What's Vancouver's MSA population? How about Toronto? Montreal?

[Bcasey25raptor]

If Canada measured it's CMA's like the US did, how large would Canada's 3 largest CMA's be.

I think Vancouver would be near 3 million, Toronto would be 8.5 million, and Montreal would be around 4.5 million.

What are your thoughts on this? It's very obvious the US and Canada measure metro areas differently, so knowing this how large would Canada's largest be if measured the same way?

[Chadillaccc]

I'm not so sure about that, due to the fact that Metro Van is boxed in by the ocean to the west and the Abbotsford-Mission Metro area. You are probably thinking of what the Vancouver CSA (combined statistical area) would look like, as it would include the Abbotsford-Mission CMA, the Chilliwack CA, Hope, and up to Squamish as well. Around 2.8 - 2.9 million.

Your Montreal and Toronto ones are probably correct, with a Toronto CSA of around 9.5 million. Calgary, Edmonton, and Ottawa would all be about their present size, except that Foothills and Okotoks would be included in Calgary, increasing the population to about 1.45 million.


Can't even imagine what those CSA's would look like though.

[Bcasey25raptor]

Originally Posted by Chadillaccc

I'm not so sure about that, due to the fact that Metro Van is boxed in by the ocean to the west and the Abbotsford-Mission Metro area. You are probably thinking of what the Vancouver CSA (combined statistical area) would look like, as it would include the Abbotsford-Mission CMA, the Chilliwack CA, Hope, and up to Squamish as well. Around 2.8 - 2.9 million.

Your Montreal and Toronto ones are probably correct, with a Toronto CSA of around 9.5 million. Calgary, Edmonton, and Ottawa would all be about their present size, except that Foothills and Okotoks would be included in Calgary, increasing the population to about 1.45 million.


Can't even imagine what those CSA's would look like though.

Yeah I guess it would be CSA.

Either way, when measuring CSA's it makes Vancouver seem puny even compared with portland.

[Procrastinational]

Originally Posted by Bcasey25raptor

Yeah I guess it would be CSA.

Either way, when measuring CSA's it makes Vancouver seem puny even compared with portland.

I don't know about puny...

Metro Vancouver is larger than Portland's MSA (2.2 million), and if Vancouver were measured using CSA methodology, they would pretty well be the same size (Portland CSA is about 2.9 million).
Makes sense because both Portland and Vancouver city proper are about 600k, and their metro areas are similar in size.

Despite similar sizes, Vancouver IMO feels quite a bit bigger due to being somewhat more dense and having a number of large urban centres (Surrey, Burnaby, Richmond, etc) whereas Portland seems more centralized around the CBD.

edit: I have no idea why people fret about the numbers... it doesn't matter whether a city is measured as 1 million or 1.4 million or whatever, the methodology doesn't change reality. There are plenty of cities around a million in Europe that feel much larger than a comparable city in North America.

[RWin]

Originally Posted by Procrastinational

edit: I have no idea why people fret about the numbers...

I think it's a "New World We Still Have Something To Prove" insecurity.