Quote:
Originally Posted by isaidso
Agree. When comparing Toronto to US MSAs I've stopped using Toronto CMA as it omits 1.2 million people in metros literally across the road from it. I use Greater Toronto - Hamilton which quite closely mirrors Toronto CMA + Hamilton CMA + Oshawa CMA. It had 7,680,502 people in 2019 an increase of 144,566 over the previous year. The Greater Golden Horseshoe is far too spread out to be considered a metro though; it's analogous to the Bay Area.
That said, one may have to revisit whether the GGH is a de facto metropolitan area 20-30 years from now. Things seem to be heading that way. As all those periphery CMAs expand they will start growing into each other. The first to do so will likely be Kichener-Waterloo CMA with Guelph CMA. The GGH is all connected by commuter rail already and those bonds are getting stronger. GO Transit expects its passenger volumes to balloon from 80 million to 200 million in the next 25 years.
Greater Golden Horseshoe
https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/t1/tbl1...pid=1710013501 |
Do you think being farther out and being separated by the greenbelt makes a difference in connectedness to each other in creating a GGH? For instance, as is prominent on the map, Oshawa, Newmarket or Milton, Hamilton and St. Catherines are "inside" the Greenbelt, but say, Barrie, Guelph, KW, or Peterborough are not. You do get the impression the greenbelt does provide some kind of physical as well as psychological barrier but it is breaking down. The feeling of "city/town, then travel through some green space, forest, farms and fields (which aren't going to be developed at least according to plan), then city/town again" kind of makes a bit of separation in the minds of the commuter but then again, cultural, psychological, and economic distance isn't always dependant on physical distance.