1. 14
Canada: Smart Cities,
tough choices
Canadian cities are regularly cited in various global “smart
city” indices. Yet a growing number of complex social and
environmental ills have been left largely unaddressed over the
past 3 decades. The new Federal Government, led by Prime
Minister Justin Trudeau, is seeking to tackle these, and has set
itself some very ambitious targets. Success will depend not only
on the amount of money spent, but on how choices are made.
Words: John Hogan, Independent Consultant based in Toronto, Canada. / Photos: The author and pixabay.com
“
Brand Canada” has for decades been
defined by its millions of lakes, towering
Rockies, forbidding north and quaint
coastal communities. And for good
reason, as its first settlements were first
established by its Aboriginal peoples
nestled into geography to facilitate trade, protection
and travel. European colonisation relied heavily
upon these networks to establish its first towns and
cities in the East, which stretched westwards with the
arrival of the locomotive in the late 1800s. Montreal,
Toronto, Winnipeg, Calgary and Vancouver have
beentransformedfromtheirfur-tradingpast,evidence
to this is Toronto making an appearance in Star Trek
featuring Viljo Revell‘s city hall design known as
Nathan Phillips Square, or Moshe Safdie Habitat
model community in Montreal build for Expo ‘67.
These otherworldly spans of concrete were juxtapo-
sed against the sidewalk thinking of Jane Jacob who
made Toronto her home for 35 years. She reminded
technicians and politicians alike of the inherent com-
plexity of cities and their need for bottom-up design
and mixed-use neighbourhoods to realize safer, more
desirable and economically prosperous nations. Her
influence is readily apparent in neighbourhoods like
the celebrated St-Lawrence Market which in the early
70’s was a brownfield site carpeted with parking lots
and car dealerships, transformed today into thriving
a neighbourhood with integrated social and market-
based housing, businesses, restaurants, entertainment
venues, transportation hubs and park space.
Unfortunately, many of these valuable lessons have
been lost. Despite Toronto and Vancouver leading
North America high-rise construction for close to a
decade, housing continues to become more unaffor-
dable. Many also question the value of what is being
built. All too often new developments do not focus
enough on what will take-place at the street-level
where life occurs. Without affordable spaces for en-
trepreneurs, artists and social enterprises there is no
diversity and the neighbourhood is starved of vital life
force. Despite being located in relatively central lo-
cations, no one except for its residents have a reason
to venture in. They are in effect re-creating suburbs.
While they may be vertical, they are equally burdened
by the ensuing higher costs and inefficiencies associa-
ted with their older siblings that have been the bane of
cities around the world.
Its vast wilderness may shape Canadian identity, but
with more than 80% of Canadians living in urban
areas, cities are increasing defining its destiny. Yet
despite their importance, many are surprised to learn
that Canada does not have a national urban policy.
This is as a result of Canada’s approach to federalism
in which Towns and Cities are governed by its 10 pro-
vinces and three territories. Previous governments
have been loath to be seen as “interfering” and have
left cities to govern themselves within a hodgepodge
of often conflicting provincial standards and norms.
Not surprisingly this lack of strategic integration has
THE REALITY IS THAT
MANY POLITICIANS
ARE ILL EQUIPPED
TO TACKLE THE
COMPLEX REALITIES
FACING TODAY

2. 15
not worked very well, particularly as cities lack the
funds necessary to cover more than basic 20th cen-
tury core services (roads, waste, water, parks and
recreation), leaving out critical areas such as 21st
century concerns, including: social services, housing,
mass transit, transportation and a whole host of eco-
nomic innovation initiatives. This is understandable
with property taxes making-up only 10 per cent of
the total tax bill for a resident while the other 90 per
cent are being sent to provincial and national gover-
nments. The current crisis in housing affordability is
one example, with alumni of the St-Lawrence Neigh-
bourhood regeneration admitting that it would never
have happened without the involvement of the natio-
nal government to fund key aspects of the vision.
Yet another is on the environmental front. Canada in
previous years has the dubious distinction of having
won the Fossil of the Day, Fossil of the Year, and
the Lifetime Unachievement Fossil Award from the
Climate Action Network, an NGO involving some
110 countries working to promote action on climate
change.And it has been well deserved, if one looks at
Canada’s annual per capita production-based Green
House Gas (GHG) emissions have been 22.65 tonnes
of carbon dioxide, among the highest in the world and
a 26 per cent increase since 1990, rather than the 6
per cent reduction which had been agreed to in the
Kyoto protocol. Yet behind this stark national figure
is an enormous range of GHG emissions attributed
to cities & neighbourhood levels. Cities are undenia-
bly the most effective level in which a whole host of
policy instruments can be deployed to limited GHG
emissions, but a national framework is required to
actively measure these and assess their impact when
making infrastructure, economic and urban planning
decisions.
Against this backdrop, what are some of the Smart
City initiatives that are being be brought to bear to
create more sustainable, equitable and prosperous ci-
ties in Canada?
Networks – Partnerships – Impact
Many Canadian cities have been quick to recognize
that digital and big data that are shaping how they
evolve and public services are used. Toronto’s Open
Data initiative currently involves 222 data sets and
being used by over 70 applications created by inde-
pendent developers. Indeed many of the world’s lar-
gest tech giants —IBM, Cisco, Siemens are spending
millions of dollars promoting smart city technology
BACKDROP: CANADA DOES
NOT HAVE A NATIONAL
URBAN POLICY AND HOUSING
CONTINUES TO BECOME
MORE UNAFFORDABLE

3. 16
across Canada. Why is this? While they may be loath
to admit it, the reality is that many politicians are ill
equipped to tackle the complex realities facing today,
particularly when they insist on viewing any proposal
through exclusive tax reduction or union preserva-
tion lenses. Without a doubt, big data and smart te-
chnologies allow us unparalleled insight into what is
happening, but Rob Ford stands as a stark reminder
that many do not want to look. During his era, one
of his many pet peeves was bicycle lanes which he
perceived as a “war on car drivers”. He was in good
company with a majority of Torontonians agree-
ing with him. But slowly but surely bike lanes have
been slowing expanding across Toronto and with this
has been a dramatic shift in public attitudes. Maybe
roads are like houses, with “fences” making for better
neighbours? Cities need strong leaders to make this
work, but there is no substitute to real life experience.
Part of being smart, agile and nimble, requires all le-
vels of government being able to show us what works
at the street level. When in doubt, pilot, pilot, pilot it
would seem.
So not every problem can be solved by an app, real
construction is required. A perennial problem facing
many of Toronto’s older neighbourhoods, internet
speeds are limited to legacy copper phone cables,
creating nightly digital gridlock as Netflix uses go on-
line. For the fortunate people live and work in one of
Toronto’s fastest growing neighbourhoods thanks to
a new partnership with Waterfront Toronto, a public
organization all three spheres of government, builders
-chosenonthebasisoftheirdesignandenvironmental
credentials- and two-tech firms: Beanfield a fiber-only
internet provider and IBM. Through this commercial
initiative, this rapidly growing neighbourhood is
being wired with residences having access to an as-
ynchronous 1 GB service on an open-access basis.
Waterfront Toronto is quick to emphasise that this
smart city initiative is much more than a stress-free in-
ternet streaming initiative.At its heart will be a 33,000
sq.mt innovation centre targeting the creative indus-
tries that will require a state-of the–art network for
data-intensive applications. The scope of this ambi-
tious revitalization project is targeting 110,000 mixed
income residential units and room for roughly 40,000
employees, with the right kind of infrastructure built
as a prerequisite, not as an afterthought.
Certainly Waterfront Toronto and the St Lawrence
neighbourhood hold many important lessons for the
Federal Liberal government as they move to launch a
National Housing Strategy, implement a $60 Billion
dollar Infrastructure Programme that lowers gre-
enhouse gases, and commits $2.6 million dollars to
countries around the world to mitigate and adapt to
climate change. Smart technologies and high-powe-
red simulation models may not be able to interpret
our individual often contradictory beliefs, hopes and
anxieties but we have, can and must build better ci-
ties. We live in era where unprecedented technologies
hold the promise of making smarter decisions. The
challenge before us all is to ask the right question and
be willing to listen and understand the answer.
WITH MORE THAN
80% OF CANADIANS
LIVING IN URBAN
AREAS, CITIES
ARE INCREASING
DEFINING ITS DESTINY