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America is a car culture. Infrastructure and communities were build with that in mind. When more people have a vehicle, then they can live a little further from their job/shopping/healthcare/school/etc... That encouraged the housing developments, strip malls, drive thrus, and beltways we have today. It's an unfortunate reality for those that want denser housing, mass transit, and 15 minute cities. However, the culture of the US is not likely to change. Cars grant individuals with freedom of movement, independence, and a sense of ownership of something. They might be an expensive mode of transpiration, but most Americans like that!
And that is why American suburbs are unique.
I was in Europe this summer, and I enjoyed the walkability of most places I went to. But I also enjoy my Subaru, and having the liberty to get in it and drive to the mountains if I want! Or stop at Buccee's when I drive in the south.
The USA suburbanization is really unique. Other countries are kinda similar, especially Canada, and also Australia and New Zealand. But in these countries the suburbs are a bit denser overall, I suppose. In some american suburbs the density is extremely low, with bigger houses and a larger distance between neighbours when comparing with these other countries.
I think the reason for why suburbs in Canada are bit more dense than US suburbs is so many town homes and high rise apartments that seem to be unique to Canada. I’m not sure but I think in the 50s and 60s Canada started to build lot of high rise apartments in a park like setting close to mall that is unique to Canada.
Think of Toronto suburb the Don mills area or Jane and finch area suburbs by a park, trails, trees, shopping and you got a high rise apartments as examples is unique to Canada. Also the high rise apartments in towns, small cities and medium cities.
The US style 2 to 6 story apartments never caught on in Canada for some reason. They built some in the 40s and 50s but it was very small and never caught on like the high rise apartments did.
In the case of Brazil, living in detached houses is far from uncommon. There are some geographical limitations because of the country's topography, as well as socio-economic limitations that make people build smaller houses in smaller lots, sometimes two or three houses in the same lot. So suburbs usually are associated with poverty here. But there are parts of the country where people have a better financial situation and the cost of living is decently affordable, so the suburbs are better (still much more dense than USA).
I’m not sure how much of Brazil is rain forest or how much flat land they have. But does Brazil not have mountains. If you look at the US they could just have lot more nice land compared to Brazil.
I think the reason for why suburbs in Canada are bit more dense than US suburbs is so many town homes and high rise apartments that seem to be unique to Canada. I’m not sure but I think in the 50s and 60s Canada started to build lot of high rise apartments in a park like setting close to mall that is unique to Canada.
Think of Toronto suburb the Don mills area or Jane and finch area suburbs by a park, trails, trees, shopping and you got a high rise apartments as examples is unique to Canada. Also the high rise apartments in towns, small cities and medium cities.
The US style 2 to 6 story apartments never caught on in Canada for some reason. They built some in the 40s and 50s but it was very small and never caught on like the high rise apartments did.
I think it has to do with climate. 65% of Canada has snow cover for six months per year. Some Canada regions have as much as 131 inches of snow on average per year. It's like a nine story building of snow.
A lower density of single family homes or 2 story apartments means more roadway between homes/apartment. With Canada's fierce winters, the issue of plowing and the second issue of finding places to pile up the snow is a serious problem. Keeping sidewalks free of snow and ice is different. It makes sense for Canadians to live in high rise apartments close to a mall.
I think it has to do with climate. 65% of Canada has snow cover for six months per year. Some Canada regions have as much as 131 inches of snow on average per year. It's like a nine story building of snow.
A lower density of single family homes or 2 story apartments means more roadway between homes/apartment. With Canada's fierce winters, the issue of plowing and the second issue of finding places to pile up the snow is a serious problem. Keeping sidewalks free of snow and ice is different. It makes sense for Canadians to live in high rise apartments close to a mall.
In theory this seems possible but in practice I don't really think so. Factor in that 90 percent of the Canadian population lives within 200 miles of the U.S. Toronto and southern Ontario as a whole accounts for almost 1/4 the Canadian population alone and is further south than Minneapolis and only a few degrees of latitude north of Detroit and Chicago. Most of Southern Ontario if you go due east or due west you'll land in the U.S and not Canada. There really isn't a massive difference in the weather Canadians on a whole experience as do Americans living on border states with Canada. Snow levels in Toronto or even Montreal are certainly not much heavier than Boston, NYC, Chicago etc.
Southern B.C namely Vancouver and Victoria also have a pretty strong population with YVR being the third largest city and its weather is generally better than Chicago, NYC and Bos - lots of year round clouds but it is typically warmer than those places and doesn't get much snow.
I think the biggest reason for Canadian cities being more highrise in nature is growth that was very heavy very quickly from the late 50's onwards. Couple that with cities that weren't designed around a massive interstate system and I think these are stronger reasons why your typical Canadian large city and metro is more compact and dense than U.S cities. You also see this in Transit utilization where Canadians are far more likely to use PT than Americans. The data supports this.
It isn't that Canada isn't a car centric society - by and large I think it is just less so than the U.S. It skews a bit more over to Europe than the U.S, but the two are still more similar to one another than other places.
I think it has to do with climate. 65% of Canada has snow cover for six months per year. Some Canada regions have as much as 131 inches of snow on average per year. It's like a nine story building of snow.
A lower density of single family homes or 2 story apartments means more roadway between homes/apartment. With Canada's fierce winters, the issue of plowing and the second issue of finding places to pile up the snow is a serious problem. Keeping sidewalks free of snow and ice is different. It makes sense for Canadians to live in high rise apartments close to a mall.
The high rise apartments was a eastern soviet block thing and places like east Asia. I also hear in places like France and the UK has high rise apartments but less so than the eastern soviet block and Asia.
The 2 to 6 story apartments just never caught on in Canada. The use of apartments in Canada was always more low income, single people and people who just came from other countries, and poor people like the US well the middle class owning home. If you are just starting of you more likely to be in apartment than later on get house.
It just now with cost living so high that you starting to see more middle class in apartments now.
But the use of apartments was always easy fix by the government for low income and single people. As to why 2 to 6 story apartments just never caught on in Canada I don’t know why. May be city planners look at the UK or Europe than the US at the time and that just got ingrain into culture that a apartment is high rise.
I also see the US calling duplexes and townhouses apartments where apartments in Canada seem high rise where the dictionary view in Canada is apartments mean high rise not some thing 2 to 6 story building. Where the use had different dictionary view of what a apartment means.
I’m sure land value cost in the 50s and 60s was very cheap in Canada and sprawl was not issue at the time so it seems some thing else going on at time. The only think I can think of is city planners in Canada look to the UK or Europe not the US at the time.
I think the biggest reason for Canadian cities being more highrise in nature is growth that was very heavy very quickly from the late 50's onwards. Couple that with cities that weren't designed around a massive interstate system and I think these are stronger reasons why your typical Canadian large city and metro is more compact and dense than U.S cities. You also see this in Transit utilization where Canadians are far more likely to use PT than Americans. The data supports this.
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Are you saying US cities are not growing at the rate has cities in Canada? Canada seems to stick the poor in little pocket areas in high density areas where as the US poor is stuck in ghetto areas with lower density more spread out.
I’m not sure how much of Brazil is rain forest or how much flat land they have. But does Brazil not have mountains. If you look at the US they could just have lot more nice land compared to Brazil.
The northwestern 1/3 of the country's territory is the Amazon rainforest, where it's mostly flat. The country is hilly overall, especially near the east coast where most of the population lives.
The northwestern 1/3 of the country's territory is the Amazon rainforest, where it's mostly flat. The country is hilly overall, especially near the east coast where most of the population lives.
That would explain why cities are super dense and lots of high rise apartments with northwestern 1/3 of the country's territory is the Amazon rainforest and east is mostly mountains. And cities built by the mountains with very little land to sprawl out to unlike the US.
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