Top Ten Canadian Cities

[mathieu30]

Then again I drove by London in the summer of '99.

During the summer? August, september, october? Did you visit the ice rink? The Subway restaurant? Wendy's? I was there, in one of those 3 places, all summer, le french goaler. Wow, there's a chance I already met PTG in person..

B)

[Pierre the Great]

you were in London?

No, just drove through, stopped at the service stop on the 401 for dinner.

But I'll make a more detailed stop in the next 5 years I can almost bet on it.

[Dirty Harry]

notice most of the top 10 are government towns? I guess it is easy to get a good rating when the majority of your town has a cushy, tenured overpaid civil service job and no worries.

If you are someone living in reality who is stuck with a real job, or has ambition to become something greater than a tenured rating C-5 pencil pusher you're going to want to live in actual city like Vancouver, Montreal, Calgary or Toronto.

Gander, NL

LOL!

Edited May 4, 2007 by Dirty Harry

[Mr. Nasty]

notice most of the top 10 are government towns? I guess it is easy to get a good rating when the majority of your town has a cushy, tenured overpaid civil service job and no worries.

If you are someone living in reality who is stuck with a real job, or has ambition to become something greater than a tenured rating C-5 pencil pusher you're going to want to live in actual city like Vancouver, Montreal, Calgary or Toronto.

Gander, NL

LOL!

Wow...somebody sounds a bit bitter.

For the record, Gander NFLD...is home to one of North America's busiest airports. Employs much of the city. Obviously you can't see past the end of your big city nose. I have lived in Montreal and Toronto and that type of attitude is rampant. I finally chose right when i moved to the Maritimes.

[Pierre the Great]

notice most of the top 10 are government towns? I guess it is easy to get a good rating when the majority of your town has a cushy, tenured overpaid civil service job and no worries.

If you are someone living in reality who is stuck with a real job, or has ambition to become something greater than a tenured rating C-5 pencil pusher you're going to want to live in actual city like Vancouver, Montreal, Calgary or Toronto.

Gander, NL

LOL!

Exactly Dirty Harry. This is like the anti big city poll considering

Montreal, Vancouver, Toronto, Calgary have 12,008,767 million people with the metro areas.

And with a population of 33 million (est.)

that's 36% of the population living in 4 areas.

And I'm not even counting Edmonton which would make it over 40% in just 5 areas of the country.

And I wonder why most of the country lives in either Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver, Calgary, Edmonton. hmmm

[Habsy]

Wow...somebody sounds a bit bitter.

For the record, Gander NFLD...is home to one of North America's busiest airports. Employs much of the city. Obviously you can't see past the end of your big city nose. I have lived in Montreal and Toronto and that type of attitude is rampant. I finally chose right when i moved to the Maritimes.

Gander may be a nice place to live, I guess. But hold on, the airport doesn't rank anywhere near the top in Canada, never mind north america. That sort of information is readily available online. Not in top 10 for passengers in Canada, not even in top 20 for plane movements, in Canada. I love how people just throw out facts. kinda like PTG...

[beliveau1]

London, Kitchener-Waterloo, Guelph, Cambridge and the surrounding area compromise what is known as the Golden Horseshoe - a strong industrial & technology basin that helps drive the provincial & to a great degree the national economy. Four of Canada's better universities populate the area, one of which has a great international reputation. The area is all basically less than three hours away from the 'centre of the hockey universe' with much to offer on their own. All are growing cities and have top flight living standards - Cambridge being more of an industrial based city though. London has one of the best research & education hospitals in the world(it's organ transplant centre is a world leader as major drug firms, research companies & technical firms are involved there), while Waterloo & Guelph offer three excellent but diversified university campuses between them(Laurier, U of G & UW.) Waterloo is a world leader in high tech research & development with many major international computer/technology oriented firms investing highly in the city.

London has a population of over 350,000 in the city proper and closing in on 500,000 as a metropolitan area. It has a considerable role in the Canadian insurance business as well as in many other areas - especially medical, biotech & technical research.

London, Ontario

The Tri-Cities as a metropolitan area has a population of about 510,000 (= Kitchener 214,000+, Waterloo 113,00+[20,000 plus students], Cambridge 120,000+ and the outlaying regional population.) Guelph has a population of 127,000 plus in the city proper and a metropolitan population of over 200,000.

In fact London was originally considered for the capital of Upper Canada, while Guelph is one of the oldest planned communities in Canada.

Major businesses in the region:

London = Kellogs, GM Suzuki, Ford, GE Electro-Motive, London Life, CAMI, General Dynamics Land Systems(military vehicles), University of Western Ontario

Waterloo = RIM is situated here(Blackberry), Sybase, Google, LSI Logic, MacAfee, Adobe, Oracle & AGFA have development offices here as well as involvement at UW with Microsoft. US Military has had contracts with UW as well: SunLife, ManuLife & Clarica Insurance/Financial are headquartered here. Seagram's started here. There is a long list of other significant high tech firms in the city as well. University of Waterloo is world famous and Wilfrid Laurier University is here also.

Kitchener = Budd Canada, Schneider Meats, UW is currently building a School of Pharmacy/Health Sciences campus & a School of Medicine (in conjunction with McMaster University); and of course the infamous Oktoberfest celebrations every fall. As well as it's own International Airport in the suburb of Breslau.

Cambridge = Toyota, Babcock-Wilcox, Frito Lay(Hostess), ATS, Northstar Aerospace, Com Dev are a few iindustries there, along with the new UW School of Architecture campus....

Guelph = Sleeman Breweries, University of Guelph(School of Veterinarian Medicine), Daltec Industries, Euclid-Hitachi, Tuetech & Imperial Tobacco to name a few.

I have to say from what I've read/seen/studied I doubt that any of them [except possibly Guelph?], but especially London resemble Peoria, Illinois (population 113,000/ famous for being 'the average American city' and a reflection of Midwestern culture) in any way? I could be wrong, but......

Any ways - history/geography lesson & rant completed (I feel much better now)

Edited May 5, 2007 by beliveau1

[Pierre the Great]

Was I knocking London? Okay it was back handed complement.

Just when I think of London and the region as a whole I cannot but think of Peoria, Quad Cities, Rockford. Midwestern feel, a city surrounded by farm land. But industrial, life line of the region.

That's what I think when I think of London. City feel in a rural setting. Its great, but its just not for me.

[Dirty Harry]

Wow...somebody sounds a bit bitter.

For the record, Gander NFLD...is home to one of North America's busiest airports. Employs much of the city. Obviously you can't see past the end of your big city nose. I have lived in Montreal and Toronto and that type of attitude is rampant. I finally chose right when i moved to the Maritimes.

Not bitter and not trying to diss these cities too much cuz Im sure they are nice places. Just mocking at how ridiculous the survey is that compares Quebec city to Montreal, Victoria to Vancouver and Gander (10,000 population, cmon!) to Toronto. Comparing a govt town of 100,000 to a multi-million population metropolis is just a garbage study and completely misleading, it is apples and oranges.

Edited May 5, 2007 by Dirty Harry

[Pierre the Great]

To me Canada is the cities and then when you want to get away you have awesome environments and very cool small towns to visit.

[RobRock]

Wow...somebody sounds a bit bitter.

For the record, Gander NFLD...is home to one of North America's busiest airports. Employs much of the city. Obviously you can't see past the end of your big city nose. I have lived in Montreal and Toronto and that type of attitude is rampant. I finally chose right when i moved to the Maritimes.

It's just too bad that it isn't actually a city. The provincial government has never passed any legislation granting Gander a city charter. It has only done that for three cities; St. John's, Corner Brook and Mount Pearl.

[Pierre the Great]

you live in Gander Rob Rock?

[beliveau1]

To me Canada is the cities and then when you want to get away you have awesome environments and very cool small towns to visit.

Call me stupid, but not sure what you mean by this? Please clarify..... :?-

[Captain_Stealth]

It's Moneysense. Vancouver is an expensive place to live therefore why we're so low. That's the only way having Vancouver at 15 makes sense.

[Pierre the Great]

Call me stupid, but not sure what you mean by this? Please clarify..... :?-

Or this Canada has some of the most livable big cities in the world. Toronto, Vancouver, Montreal. Its a mixture of people and different cultures, a mosaic which is very cool. Then the towns in the mountains or the towns in the prairies or in the country side have their own fabric and a different culture in and of itself.

Basically Canada has a billion things to offer. You want small towns with history that go back centuries, Canada has that, you want a big city feel, Canada has that; and if you want to live in a mountain village it has that too.

For me I'm a big city person who likes to get away in the weekends in the mountains. I also like the sea, a walkable city and lots of parks. And I love the rain.

Therefore my place would be the Vancouver area.

Now my parents, they would love PEI or Nova Scotia. More so PEI its like Cape Cod x 10.

Me I'm a mountain person because I'm very very very tall. I need to be in a place that makes me feel like an ant. Plus I like the Pacific Northwest.

Basically as my parents would say, small towns are for where you retire to big cities is where you make yourself. Or as what happened to my mom, leave the small town to make something of yourself and go to the big city.

Small towns will always have this dilemma because there's only so much you can do. Therefore these cool little towns rely on summer homes/winter homes/cottages, tourism.

Because Newfoundland for example for me, looking at a picture of the ruralness of the place makes me want to visit every single town and village. Its an awesome place. But could I live there? unfortunately I couldn't. But I'd love to visit etc.

So as I see this list I see it as a guide for the big city folks to pick a town to vacation in.

Edited May 7, 2007 by Pierre the Great

[beliveau1]

Or this Canada has some of the most livable big cities in the world. Toronto, Vancouver, Montreal. Its a mixture of people and different cultures, a mosaic which is very cool. Then the towns in the mountains or the towns in the prairies or in the country side have their own fabric and a different culture in and of itself.

Basically Canada has a billion things to offer. You want small towns with history that go back centuries, Canada has that, you want a big city feel, Canada has that; and if you want to live in a mountain village it has that too.

For me I'm a big city person who likes to get away in the weekends in the mountains. I also like the sea, a walkable city and lots of parks. And I love the rain.

Therefore my place would be the Vancouver area.

Now my parents, they would love PEI or Nova Scotia. More so PEI its like Cape Cod x 10.

Me I'm a mountain person because I'm very very very tall. I need to be in a place that makes me feel like an ant. Plus I like the Pacific Northwest.

Basically as my parents would say, small towns are for where you retire to big cities is where you make yourself. Or as what happened to my mom, leave the small town to make something of yourself and go to the big city.

Small towns will always have this dilemma because there's only so much you can do. Therefore these cool little towns rely on summer homes/winter homes/cottages, tourism.

Because Newfoundland for example for me, looking at a picture of the ruralness of the place makes me want to visit every single town and village. Its an awesome place. But could I live there? unfortunately I couldn't. But I'd love to visit etc.

So as I see this list I see it as a guide for the big city folks to pick a town to vacation in.

Okay - now I understand what you meant! However being from a small town in northern Ontario before moving to the city - well it's a no brainer for me..... I'm leaving the city for a small town/country destination the moment I get a chance to!!!!!! Now if I only had that 10 million bucks they are talking about in some other thread here

[Pierre the Great]

Okay - now I understand what you meant! However being from a small town in northern Ontario before moving to the city - well it's a no brainer for me..... I'm leaving the city for a small town/country destination the moment I get a chance to!!!!!! Now if I only had that 10 million bucks they are talking about in some other thread here

haha don't we all.

If I had 10 million I'd buy a mountain home some where in the interior BC or in the Sea to Sky highway region as my 'getaway'.

cuz I'm a mountain man. lol

I heard around Pemberton BC they can grow strawberries. Strawberry farm. lol

I have a fondness for both really. I think I mentioned this earlier but I know I've talked about my family farm on this site before. I split my time between city life and farm land. So I've got a little place in my heart for both.

[jetsniper]

haha don't we all.

If I had 10 million I'd buy a mountain home some where in the interior BC or in the Sea to Sky highway region as my 'getaway'.

cuz I'm a mountain man. lol

I heard around Pemberton BC they can grow strawberries. Strawberry farm. lol

I have a fondness for both really. I think I mentioned this earlier but I know I've talked about my family farm on this site before. I split my time between city life and farm land. So I've got a little place in my heart for both.

Shit man, I'd do the same thing. Lakeside cabin on Lake Windemere where I can get to Invemere by boat. Single best place in the world, a lot of Calgarians spend their vacation time in and around there.

[Pierre the Great]

Yeah I know a Vancouverite who now works in Calgary and he spends half his time in Canmore. lol

lol this thread has turned into an I love Canada thread.

But I mean if you like the mountains and that whole mountain life, you can't really beat BC or Alberta.

And I've been to Colorado, the definition of mountains in America. lol

So much exploring I've got to do. British Columbia alone will take years to explore from Peace River region to Tofino. lol

[beliveau1]

haha don't we all.

If I had 10 million I'd buy a mountain home some where in the interior BC or in the Sea to Sky highway region as my 'getaway'.

cuz I'm a mountain man. lol

I heard around Pemberton BC they can grow strawberries. Strawberry farm. lol

I have a fondness for both really. I think I mentioned this earlier but I know I've talked about my family farm on this site before. I split my time between city life and farm land. So I've got a little place in my heart for both.

Wild strawberries were plentiful in the fields around our home in northern Ontario where we lived in the country before moving to town - uuummmmm!!!!! Many a nice summer day that we just sat in the field gorging ourselves on those delicacies in between playing baseball.......

[Pierre the Great]

cool!

I have more of a connection to sweet corn, since well I'm in the corn belt and wheat belt of america. lol

And Soy beans.

Where in Northern Ontario?

[jetsniper]

Actually, I'd attempt to buy this cabin...

And if you look the other way you see...

And random scenery shot standing from the same spot...

Thats my favorite place in the whole freaking world.

[beliveau1]

cool!

I have more of a connection to sweet corn, since well I'm in the corn belt and wheat belt of america. lol

And Soy beans.

Where in Northern Ontario?

The Cobalt/Haileybury/New Liskeard area - known as the Tri-Towns. New Liskeard has amalgamated with Haileybury & Dymond to form the town of Temiskaming Shores. The area is known as 'the Little Claybelt' which is a rich farming area beginning at new Liskeard - some massive dairy farms there and government research for crops is done at the big testing facilities they have there (in conjunction with the University of Guelph if memory serves me right?) My mom worked in the veterinarian lab there for quite a while before she retired.

I grew up about 18 miles south-east of Cobalt along the Montreal River in a Hydro colony - my dad worked at the power plants there for Ontario Hydro until they flooded it out to make a bigger system. The family then moved to the big city of New Liskeard.

Check out Cobalt, Ontario on the web - a truly historic town & the first opponent the Habs ever played(always have to get that one in!)

[Pierre the Great]

Oh cool! looked it up.

The 'historic' part of my town was torn down for a road expansion and then a Lowe's. lovely.

[RobRock]

you live in Gander Rob Rock?

St. John's