Nordic countries vs Canada (live, nightlife, public transportation)

[ABQConvict]

The comparison is absurdly unbalanced.

Like saying, would you rather have you absolute favorite food, every meal, for the rest of your life, or anything else you can imagine, but not your favorite.

I prefer using the word Scandinavia for the Nordic countries, so I am just going to use that word.

Scandinavia at most includes 5 countries, so it is a collective amount of 5 countries vs. 1 country with Canada. It is a bit different from the other thread topic in Canada vs. Sweden that uses only 1 Scandinavian country.

Both Scandinavia and Canada have a high quality of life, with plenty to enjoy and worthwhile places to get to know and explore.

It is overall a tie for me with Scandinavia vs. Canada.

However, Sweden, Denmark, and Norway I like much more than Finland. Iceland is in between. Finland to me just seems not as interesting, magnificent, and inspiring as the other Scandinavian countries, but my opinions could change for Finland.

Despite the horrible subpolar oceanic climate, I still like aspects about Iceland but a tiny bit less than Sweden/Denmark/Norway.


Some further opinions/impressions of mine in the criteria:

Scenery: Overall a tie. The best scenery for me in Scandinavia that I know of is Stockholm, Copenhagen, Norway’s coastal mountainous fjords, Iceland’s coastal+inland mountains and fjords, all of the lush forests and lakes in Sweden, Bergen, Oslo, Alesund, Reykjavik, and Gothenburg.

The best scenery for me in Canada is Vancouver, Montreal, Canadian Rockies, Canadian Cascades, Vancouver island’s mountain range, Whistler, Banff, Tofino, and Toronto.

I included both nature and urban scenery.

Quality of life: Another tie with a very high quality of life in both regions.

Nightlife: Another tie. Stockholm/Copenhagen/Reykjavik/Gothenburg/Bergen appears to equal Montreal/Toronto/Vancouver for nightlife excitement and vibrancy.


Cities: Canada wins by a tiny bit. Scandinavian cities are nice, but Canada offers more variation while still having some of the qualities of Scandinavian cities.


Public Transportation: Tie. Montreal and Stockholm subway systems actually seem nicer, more relaxing, and more pleasant to me than NYC’s subway system, even if smaller.

I don’t know as much about Copenhagen, Oslo, and Toronto’s public transportation, so I wont comment for that.

Vancouver is recently developing an impressive, ultra-modern, mostly above ground light rail system called the SkyTrain. It is good if they continue to expand that system in the most effective areas of the Vancouver area.

History: Scandinavia’s history is more extensive, and impressive. However, Canadian history is not bad.

Winter activities: There is a lot of activities that can be done in both the summer, winter, autumn, and spring, that are year round type of activities.

For the activities that can only be done in the winter, Scandinavia and Canada are both equally good for that, similar to year round activities.


Other?: For the miscellaneous/other category, it has to be mentioned that Scandinavia has a much better music scene than Canada, at least for musicians from there, with phenomenal, deep, and impressive music.

Also, most of Scandinavia has very close proximity to most of Europe, and at least 20 other countries in Europe with a wide variation of places to see in such close distance. Canada has very close proximity to the USA, but that is it.

As someone from the USA, I like that Scandinavia seems more foreign/exotic/less familiar to me than Canada.

[Grim Reader]

Originally Posted by

Scandinavia at most includes 5 countries, so it is a collective amount of 5 countries vs. 1 country with Canada.

"Scandinavia" is defined as the three Nordic countries which share the same system of government, constitutional monarchy, and have mutually intelligible languages. Norway, Sweden and Denmark. The term you are looking for is the "Nordic countries" which also include Iceland and Finland.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by

Nightlife: Another tie. Stockholm/Copenhagen/Reykjavik/Gothenburg/Bergen appears to equal Montreal/Toronto/Vancouver for nightlife excitement and vibrancy.

.

Not trying to attack you but do you really think that?

Stockholm, the largest city in the region, is much smaller than Montreal or Toronto, and smaller than Vancouver even. Reykjavik and Bergen are barely larger than Sudbury, Ontario* I think.

I know population is not always a true indicator of vibrancy and that certain cities punch above their weight, but still...

EDIT: *OK, maybe not Sudbury but they are smaller than Halifax.

Originally Posted by Grim Reader

"Scandinavia" is defined as the three Nordic countries which share the same system of government, constitutional monarchy, and have mutually intelligible languages. Norway, Sweden and Denmark. The term you are looking for is the "Nordic countries" which also include Iceland and Finland.

The definition is mostly the same for places that encompasses Scandinavia, and Nordic countries, so it is synonymous with almost no difference in association.

Sometimes the strictest definition for Scandinavia/Nordic includes Sweden, Norway, and Denmark. However, usually the less strict definition also includes Iceland and Finland.

The term “Scandinavia” just sounds better to me than using the word “Nordic.”

Originally Posted by Acajack

Not trying to attack you but do you really think that?

Stockholm, the largest city in the region, is much smaller than Montreal or Toronto, and smaller than Vancouver even. Reykjavik and Bergen are barely larger than Sudbury, Ontario* I think.

I know population is not always a true indicator of vibrancy and that certain cities punch above their weight, but still...

EDIT: *OK, maybe not Sudbury but they are smaller than Halifax.

Ok, but you certainly could have different wording for that first sentence.

Also, I wrote a nice long post with plenty of specific details, so I don’t know why you decided to focus on the tiny part of the post you did not agree with because you probably still agreed with 90% of the rest of the post.

Population size is not always an indicator for what a city is like, so you should know some Scandinavian cities feel big for their size, especially Stockholm and Copenhagen.

Stureplan in Stockholm and some of the nightlife districts of Copenhagen are prominent high quality centralized nightlife districts over there, and probably do equal Canada’s best nightlife areas, and that is also most likely true for all of Scandinavia vs. Canada for nightlife.

For Canada, it appears Montreal has the best nightlife, at least during the summer. I visited Montreal 3 times in 3 different years and enjoyed how the nightlife felt easygoing, relaxing, centralized, and easy to figure out the best nightlife places there. Then again, that is coming from the perspective of being a tourist there.

I don’t think Vancouver’s nightlife is that bad, but it is definitely a bit weak compared to Montreal, Vancouver can easily try to improve that.

Either way, I still love Vancouver despite the weather there, and high cost of living. I visited Vancouver once before, and enjoy the idea of visiting again. I had plans to go to UBC in Vancouver for college, but had to change those plans. I also enjoy Montreal.

Toronto gets mixed reviews from plenty of people for all sorts of topics and categories. A lot of people view Montreal and Vancouver having more of an impressive wow factor overall compared to Toronto and more visually interesting. I like Montreal and Vancouver more than Toronto.

That is similar to how a lot of people view Copenhagen/Stockholm vs. Oslo with Montreal/Vancouver vs. Toronto.

Toronto certainly has some nice things about it, but it appears a bit disappointing in some ways.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by

Ok, but you certainly could have different wording for that first sentence..

If that came across badly that is the exact opposite of what I intended to say. Sorry.

Originally Posted by

Also, I wrote a nice long post with plenty of specific details, so I don’t know why you decided to focus on the tiny part of the post you did not agree with because you probably still agreed with 90% of the rest of the post.

Population size is not always an indicator for what a city is like, so you should know some Scandinavian cities feel big for their size, especially Stockholm and Copenhagen.

Stureplan in Stockholm and some of the nightlife districts of Copenhagen are prominent high quality centralized nightlife districts over there, and probably do equal Canada’s best nightlife areas, and that is also most likely true for all of Scandinavia vs. Canada for nightlife..

I would agree that population size is not always the number one determining factor. It's just that seeing Reykjavik and Bergen thrown in there with Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver probably threw me off.

Places like Calgary, Edmonton, Ottawa (all in the 1.2 million range) and also Quebec City (750k) and Halifax (400k) probably hold their own nightlife-wise as well when compared to a lot of the Scandinavian cities.

Originally Posted by Acajack

If that came across badly that is the exact opposite of what I intended to say. Sorry.

Ok, I understand now. No worries.

I would agree that population size is not always the number one determining factor. It's just that seeing Reykjavik and Bergen thrown in there with Montreal, Toronto and Vancouver probably threw me off.

Places like Calgary, Edmonton, Ottawa (all in the 1.2 million range) and also Quebec City (750k) and Halifax (400k) probably hold their own nightlife-wise as well when compared to a lot of the Scandinavian cities.

I can see how that would happen.

I was referring to that when comparing all of Canada vs. Scandinavia, and just including a collective amount of cities in each region, so a separate association.

Montreal/Vancouver/Toronto appear to equal Copenhagen/Stockholm.

However, of course Bergen, Reykjavik, Gothenburg do not equal Montreal, Vancouver, Toronto, even if they are good for their population size.

For Calgary, Edmonton, Ottawa, and Quebec City, I don’t know as much about them to have included them for nightlife. A lot of people make it sound like their nightlife is similar to Oslo, if it had to be compared to at least 1 place in Scandinavia, with being mixed but not that good for their population size.

[Dan321]

Originally Posted by BIMBAM

History: Nordics. Canada, despite what some may think, is not so much lacking in this department, especially east of Ottawa, but the Nordics have been a major civilization for a thousand years so they've got us beat.
Scenery: Nordics are pretty, but I'm going with Canada on this one. Just by the sheer amount of geography the country's got, you end up with more amazing natural sights.
Cities: Canada. Nordic cities are nice, but they're tiny. If the Stockholm metropolitan area were in Canada it'd only be the fourth largest city, and it'd have three other cities nipping at it's heels population wise. Canadian cities are big, vibrant, and have just a ton going on. Montreal, Toronto, and Vancouver have more going for them then the Nordic cities do (although Vancouver can sometimes sacrifice urban fun by concentrating too hard on its natural beauty).
Quality of life: tough to say, they're both good. Probably the Nordics?
Public Transportation: It actually tends to be pretty robust in Canada's big cities! But at the smaller cities and towns level it's not very good, and we have a history of autocentricity and less old urban development, so the Nordics is better on the whole.
Winter activities: same.
Nightlife: a regional thing. The Nordics would beat the Canadian West, but Southern Ontario and Quebec would hold their own
Location: Nordics. Much of Canada is really isolated and we're only near one other country, while the nodrics are a short plane ride from the rest of Europe, North Africa, Turkey etc.

On the whole, I'm torn! If the Nordics had the population of Canada, they'd win, but since Canada is much bigger and also more populous it has more stuff to pick from.

Hello. It was nice comments made by you. I agree with you about the most, but in terms of "City", no. The Scandinavian Cities such as Stockholm, Gothenburg (Göteborg), Malmo (Malmö), Copenhagen (Köpenhamn) and Oslo, are smaller than big Canadian Cities in terms of Population and the area size, but they include much more in terms of infra structure and public transport, They are better in Services such as hospital, libraries, government offices. There are much more efficient, and they have much more but intense. Of course your opinion is respected. I lived for 15, 16 years in Sweden and now I have been living in Toronto for 9 years. Quality of life is definitly better in Scandinavian Countries and also Finland. I have no idea about Iceland and I don't think Iceland has much to offer compare to Canada. Public Transportation even in Canada's big cities cannot beat the one in Scandinavian at all.
I have the same opinion as yours related the other points, History, Scenery and night life. Culturally you have more home feeling in Canada as an immigrant.

[theurbanfiles]

Originally Posted by iNviNciBL3

Which of the two would you prefer to live and why?

Nordic countries: Iceland, Norway, Sweden, Denmark and Finland vs The Great White North! (Canada)

Criteria

History
Scenery
Cities
Quality of Life
Public Transportation
Winter Activities
Nightlife
Other?

History: Nordics
Scenery: Not sure there's anything in Canada that quite matches the Norwegian Fjords, or Iceland if we are counting it. That said, Canada has a wider diversity of scenery and more scenic spaces overall.
Cities: Even, maybe slight lean Canada but quite close
Quality of Life: Nordics
Public Transportation: Nordics
Winter Activities: Depends on which. In terms of winter themed activities Nordics, in terms of winter sports/etc., Canada more consistent.
Nightlife: Canada probably