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I really don’t know how anyone can ever go to the “city” of Oshawa and believe the CMA isn’t much more restrictive than even an MSA.
Toronto is a significantly larger city than Philly.
Okay, TO has almost twice Philadelphia's population (2.8m vs. 1.575m in 2021*), and only three cities in North America are more populous (Mexico City, New York, LA; Toronto edges out Chicago for the #3 spot).
So a bigger core city in a metro roughly equal to Philadelphia's in population. Toronto is just a little less densely populated than Philadelphia, which in turn is a little less densely populated than Chicago.
I don't get the shade you throw at Oshawa. 171,000 people make for a mid-sized city. Its population density is low because (like Kansas City) its boundaries include a good chunk of undeveloped land; most of those 171,000 residents live in a much smaller area that would be recognizable as a city, albeit a low-rise one.
But I guess the CMA definition is a little more restrictive than the MSA definition, for while Oshawa is in the GTA (along with the rest of the Regional Municipality of Durham, of which it is a part), it's not in the Toronto CMA (which excludes Durham's eastern half) — it's its own CMA.
*Though I wonder how the Census Bureau sampling produced a loss of ~28,000 residents in one year. It doesn't look to me like people are leaving Philadelphia at that fast a clip.
It's funny back in 2012 back when this thread was made I would have Chicago firmly at #1, Philly at #2, then Toronto last. Now its by far Toronto at #1 in most categories, Chicago at a distant #2, then Philly last.
Okay, TO has almost twice Philadelphia's population (2.8m vs. 1.575m in 2021*), and only three cities in North America are more populous (Mexico City, New York, LA; Toronto edges out Chicago for the #3 spot).
So a bigger core city in a metro roughly equal to Philadelphia's in population. Toronto is just a little less densely populated than Philadelphia, which in turn is a little less densely populated than Chicago.
I don't get the shade you throw at Oshawa. 171,000 people make for a mid-sized city. Its population density is low because (like Kansas City) its boundaries include a good chunk of undeveloped land; most of those 171,000 residents live in a much smaller area that would be recognizable as a city, albeit a low-rise one.
But I guess the CMA definition is a little more restrictive than the MSA definition, for while Oshawa is in the GTA (along with the rest of the Regional Municipality of Durham, of which it is a part), it's not in the Toronto CMA (which excludes Durham's eastern half) — it's its own CMA.
*Though I wonder how the Census Bureau sampling produced a loss of ~28,000 residents in one year. It doesn't look to me like people are leaving Philadelphia at that fast a clip.
Yes but places Oshawa are much more like a Norristown or whatever than a Wilmington DE. It’s a city that by American standards is swallowed by “Toronto”. I’d argue Hamilton abd Wilmington have very similar relationships to TO/Philly but one is “part of Philly” and one isn’t part of Toronto because of Government definitions rather than a radically different reality on the ground.
Also with how fast Canada is growing I don’t think Toronto is less dense than either city anymore.
It's funny back in 2012 back when this thread was made I would have Chicago firmly at #1, Philly at #2, then Toronto last. Now its by far Toronto at #1 in most categories, Chicago at a distant #2, then Philly last.
transit (by far, TTC is approaching tier 1 level), safety (by far, both chicago and philly have sky high crime), diversity/integration, economic growth, skyscrapers, urbanity, nightlife (so many chicago spots are getting closed due to constant shootings and crime, toronto doesn't have that problem), better location, more foot traffic, quality of life, shopping, scenery, etc.
Though again, there are things Chicago is better at, and this is due to its more historical legacy status as Toronto is a younger city.
Chicago has better/more attractions, better downtown, better food, better lakefront, more history, better architecture (by far), a better skyline, more cheaper (by far, although there's a reason for that...), etc.
transit (by far, TTC is approaching tier 1 level), safety (by far, both chicago and philly have sky high crime), diversity/integration, economic growth, skyscrapers, urbanity, nightlife (so many chicago spots are getting closed due to constant shootings and crime, toronto doesn't have that problem), better location, more foot traffic, quality of life, shopping, scenery, etc.
Though again, there are things Chicago is better at, and this is due to its more historical legacy status as Toronto is a younger city.
Chicago has better/more attractions, better downtown, better food, better lakefront, more history, better architecture (by far), a better skyline, more cheaper (by far, although there's a reason for that...), etc.
AFA attractions are concerned, I think you may be selling Toronto short there. The Royal Ontario Museum, the Ontario Science Centre, the Hockey Hall of Fame (let's not forget that it's Canada's national sport), the Art Gallery of Ontario, Museum of Contemporary Art and a passel of specialized museums (including the Aga Khan, the first in North American devoted to Islamic civilizations), great shopping on Bloor Street West, the Church-Wellesley Gayborhood (all three of the cities being discussed here mark their gayborhoods with some form of public signage; San Francisco is the only other city in either country that does), the annual Canadian National Exhibition in the fall, and so on.
And note that I haven't touched the CN Tower yet.
That tower is a giant exclamation point that puts Toronto's less substantial skyline almost on par with Chicago's, IMO. And from what I hear of the pace of construction there, Toronto's skyline will continue to bulk up. Toronto's come quite a long way since 1965, when its city hall was designed with two towers of differing heights because they were the two tallest buildings in the city.
I'd definitely give Chicago the nod for both food and its lakefront over Toronto. But Philadelphia also has an outstanding food and dining scene as well as signature sandwiches (Chicago hot dog vs. cheesesteak; Italian beef vs. roast port Italian). And Philly owns the history category. And while no one can truly say they understand American architecture without knowing (or visiting) Chicago, Philly is another city that has a strong architectural history (and the most famous architect to come out of Chicago cited Philadelphia's most original 19th-century architect as one of the most important American architects).
Put another way, I think that you could make a case for Toronto resembling both Chicago and Philadelphia, maybe in equal measure but in different areas.
And I'd qubble with your statement that metro Toronto has a population of 10 million.
That figure is the population of the entire Greater Golden Horseshoe, Canada's largest urban region, which rings the western end of Lake Ontario and touches Lake Erie at its western end. This includes the separate metropolitan areas of Hamilton and Fort Erie.
This would be akin to combining the Philadelphia and New York MSAs into one single metropolis. Or more accurately, it's akin to what the U.S. Office of Management and Budget calls a "combined statistical area,", which is an agglomeration of two or more MSAs and µSAs ("micropolitan statistical areas"; the Canadian counterpart is the "census agglomeration"). Canada has no CSA equivalent.
Since I haven't familiarized myself on how Statistics Canada defines census metropolitan areas vs. the OMB's criteria for defining metropolitan statistical areas (which is based on commuting percentages), I can't say whether the Toronto CMA would or would not be bigger using the US criteria. What I can say is this: The Ontario provincial government also defines a territory it calls the Greater Toronto Area, which includes the three regional municipalities bordering the City of Toronto (Municipality of Metropolitan Toronto, 1954-1998) and the regional municipality of Halton further west. The GTA covers a bit more territory than the Toronto CMA. Its population as of the 2021 census was 6,711,985 — about half a million more than the 6,228,701 people the Census Bureau estimated lived in the Philadelphia MSA that same year.
Still, that's closer to the population of Greater Philadelphia than it is to the population of Chicagoland.
And the Toronto CMA, which includes some communities not in the GTA but also omits some that are, has a population nearly identical to that of the Philadelphia MSA: 6,202,225.
However, the Greater Golden Horseshoe is a good bit larger than the Philadelphia-Reading-Camden CSA, whose 2021 estimated population was 7,366,346.
I don't know how anyone could ignore the pretty striking paralells between Philadelphia and Toronto's metro areas because they match up in multiple configurations (GTA, CMA, GTA/Hamilton, Golden Horseshoe and Philly MSA, Philly UA, and Delaware Valley).
Just because CMA to MSA might not be an exact translation doesn't mean its logical to crank the number as high as you can get it to facilitate a Chicago comparison.
So like you've pointed out, you can go through an entire range of measurements-Toronto CMA, GTA, GTA and Hamilton, Golden Horseshoe....and find a Philadelphia match for each one.
The only way to get to Chicago is by way of the "Greater Golden Horseshoe" which adds 2 million to the Golden Horseshoe and Statistics Canada says is the largest urban area in Canada with 9.7 million.
The area of that is over 12,000 square miles, while the Philly MSA is 4600 square miles, Delaware Valley is 5100 square miles, and Chicago's MSA is 7200 square miles.
TL/DR-
It makes way more sense to compare the GTA with metro Philly or the Golden Horseshoe with the Delaware Valley than Chicagoland.
You've got multiple data points that line up nearly perfectly for Philly/Toronto, but people are upset because they think a city as large as Toronto just has to have a 10 million metro area.
transit (by far, TTC is approaching tier 1 level), safety (by far, both chicago and philly have sky high crime), diversity/integration, economic growth, skyscrapers, urbanity, nightlife (so many chicago spots are getting closed due to constant shootings and crime, toronto doesn't have that problem), better location, more foot traffic, quality of life, shopping, scenery, etc.
Though again, there are things Chicago is better at, and this is due to its more historical legacy status as Toronto is a younger city.
Chicago has better/more attractions, better downtown, better food, better lakefront, more history, better architecture (by far), a better skyline, more cheaper (by far, although there's a reason for that...), etc.
No - that's not why things are closing. This is present in all major cities post-COVID. However, Chicago nightlife is still going strong as always based on recent visits in the summer.
transit (by far, TTC is approaching tier 1 level), safety (by far, both chicago and philly have sky high crime), diversity/integration, economic growth, skyscrapers, urbanity, nightlife (so many chicago spots are getting closed due to constant shootings and crime, toronto doesn't have that problem), better location, more foot traffic, quality of life, shopping, scenery, etc.
Do you live in Toronto? Chicago has far more train stations.
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Chicago has far more train stations.
