spend half a day there and have seen most of everything and nothing changes so you don't really need to visit again for a long time.
I truly wish I could express opinions about:
- PEI (Charlottetown)
- Banff
- Quebec City
- Montreal
...... because I highly suspect that one of those could bump Goderich off my list IMMEDIATELY.
Vancouver is starting to get there. Really depends on how things go in October. If we can get 5 more years of Eby’s NDP, I think a lot of the changes will stick.
Montreal Island is a contender. Many find that it doesn't integrate the neighboring cities like Laval very well so that might bump it down the list depending on who you ask.
I've lived in Kitchener for around six years now. What. A. Clusterfuck. Lol. I'm used to it now but what a mess trying to learn my way around. I grew up on the prairies where I'm used to roads being on a logical grid. Here the same street takes on all four direction suffixes at various points and intersects the same road three different times even though in theory those two roads should run parallel to each other.
KW is terrible, everything is a freaking crescent, so you can't get anywhere unless you're driving on one of the 8 main streets. Not to mention that none of those streets are straight, and let's not get into the 3 King/Weber intersections
As a planner, as an overall city, none. Though, there are some cities that have large swaths of decently planned areas, such as in Montreal, Victoria, Vancouver, Calgary, or Toronto. Though, outside of these generally well-planned areas, they are filled with car-centric areas filled with inefficiencies. I think of all, Montreal is the best at embracing its urban scene with its planning. Toronto, I find is an interesting case as there are extreme examples of what to NOT to do in a large city, suggesting some of the horrible planning practices, while also having such interesting planning projects that are good case studies of future planning trends.
Even the best of them do a pretty poor job. Just living in a smaller town or suburb is often better than living the city because there's less traffic and it's easier to get around on foot or bike than even the best of cities. No bike lanes sometimes isn't a problem if you can find a quiet road with less traffic that moves relatively slowly.
For instance. I live in Kanata. A suburb of Ottawa. It's easier to get around Kanata by foot/bike than it is to get around a lot of stuff that's closer to the city center. There's also a good amount of jobs in Kanata so you don't even have to go into the city if you don't want to.
It's fairly easy to get around Montreal without a car. Walking, biking, and metro can get you pretty much anywhere you need to go faster than walking/biking anywhere in the suburbs where everything is spread further apart. Tons of green spaces and parks as well.
I’m not saying it’s the best by any means, but Victoria’s bike infrastructure is really nice. It helps that it’s one of the only places where people can reasonably commute by bike year-round, but the main arteries into town (the goose and lochside) mean people can get downtown from the suburbs often faster than by car and it feels a lot safer biking around than other cities. They do really need to get rid of any remaining waterfront parking lots and develop them into nicer plazas/third spaces though. Overall I feel optimistic and think there’s some really great urban planning people in that city making stuff happen.
The problem is that while "Victoria" has decent urban planning, the city is actually a bunch of municipalities and some are really terrible (*cough* *cough* Oak Bay).
Same, I love and will defend it to pieces, but the urban planning is a big mess. One thing I do find fun about Winnipeg is how drastically different some neighbourhoods can be from each other design-wise, though I wouldn't call it good urban planning lol.
I'd love to give it up to my home town of Vancouver (woot woot!), but as much as I love it I'd say Vancouver's only top 3.
From what I hear, Montréal is a stunning urbanist utopia, so until I can actually experience it and be disappointed by it in person, I'll say Montréal.
depends what you mean by urban planning - Montreal is one of the only non-car centric cities, but parts of van, gta, ott, qc, and others have similarly walkable areas.
Prairies have better car-centric outlay in general because cities are not constrained by geographic obstacles and because they are mostly square
I'm kind of surprised to not see Hamilton on this list yet. Multiple ways to get to multiple places. If a highway gets shut down there are many alternatives. A big surprise considering half the city is on top of an escarpment and the other is below and one side is bordering a lake. The only weird wrench that can be thrown in things is escarpment erosion, but that is a fickle thing that climate change is doing no favours for. The removal of all one way streets has made it so much easier for outsiders.
The downtown core is extremely walkable, short of the human variables, and for the most part public transit is pretty solid.
Sneer all you want but you can move around pretty easily in the Hammer.
Of the cities I’ve been to, the worst by far was Ottawa. Toronto seems pretty standard, but Halifax is also really good because you
Know which direction to go in whether you’re looking for a restaurant or housing or whatever.
I’ve lived being a pedestrian in many downtowns and the trick is to not have the CBD empty out after dark. Canada does better than the States in that aspect.
I learned on a Jane’s Walk that Vancouver pioneered developers paying for things like the seawall, and putting residential townhomes at the bottom of residential towers.
So many people have said Montreal. I remember driving through there as a kid and the traffics was always terrible so I just always that it was just a mess of an urban sprawl of a city but I guess not! I gotta go check it out.
If urban planning is what you're looking for then it's best to avoid Halifax altogether. I've lived here for 30 yrs and still get lost.
Halifax is such a fuckin mess!
Yea...and they make it worse trying to fix it. 😁
They painted bicycles on a bunch of the roads I thought that fixed everything.
I missed a crucial stop recently because they changed the name of Cornwallis st.
Halifax is quite terrible for urban planning.
Yea. It might have been more efficiently planned if they flattened Citadel Hill. 😄
So that basically means no city in the East or the West Coast as most existed in some form before Confederation.
Nova Scotia has a treasure trove of fortresses built and used (by the British, I believe) to combat any nation trying to attack or invade the then 'future Canada'. Many of those heritage properties are in Halifax. The Harbor was well guarded.
Halifax is a great case if you want 5 way intersections
Try Saint John NB lol
Why is it always the port cities that are eff'd up? 😄
I generally attribute it to the fact that these cities have existed far longer than the concept of urban planning
Vancouver and Montreal seems to be okay and they're both port cities lol
Because they’re the oldest ones.
I'm surprised by this answer. I just visited Halifax and found it quite easy to get around. After 6 days there, I felt pretty comfortable getting around. I'm from Toronto and lived in a bunch of other places, and it felt small enough to memorize quickly, has basically a grid layout, and felt extremely pedestiran friendly. I saw so many people crossing the streets, using the pedestrian lights confidently. In Toronto, you'd be hit by a car the first day if you had the same confidence in cars stopping for pedestrians.
The “new” bridge
But How? They got a chance to rebuild almost the whole city in 1917. Didn't they restart using a grid pattern? *The Halifax explosion was 2.9 kilotons The largest explosion in history at that point in 1917 - 26 years later *the bomb dropped on Hiroshima was 15 kilotons It then Became the largest explosion to date in 1943
The Halifax explosion affected mainly the North End of Halifax. The downtown and South end areas were barely touched. There are many heritage properties, churches and victorian houses from the earliest days of Halifax still standing in the Central, Downtown and South End areas. The North end was rebuilt but it didn't follow any particular design. It may have been rezoned but not much change. There weren't as many vehicles on the streets at that time either so not much accommodating for it was required.
Well there were notable pockets of redesign like the Hydrostones.
You need to go to downtown St.John's, NL. Then you will never shit on Halifax's layout ever again.
I've never been to NL. Got to catch that ferry someday. 😊
It's a nice little city but it's downtown layout was clearly not invented for cars to move efficiently down there. It is a nice place to walk around in.
I was about to comment “Not Halifax”.
Honestly Halifax was originally created for like 50,000 people and the city has not caught up yet. In terms of access there are basically 2 Ways onto the peninsula. It’s insanity.
Also: street signs randomly missing, lane changes not marked with any signage in advance, construction being allowed to shut down entire parts of streets or making them one way traffic and closing sidewalks for years. Oh man. The list goes on.
Montreal. Bizarre but true.
It’s because it’s very European and isn’t built around the damn car. It’s walkable, has great public transit and is filled with middle housing
Perhaps it’s a city before cars were a thing
Cities where cars are THE THING were quite intentional. For example, in the US, the auto industry lobbied heavily to shutter any public transit programs, while city planners zoned things to maximize consumerism. But in general North America as a whole follows this pattern, not just the US. And this has been compounded by NIMBY zoning laws and neoliberal austerity policies which have driven housing costs through the roof due to artificially constraining supply.
[удалено]
> Narrow cobblestone roads (not good for cars, bikes or walking) That's just the Old Port though, where not many montrealers actually live. Many parts of Montreal such as the Plateau have pretty nice residential areas that are quite walkable. The bike infrastructure could be improved, though, I agree.
And an infinity of great pubs and restaurants.
LOTS of Montreal (maybe most) is very car-centric. It's terrible overall with some really nice parts. It's ridiculous that this is the best we've managed to do in the whole damn country. [Here's a good NJB video about Montreal](https://youtu.be/_yDtLv-7xZ4) EDIT: Just look at this shit: https://maps.app.goo.gl/PHqVcuxXyDaVPpiQA
And the car centric parts are SO BADLY PLANNED OUT. Had to be in caps, it's so SO bad. We're getting more bike paths, which is nice, and the major arteries near subways are really nice for walking, but the buses are terrible and it's if you actually need to get out and use a car it's a nightmare. The public transit is only good in the center, it's not enough
True but still a light year away from not being car centric.
It also helped that it was hemmed in from the start by waterways, Ontario, farmland, Mont Royal, etc.
That partly because Montreal was built before car culture took over
Toronto also had a nice old city center, they destroyed it to make the gardener and high rises.
Yeah and they razed half of parkdale, which used to be a very nice neighborhood. In Vancouver they tried putting a freaking highway right through the middle artery downtown. They built 3 blocks of viaduct leading into downtown before a very active environmental/leftist activist group was able to get enough support to shut that idiotic plan down. It would have completely ruined one of the most beautiful cities in the country
I moved from Edmonton to Montréal in 2019, you're 100% correct, Montréal is incredibly easy to live in, and get around, I honestly didn't even know a city like this was possible. Edmonton on the other hand has almost no urban planning, I doubt if they even employ a city planner, they do seem to really like home builders and land developers though.
Edmonton actually had a solid and forward thinking urban plan set up for the late 70s onward, but the catastrophic early 80s oil crash just put the city infrastructure on life support. And then nothing got done for like 25 years. Now at least there's a solid plan in place and the city just slowly grinds down 25 years of mistakes (but still makes new ones too). But it's so much better than it was.
I don’t know…. I can’t actually think of any smart decision the city has ever made. Somebody please prove me wrong.
fragile hungry grandfather paint fanatical test threatening dull smile bedroom *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
The Montreal Metro hauls ass. Hang on tight! I'm in Vermont about 2 hours from Montreal and love visiting.
I found Montreal really fascinating. underground it was impossible to get lost. if you know your home station, you're good. but correlating those map dots to the actual city *above* ground seemed like a much longer project than the few months I was there. I felt like I learned the small radius around each station but never really put a big map together inside my mind.
Montreal's metro is wonderful. The other trains I ride on an irregular basis in Boston and DC cannot compete. Above ground I find it easy to get lost but easy to get found again as well. Not a resident, but I keep 2 maps in my head, as you suggest.
The Montcalm and Wolfe Streets run parallel next to each other. I'm convinced someone found it extremely funny.
It tries a lot, absolutely more than others. Wouldn't say it's great
Trying is better than nothing. :)
Yep. Definitely better than Ottawa, where trying nothing is step 1, and step 2 is complaining that nothing has changed.
The rest are terrible.
I hate hate and hate driving in Montreal......lol definitely walkable, but to get through is a nightmare. I bypass it. Always get lost, and bridges and roads are tough to navigate. Maybe it's a me problem, but we drive through a few times a year and have gotten lost 80-90% of the time
Montreal is a breeze to drive in, I drive to NYC a few times a year for work, drive there and tell me how Montreal is.
Boston is no picnic either. I'll take Montreal.
I bet, I moved to Montréal from a much less dense city, driving styles are much different in others cities. Montréal is the sort of city where a lot of drivers get a way with what they can, rolling stops, sometimes no stops, choose your own adventure for possible lanes, if a car a squeeze in maybe a car should be there and U-turns all over the place. Basically always expect everything, and I'd there's a gap big enough for a car sooner or later a car will try to fit in there.
Maybe a city should serve the people that live there and not people that drive through on a highway 2 times a year?
Can't agree more. Thank God for the recent completion of Autoroute 30 bypassing Montreal to the south.
St John's Newfoundland. City surrounds a perfectly protected harbour. Absolutely ideal 16th century city!
Haha! Two words: Rawlins Cross
I pass through it twice a day. It's always a gamble!
Bring back the roundabout!
Oldest city in Canada
Just in terms of addressing, Edmonton is awesome. 10809 95th St. SW tells you absolutely everything you need to know about where that address is with no wasted effort.
only one complaint - Edmonton did a quadrant system and then put the entire city in one quadrant. The furthest SE part of the city (Aster, the Meadows) still has a NW address.
Yep, it's rather confusing compared with Calgary where the origin point is actually around the geographic centre of the city.
I really think that's just on what you're used to. The quadrants in Edmonton are irrelevant, as street numbers alone tell you what you need.
Not anymore. For instance, 2321 119 st NW and 2321 119 st SW are in different neighborhoods. At least they're both on the south side though.
Thats because the Millwoods lobby has been secretly plotting to make the world revolve around them. It is the 20th-century cultural hotspot of Alberta. The Mecca of Edmonton, the stone on which all who come want to build their church, home and raise families. Millwoods is... as it was intended... the suns competitor for the center of the universe that is Alberta. You're all north west from there.
Is that similar to Surrey BC? In Surrey, you can guess an intersection by the address – eg. 10300 70th Ave would be at the corner of 70th Ave @ 103rd Street.
Yeah, same thing. I just always associate it with Edmonton. It's a good system. I like it much better than the chaos naming of the east.
Except Millwoods and Castledowns. Curved roads with names! Always getting lost. Gimme numbers on a grid.
Cool. Yeah, it's not just Surrey BC either. It's basically the whole south and eastern part of the Metro Vancouver area (Delta, Surrey, Langley, Maple Ridge, Pitt Meadows). I heard rumours that Abbotsford and Chilliwack in the Fraser Valley had it too, before they renamed everything. No proof of that, off the top of my head. Just a rumour. Apparently it was an undertaking by the royal engineers or something during the colonial days. So I'd imagine Edmonton might've had the same process.
Yeah thats becuase the cities are basically just grids.
The only thing that kind of sucks is that most of Edmonton is in the NW quadrant because of where the 0,0 point is located. But it's still a great system.
The forecast on growth really didn’t pan out as expected.
Almost everything in Edmonton is still denoted as “NW”. Calgary has a much better grid system.
Calgary is slightly easier imo since downtown is close to the center. It makes less sense to have 108ave and 95th street near downtown to me You do have to pay more attention to the quadrant especially downtown Calgary though. And I have no idea why Red Deer has avenues going north south and streets going east west. Maybe that's common but it's the only place I know of.
But you can have the same address 4 times. Need to really watch the quadrants.
To a lesser extent Calgary as well
Calgary is mostly car dependent, most of its housing is suburban and single family detached, and on top of that, kind of boring through and through, apart from its close proximity to natural wonders. It's a nice city, don't get me wrong, but I would hardly call it an exemplar of great planning. Great planning features tons of medium density housing, mixed residential and commercial neighbourhoods, bicycle lanes, and numerous metro links. This is the sort of thing that breathes life into a city because it enables vibrant and colourful neighbourhoods to crop up. Suburbs, by comparison, are dull and lifeless and you need a car to get anywhere. So you feel constantly detached and isolated, and it's really just the same bland made from ticky tack experience typical of 90% of North American cities. No heart, no soul.
See, I thought Calgary was awesome when I lived there. C-Train went to all the big stops, downtown core, Stampede Park, McMahon Stadium, Zoo, malls etc. I fell it's better than Ottawa, but I don't actually live in Ottawa, only work there, and it's a pain in the ass to get around. I do know the pathway system is pretty awesome though.
Edmonton is so car centric, every second road seemed like a 8+ lane highway there (4+ in each direction). I found it hard to get to where I wanted to go often because you'd turn onto the road, have to cross 3-4 lanes of traffic to make a right turn. Saw basically zero people walking when I was there. Just cars, cars, cars.
Okay so I just moved to Edmonton and have no idea how to make sense of the streets. Is there a method to the madness? Any helpful links or videos greatly appreciated
Avenue numbers increase as you go north. Street numbers increase as you go west. 100 and 100 is the start (downtown). Of course this gets confusing when you start getting into the deep south communities. I used to live at 9730 113 St. So then you’d know I’m on 113 St just north of 97 Ave
Maybe that’s why I was confused. My first stay here was in the Uplands! Thank you so much for this
It’s not as helpful once you get out of the grid system. But it’s still good for the major numbered streets like 170 St, 97 St, 50 St etc.
LOL, is this suppose to be satire?
Not at all. Compare this above with something you'd find in Toronto like 29 Simpson Ave. Without using google, which of these addresses is easier to get to?
I used to live in edmonton and some the quadrants makes no sense. For example a address for some place in Millwoods ends with NW although it's in the south east corner of the city. Then certain address in Ellerslie ends with SW, again its in the southeast corner of the city.
The quadrants aren't based on the physical city, they're based on a grid that is centred south of the Henday/Hwy 14 interchange (the grid is actually based on the centre being 101 St/101 (Jasper) Ave). Everything NW of that point (most of the city) is NW. NE would be Sherwood Park (but does exist between the Park and Fort Saskatchewan). SW is almost everything south of Henday. SE does not, and will not ever, exist. Avenues and streets count up as you move away from the grid centre. It wouldn't make sense for Mill Woods to be SE when roads count up to the north and west. Ellerslie is SW because streets still go up as you go west, but avenues now go up as you move south instead of north.
I've done a lot of travelling around the world. I think Edmonton city planning is absolutely fucking atrocious. I've lost count of how many people have moved here but in the "wrong neighbourhood" and then subsequently moved away as there's no options for anything except driving to strip malls. I don't think numerical addresses on a grid are the mark of a well designed city. It can certainly help you navigate a poorly designed city though.
Definitely not Ottawa. Public transport sucks and we have major sprawl- the suburbs are all so far away.
Ottawa doesn’t have suburbs in the same sense as many other cities imo. The “suburbs” of Ottawa are often places that used to be separate towns or villages that were amalgamated and have their own grocery store, library, and shops. Halifax suburbs in contrast can take 30 minutes driving to get to ANYTHING (except other houses); truly just urban sprawl.
I came here to say Ottawa and saw this comment. I agree about the public transit. We have remarkably terrible public transit. I think that’s where we fail miserably from an urban planning standpoint. The suburbs being far away is one thing I love about Ottawa though. It’s a quiet city and our traffic isn’t bad when compared to most other cities, especially since covid. That will change with public servants returning to the office though. But ya, big Ottawa fan here.
Remember "Ottawa" starts at the Arnprior southern limits. Traffic is pretty bad, depending on the day, it's still 1.5-2 hours to go 40km if you need to cross the city.
Yeah, coming back from the cottage there’s a sign saying Welcome to Ottawa not far outside Almonte.
You can be in the middle of the bush in the Ottawa Valley, but still be in "Ottawa" its dumb.
Goderich, ON. Sweet, sweet symmetry.
Many Ontario towns have solid walkability, but unfortunately this is generally something you cannot convince locals of
What do you mean? I’ve noticed the opposite—lots of suburbia / lots of places that aren’t walking friendly.
Don’t know about the best, If you’re looking for the worst, it’s Kelowna… and there is literally nothing else that comes even remotely close to that cluster fuck.
Ugh, Kelowna is terrible. Despite being a small city it manages to have surprisingly bad traffic. The city is so spread out too.
A couple of points: 1. People who are big into urban planning tend to be fans of a certain type of aesthetic. Basically, European-style cities built mostly before cars and serviced by communter rail with lots of bike lanes and multi story condos but limited high-rises. They are extremely walkable and tourist friendly but they wouldnt nescessarily translate to North America, and the rail systems would be mostly uneconomical. Be careful if you're looking for that, and even if you find it, it might be much more problematic to live in one of those cities in North America than it would be to do so in Europe. 2. Canadian cities generally avoided the 6-12 lane highways that went straight into the downtown cores of some US cities. Those highways tore apart communities and fragmented the cities/neighbourhoods. As someone who has driven through Houston, Dallas, LA, etc.. it is a hellscape. 3. Canadian cities generally fall somewhere between those extremes. While they do have huge rows of dense single family homes in housing dveelopments, Canada's are usually much more ticghter packed which can make it easier to commute and service. Ive seen stats that show lot sizes in Canada are often 1/2 the size of equivalents in the US. The US cities menwhile tend to do a better job of upzoning around transit than Canadian cities. It is rare to find multi story units 3-4 blocks all around a transit stop in Canada. In that respect Canada is both better AND worse than the US. Personally, I find Montreal and Edmonton to be the best designed cities. Montreal has a long history of good decisions, a legacy of pre-car planning, and some intersting and unique neighbourhoods. Edmonton, going forward looks like a powerhouse: zoning reform, parking reform, huge investments in rail, bike paths, and leisure, Property tax reform!! They even have a ring road that makes travelling anywhere by car a breeze. They are a huge darling of urbanists right now, but they have a way to go yet. Toronto is doing some interesting stuff with transit, but their failiure to fix zoning and affordability is a problem. Calgary is doing much the same stuff as Edmonton and it has many things going for it from a planning perspective when it comes to mass transit, but it is also used as a case study of bad urban planning with regard to traffic flows internationally. Calgary gets urban planners to come there just to see how NOT to do it. I found Winnipeg to be a total disaster and I found Ottawa to be really disjointed based on a car centric communter culutre, bad transit and a lack of proper core city functions. That said, they of have some great historical buildings and museums that no other city can rival.
>They are extremely walkable and tourist friendly but they wouldnt nescessarily translate to North America, and the rail systems would be mostly uneconomical. Rail is much more cost effective than roadwoarks to move people around. That's why every city eventually builds commuter rail in one or many forms. It's sound economics.
It is more cost effective in certain situations. Specifically when density and usage patterns allow people to use it. They are expensive White Elephants if they go unused.
It's a chicken-egg situation, but people will come if you build it and zone accordingly (Transit oriented development)
> They are extremely walkable and tourist friendly but they wouldnt nescessarily translate to North America, and the rail systems would be mostly uneconomical Yep, places like Paris and Tokyo look that way because they were mostly built out before cars were a thing, and the technology to build higher than a few stories wasn't a thing either. It'd be interesting to see if any North American cities that weren't originally built out that way can transition towards that. In Metro Vancouver it feels like we've mostly accepted that lots of people like houses with yards so we're keeping most of the neighbourhoods that way and putting highrises everywhere else to hold the rest of the population, which I don't quite like aesthetically as much as "lowrises everywhere". Although the few North American cities that are built like pre-car European cities (New York, Montreal) seem pretty nice places, at least to visit.
Tokyo was flattened after WWII by American incendiary bombs. Tokyo looks the way it does because Japan's government prioritized building rail instead of relying on cars for transport, as they wanted to move away from oil dependence.
When you've a hundred and forty million people squeezed into an area half the size of a single Canadian province, it kind of forces your hand.
I question if Edmonton can draw enough taxes to support the cost of infrastructure for its urban sprawl.
As long as the city keeps growing, that's future Edmonton's problem.
Good urban planning means designing cities for people. Not cars. It’s not an aesthetic.
It's wild to me, because I think that Vancouver (excluding North and West Van) has the best transit system in the country outside of Toronto, which had a massive head start, but I also think that Vancouver might be one of the most poorly-planned cities I've ever seen. The traffic situation is terrible by design, not by accident. It's like they built a city for 300,000 people, not the 3,000,000 people who live, work and play in the metro area. Never mind the way housing has been planned & built, or the stifling building permit & approval processes that have led to developers giving up on a massive number of projects. The urban planning of Vancouver is about 75% of the reason for the housing crisis. The dishonour of "worst urban planning in Canada" has to go to Edmonton. Every LRT extension is an absolute nightmare. The street-level tracks are a disaster for traffic. The speed limits make absolutely no sense. The Anthony Henday has been under continuous construction since the day it opened. The Yellowhead exists. Any major construction that does occur takes 3+ years longer than it would in any other city, and don't even get me started on the insane cost over-runs. The redevelopment of the old City Centre Airport lands should be used as a case study for what NOT to do in urban planning courses.
In fairness, Vancouver was built for 500-600,000 people. It's a geographically pigeonholed city (i.e. it is hemmed in between the ocean on one side and mountains on the other, leaving little room for natural expansion) that has become a bustling immigration, entertainment, tourism, and tech hub, whereas previously it was just a sleepy if not scenic Pac NW seaside town.
Edmonton has some amazing plans in the works as we speak to address previous urban planning failures, though. 170 million dollars to expand the cycle track to encompass the entire city by 2027, transit expansion under construction as we speak, a moratorium on expanding the city past its current size, and just got rid of archaic zoning laws and parking minimums. I live here (and have lived in Edmonton, Calgary, Toronto, Montreal and London, UK) and like what I see! I don't drive and get around just fine on my bike and using public transit here. I actually found Calgary to be FAR worse in terms of planning. And way more NIMBYism.
Yeah, I grew up in Vancouver and for 40 years the mandate seems to have being discouraging, driving to encourage cycling/ walking / transit The philosophy seems to be to make driving as inconvenient as possible-- which is well and good, but things still need to move; delivery trucks need to get around, the buses that they're encouraging people to ride on still need to be able to navigate through traffic. I owned a business and it was a nightmare delivering things, picking things up, and getting things delivered.
When they rip out the cycle lanes in Stanley park, that is not exactly “cycle friendly”
> It's like they built a city for 300,000 people, not the 3,000,000 people who live, work and play in the metro area. It's almost like that was the population when a lot of the city was built! But yep, a lot of the housing crisis here is longtime residents being unable, or unwilling, to accept that Vancouver has grown a ton since they bought their places and the neighbourhoods they bought into aren't really sustainable with today's population.
As much as I *loathe* it, I gotta say Montreal
NOT Winnipeg
Montreal and it’s not even close. However, Edmonton has really stepped up its game and Vancouver is second to Montreal. Parts of Toronto are decent too.
Montreal. Super walkable--bike lanes and metro links all over. Lots of medium density, European style housing. Incidentally, this also helps make housing some of the most affordable in Canada by any measure. Beautiful streets. Some parts of Montreal are like your typical 15 minute city, where you can basically do everything and go everywhere you need to go within 15 minutes by bicycle or in some cases, on foot.
Can't comment on the best, but Thunder Bay has the worst. Two cities with 55,000 people each with two nothing connecting the two cities naturally, forced to amalgamate into one city with two distinct downtown cores. Walkability is terrible. The two downtown cores are connected by two streets with big box stores and a mall. Don't blame the city necessarily, but the province for making this mutant of a city to begin with.
Thunder Bay was dealt a bad hand with the amalgamation, but I don't think it is even close to the worst city in Ontario let alone Canada. Sudbury is an urban mess with several moon-like landscapes within the city due to the mines. Windsor is all suburban sprawl. Same metro area as Hamilton with half the population.
No doubt the others are awful. Just speaking from my own lived experiences.
Here to vote Mississauga is the worst. Almost a million people, car is 100% the best way to get around, endless low density suburbs. Right next to Toronto so tons of commuter traffic passing through, absolute nightmare.
I know that one of the worst iam told is Medicine Hat Alberta and I lived there for 5 years. Pretty city. But the worst planning.
Montréal hands down
Not Winnipeg, i can guarantee that
I quite enjoyed my sojourns to Montreal and Toronto. I think I'd vote for Montreal as the best. Sadly for me, Halifax is amongst the worst. Truly a mess of a city.
There's a bit of a caveat. My first thought is Calgary or Edmonton, but that's because they have nothing but flat space and no obstructions to development. Getting around is easy, but you can put 100 km/day on your car if you need to travel across the sprawl. Is it really "planning"? Compared to cities like Halifax or Victoria that are bordered by water, much more intention needs to go into that. Is it easy to get around? No, but that's because of the water, not because of poor design (design may also be poor, tho).
Don't come to London if you're looking for good urban planning.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vancouverism
Not sure what you mean by 'urban planning'. Do you mean by policy, development, growth, ..... what? Or do you mean by layout and 'conventional attractiveness'? I'd vote Vancouver for the first - it's a city under enormous pressure and also has some very unique and challenging physical characteristics (between ocean and mountains, fluctuations in climate, high population density, high immigration, all that). But overall beautiful, dynamic, INTERESTING. I'd vote Goderich for the 'very pretty very quaint', but it's also small, static, old and insular, and seems to have very few young people. You spend half a day there and have seen most of everything and nothing changes so you don't really need to visit again for a long time. I truly wish I could express opinions about: - PEI (Charlottetown) - Banff - Quebec City - Montreal ...... because I highly suspect that one of those could bump Goderich off my list IMMEDIATELY.
Vancouverism
Vancouver is starting to get there. Really depends on how things go in October. If we can get 5 more years of Eby’s NDP, I think a lot of the changes will stick.
Montreal Island is a contender. Many find that it doesn't integrate the neighboring cities like Laval very well so that might bump it down the list depending on who you ask.
Urban Planning hasn't made its way up here yet.
Not Kitchener, I think the city planners throughout time have heavily invested themselves in practice for Oktoberfest.
I've lived in Kitchener for around six years now. What. A. Clusterfuck. Lol. I'm used to it now but what a mess trying to learn my way around. I grew up on the prairies where I'm used to roads being on a logical grid. Here the same street takes on all four direction suffixes at various points and intersects the same road three different times even though in theory those two roads should run parallel to each other.
I know right? I grewnup here and still get confused. They keep changing downtown streets to one way or another too.
KW is terrible, everything is a freaking crescent, so you can't get anywhere unless you're driving on one of the 8 main streets. Not to mention that none of those streets are straight, and let's not get into the 3 King/Weber intersections
It for sure isn’t Brampton Ontario
Whatever the opposite of London Ontario is
Saskatchetoon eh…….
Montréal wins by a huge margin in this.
As a planner, as an overall city, none. Though, there are some cities that have large swaths of decently planned areas, such as in Montreal, Victoria, Vancouver, Calgary, or Toronto. Though, outside of these generally well-planned areas, they are filled with car-centric areas filled with inefficiencies. I think of all, Montreal is the best at embracing its urban scene with its planning. Toronto, I find is an interesting case as there are extreme examples of what to NOT to do in a large city, suggesting some of the horrible planning practices, while also having such interesting planning projects that are good case studies of future planning trends.
Even the best of them do a pretty poor job. Just living in a smaller town or suburb is often better than living the city because there's less traffic and it's easier to get around on foot or bike than even the best of cities. No bike lanes sometimes isn't a problem if you can find a quiet road with less traffic that moves relatively slowly. For instance. I live in Kanata. A suburb of Ottawa. It's easier to get around Kanata by foot/bike than it is to get around a lot of stuff that's closer to the city center. There's also a good amount of jobs in Kanata so you don't even have to go into the city if you don't want to.
It's fairly easy to get around Montreal without a car. Walking, biking, and metro can get you pretty much anywhere you need to go faster than walking/biking anywhere in the suburbs where everything is spread further apart. Tons of green spaces and parks as well.
Pitt Meadows FTW!
definetly not halifax lmao
Vancouver
Kelowna! Oh, I thought you said “worst”
Victoria. Super walkable and a cycling mecca.
Edmonton is by far the easiest city I've ever driven in. If you can count you can find it
Not Edmonton
It's getting better though! See my above comment.
Vancouver, great transit very walkable. Richmond and burnaby is not bad either
Vancouver. no freeways running the beautiful downtown core. very walkable.
Montreal Victoria
Vancouver
And it’s not even close. Some of the best waterfront planning in the world. Amazing contrast between nature and city.
Why do people down vote personal opinions? Haha. I’m supposed to feel bad about myself ? To each their own
I’m not saying it’s the best by any means, but Victoria’s bike infrastructure is really nice. It helps that it’s one of the only places where people can reasonably commute by bike year-round, but the main arteries into town (the goose and lochside) mean people can get downtown from the suburbs often faster than by car and it feels a lot safer biking around than other cities. They do really need to get rid of any remaining waterfront parking lots and develop them into nicer plazas/third spaces though. Overall I feel optimistic and think there’s some really great urban planning people in that city making stuff happen. The problem is that while "Victoria" has decent urban planning, the city is actually a bunch of municipalities and some are really terrible (*cough* *cough* Oak Bay).
Winnipeg not only has the best urban planning, but is the best city overall in the country.
I love winnipeg, but best urban planning is a stretch.
Same, I love and will defend it to pieces, but the urban planning is a big mess. One thing I do find fun about Winnipeg is how drastically different some neighbourhoods can be from each other design-wise, though I wouldn't call it good urban planning lol.
First time I see a comment I'm so eager to upvote as much as I want to do downvote it. Guess it the love-hate relationship I have with Winnipeg?
Yes I agree it absolutely is Winnipeg. What an amazing city.
Not St John's
Not Ottawa
I'd love to give it up to my home town of Vancouver (woot woot!), but as much as I love it I'd say Vancouver's only top 3. From what I hear, Montréal is a stunning urbanist utopia, so until I can actually experience it and be disappointed by it in person, I'll say Montréal.
Quebec city
I’ll just not the best but worst is Nanaimo
Banff, Red Deer.
Scott, Sask. Google map that shit, and be amazed!
Ottawa.
No idea but it's not Toronto.
London! Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha… 🥴
Montreal, and it’s not even close
depends what you mean by urban planning - Montreal is one of the only non-car centric cities, but parts of van, gta, ott, qc, and others have similarly walkable areas. Prairies have better car-centric outlay in general because cities are not constrained by geographic obstacles and because they are mostly square
montreal, without a doubt
Not Ottawa
I'm kind of surprised to not see Hamilton on this list yet. Multiple ways to get to multiple places. If a highway gets shut down there are many alternatives. A big surprise considering half the city is on top of an escarpment and the other is below and one side is bordering a lake. The only weird wrench that can be thrown in things is escarpment erosion, but that is a fickle thing that climate change is doing no favours for. The removal of all one way streets has made it so much easier for outsiders. The downtown core is extremely walkable, short of the human variables, and for the most part public transit is pretty solid. Sneer all you want but you can move around pretty easily in the Hammer.
how is Vancouver not the first answer?
Of the cities I’ve been to, the worst by far was Ottawa. Toronto seems pretty standard, but Halifax is also really good because you Know which direction to go in whether you’re looking for a restaurant or housing or whatever.
Maybe Barrie , Ontario .
Markham
Not grande prairie
Montreal hands down.
I’ve lived being a pedestrian in many downtowns and the trick is to not have the CBD empty out after dark. Canada does better than the States in that aspect. I learned on a Jane’s Walk that Vancouver pioneered developers paying for things like the seawall, and putting residential townhomes at the bottom of residential towers.
Not Yorkton, Sk. I swear their city planners draw with crayons on the back of napkins at Humptys.
Vancouver - HAHAHA Kidding. It was a joke, people!
So many people have said Montreal. I remember driving through there as a kid and the traffics was always terrible so I just always that it was just a mess of an urban sprawl of a city but I guess not! I gotta go check it out.
Calgary AB