Historical Methods, 2007

The Canadian Century Research Infrastructure (CCRI) aims to build historical data sets from the 1911-1951 Canadian census manuscripts. To enhance the meaning of the microdata, and to enable users to apprehend the spatial dimension of the phenomena they study, the CCRI integrates as much geographical information as the census can provide and also provides users with resources to map selected data or the results they get. A framework to conduct basic or sophisticated spatial analyses is also provided. The integration of geographical information necessitates the reconstitution of the entire geography of census taking, as well as of census dissemination, through the first half of the twentieth century. The raw material of the census manuscript is organized according to enumeration areas, whereas the basic spatial unit of dissemination is the census subdivision listed in the published aggregate census returns. [Ed. Census bureau terminology (from 1911 to 1951) used census district and census subdistrict for the two basic spatial units for census taking as well as compilation and dissemination. Hereinafter, we will use the present-day terminology—census division and census subdivision—favored by the CCRI and Statistics Canada.] To spatially process and map the microdata as entered and the aggregate data as published, polygon files are being created for nearly 32,000 subdivisions and managed within a geodatabase. The files form the fundamental fabric to which microdata and aggregate data are both linked. The authors address the unexpected challenges that arise from the realities of historical census data and provide an overview of the limitations and the technical framework of the overall geographical component of the CCRI.

1995

This paper, the fourth in a series, summarizes changes in the Canadian settlement system during the 1986-91 census pe1iod. Initially, it develops a periodization of urban and regional development over the postwar period and outlines the contextual factors, both national and international, that are cmTently shaping the urban process in Canada. Drawing on data to describe trends at tlu•ee spatial scales national-provincial, the urban system and the intra-urban scale-the paper demonstrates the continuing evolution of new urban and regional geographies in Canada. The paper concludes with a summary of some of the policy and research challenges that flow from those trends. CONTENTS 1 INTRODUCTION: SETIING THE STAGE 1.1 A Periodization of Urban and Regional Development in Canada 1.2 Objectives and Organization 2 THE CONTEXTUAL DYNAMICS OF URBANIZATION 2.1 The National Economic Context: Business Cycles and Restructuring 2.2 The Demographic Transition 2.3 The Changing Role of the State 2.4 The International Context: Canadian Cities in a Changing Global Context 3 THE NATIONAL AND PROVINCIAL SCENE 3.1 Immigration and Internal Migration 3.2 Migration Patterns: Rural-Urban and Provincial Flows 3.3 National and Provincial Economies 4 THE URBAN SYSTEM 4.1 Defining the System 4.2 Urban Growth, Size and Metropolitan Concentration 4.3 Urban Demographies and Migration 4.4 Metropolitan Economies 4.5 The Toronto Economic Experience 4.6 On the Size of Urban Markets 4.7 New Winners and Losers in the Urban System 4.8 Whither the Canadian City?

Geomatica, 2019

The spatial distribution of population and related density characteristics has a significant impact on urban form; a low-density urban form is typically associated with low efficiency of service delivery, poor connectivity between communities, and a high tendency of urban sprawl, whereas higher density urban form is associated with transit-oriented development, efficient service delivery, and lower overall infrastructure costs. However, an urban area is never a homogenous environment. Depending on the general community designs, natural barriers, and massive functional infrastructures (airports, large parks), the urban population be may spread out evenly or condensed into some disjointed, isolated clusters. Given the context that Canadian cities have typically low population densities, their population distributions are subject to high spatial variabilities. We use geographic information system (GIS) techniques and geostatistical approaches (Getis–Ord [Formula: see text] hot spot ana...

1979

Type5of Government Intervention in Urban Settlement Patterns Redistribution Through the Federal System This map i11dicates the net change in population for each county or census division means of data. Where possible the net change is allocated to specific urhan areas.

The Canadian Geographer/Le G�ographe canadien, 2006

1984

A long-term grant to examine urban change in Canada during the 1970s, awarded jointly to the Centre and INRS (Institut National de la Recherche Scientifique) - Urbanisation, in Montreal by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada, provided the necessary support.

2007

Recent urbanization processes have been dramatically transformed by factors both external and internal to the urban system: increased globalization and economic competition; the realignment of trade and capital flows; demographic transitions, characterized by declining fertility levels and increased immigration; fluctuations in commodity prices; technological innovations; a reduction in the costs of transportation and social interaction; and a continuing redefinition of government policies and trade agreements.

2003

The problem of declining urban centres will become prominent, however, as more and more households find that their jobs, their assets (houses), and the public services they expect are eroded by factors beyond their control. Sixty-four cities lost population between 1996 and 2001. Ten cities lost more than 6.9% of their population – all of them peripheral resource communities – with Prince Rupert, B.C. ( – 12.1%), and Elliot Lake, Ontario ( – 11.8%), leading the way.

Canada is a suburban nation. While a majority of the population now lives statistically in urban environments, that majority for the most part is found in places that are "suburban" in terms of built form or location at the periphery of large urban centres, small towns, or even villages. If we take into account exurban sprawl, there is even more dispersion of habitat. This is not to diminish the trend, at least in some of our urban centres, toward re-urbanization (i.e., the increase in population and density in traditional inner cities). We have all heard stories of walkability, downtown living, creative economies, increased transit use, condominiums and revived cultural scenes in downtowns and adjacent inner city neighbourhoods. This chapter aims to demonstrate that this is only one-side of the story. Most Canadians live in suburban constellations (see Figure 1). Those who move to major urban areas from elsewhere in Canada (rural and remote areas, as well as small towns) and those who arrive from distant shores (the majority of the approximately 250,000 immigrants who arrive each year), also tend to settle directly in suburban and exurban areas found around the country's largest cities. 1 That latter trend, which started in the final decades of the last century, has changed not only the face of our urban peripheries, but also the demographic and cultural composition of Canada overall.

Dela, 2004

Cities, increasingly, are the principal arenas in which global, national and local forces intersect. Canadian cities are no exception. Those cities are currently undergoing a series of profound and irreversible transitions as a result of external forces originating from different sources and operating at different spatial scales. Specifically, this paper argues that Canadian cities are being transformed in a markedly uneven fashion through the intersection of changes in national and regional economies, the continued demographic transition, and shifts in government policy on the one hand, and through increased levels and new sources of immigration, and the globalization of capital and trade flows, on the other hand. These shifts, in turn, are producing new patterns of external dependence, a more fragmented urban system, and continued metropolitan concentration. They are also leading to increased sociocultural differences, with intense cultural diversity in some cities juxtaposed with homogeneity in other cities, and to new sets of urban winners and losers. In effect, these transitions are creating new sources of difference-new divides-among and within the country=s urban centres, augmenting or replacing the traditional divides based on city-size, location in the heartland or periphery, and local economic base.