From 'car-dependent hellscapes' to green cities, Canadians find new ways to fight climate change

Canadians pondering their household finances know that there are always more ideas about how to spend money than there is money to spend. 

That universal economic principle was conspicuous at COP27, the latest version of the United Nations conference on climate change that went into overtime this weekend in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt. A long list of competing demands for that cash included compensation for climate damage, biodiversity loss and winding down the use of fossil fuels.

As governments at all levels consider the wisest use of tax revenue to avert a global climate catastrophe, there is growing evidence that urban development — that is, how Canada builds out its cities to accommodate an expanding population — is the cornerstone of long-term climate policy.

And while disheartened critics worry that car-centric urban sprawl still underway cannot be stopped, there are new glimmers of hope as a growing wave of low-carbon, high-density, tax-efficient, people-friendly city-building shows signs of spreading.

"If we care about climate change, we need to make it easier to walk, cycle or use public transit. Period," said Jason Slaughter, a vigorous critic of automobile-centric urban development, who grew up in suburban London, Ont. Until he got a driver's licence at the age of 16, he said, he was trapped in what he calls a "car-dependent hellscape."

Our conversation was by email, partly because Slaughter's YouTube channel Not Just Bikes, a wry and sometimes hilarious collection of sophisticated videos about urban design that has received millions of views keeps him busy, but also because he's in a different time zone. A famous Canadian export, he is a refugee from Canadian urban sprawl.

"I fundamentally do not believe that Canadian cities will materially change within my lifetime, which is exactly why we gave up on Canada," said Slaughter in our exchange last week. "That's literally why our family left Canada to live in the Netherlands, permanently."

The shock value of that despairing comment is typical, but it is belied by his opus that includes hits like Why I Hate Houston, an attack on the widening of Wonderland Road in his hometown ("Fake London" as he describes it for his international audience) and what some considered an unfair critique of Mississauga, Ontario's half-billion-dollar BRT system.

While written and delivered in a droll, contemptuous style, Slaughter's well-researched and well-produced videos, often in association with the U.S. non-profit Strong Towns, provide an accessible lesson in what's not working in North American cities and, using his current home in the Netherlands as a counter-example, how North American cities need to change.

And while the task of turning the Titanic that is the current development model is enormous, there are signs that the seed Slaughter and others have planted is beginning to take root. That's especially true in Canada's biggest cities, simply as a matter of necessity, said David Gordon, a specialist in urban planning at Queen's University in Kingston, Ont.

"You cannot build a big city out of single detached houses with everybody driving," said Gordon on the phone last week as the COP27 conference was winding up.

He said that the urban centres of Vancouver, Montreal and Toronto have done a much better job than U.S. cities, where government funding structures have created downtown "inner city" blight that is unfamiliar in Canada's vibrant and pricey urban cores.

For about 60 years Canadians have imagined the perfect Leave it to Beaver lifestyle as "a detached house where you can drive everywhere on uncongested streets," said Gordon, but like a giant game of Tetris containing too many squares, continuous suburban sprawl results in traffic gridlock.

Gordon's research shows the suburban sprawl model persists in medium-sized cities and outside urban cores partly because they have not yet reached the saturation point, but also because the model, including subsidies from existing provincial taxpayers, offers lucrative short-term profits for developers.