Toronto’s suburbs are our urban future.

Southern Ontario grows in leaps and bounds, despite being in an old industrial region in a Western country. Most of that growth is in its suburban rim, although, admittedly, some reurbanization has taken hold in Toronto’s condoland and in some suburban nodes. Toronto’s suburbs are unrivaled in terms of their diversity. They are true “arrival cities,” to use a term by Doug Saunders.

The new suburbia displays a wide variety of urban forms. It experiences a tremendous range of activities in infrastructure planning and construction in various modes and across the entire area. It is the site of political process renewal and policy innovation. Although built on the privatism of the single family home and the condo in the sky, it is also a place where civil society thrives. It is a creative powerhouse that grows by 100,000 people a year.

And yet, hear the word “suburb” and you already know the rest: sprawl, drive everywhere, sameness, consumer culture, boring, etc. This is the prevailing view – as if somehow time was still frozen in 1950s Leave-it-to-Beaver land – despite mounting evidence to the contrary. While the suburbs today have become as different from their 1950s versions as the Cleaver household was from the city at that time, our stereotypical view of these places has not evolved in the same way.

In short, the suburbs have grown up and moved on but how we think about them has not.

The suburbs have the region’s majority share of population and job growth and are home to major infrastructures such as the airport and universities. On these bases suburbia can no longer be considered subordinate to the City of Toronto. But still it is. Prejudices have power over facts – clouding our view of what the suburbs truly have become and why, most importantly, that should matter.

Fact is, the city needs the suburb more than the suburb needs the city.

The suburbs have become, like the city centres before them, the new arenas for forming and contesting politics, modes of governance, ways of life, and the forms and notions of community. Taken one step further, the suburb has become the new city. And a new kind of city – a “regional city.”

The governance of the Toronto region does not reflect or acknowledge this phenomenon. Political structures like Toronto city council dominate, for example, while dozens of suburban municipal councils make decisions that impact an equal number of residents and businesses – but do so in virtual silence and obscurity. Somehow, it’s been accepted that what goes on outside “the city” is unimportant. This is not only reflected but magnified in the media, and in politics.

But things are changing, and we should know.

For the past three years, as part of a long-term research project at York University, sponsored by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, we have been coordinating an expert group of suburb-shapers and builders to share our experiences with the aim of inspiring new forms of suburban governance. That is, to first talk and then to work towards new approaches for planning, building, servicing and governing Toronto’s ever-growing and diversifying periphery.

Calling ourselves the “Greater Toronto Suburban Working Group” we have now issued a short report to summarize what we learned. From this, we draw some ideas for shaping today’s suburbs for tomorrow – our new urban future, including:

Urban expansions should be linked to the achievement of intensification targets established by the 2006 Provincial Growth Plan for the Greater Golden Horseshoe.

Single-family home subdivisions need to become flexible and responsive to the needs of an increasing ageing population. Right now, the suburbs are no place to grow old.

Invest in strategies to support, and tap into, emerging community networks to increase social inclusion and cohesion.

Adopt infrastructure standards (e.g. roads) that are more compatible with a built form that is becoming more compact, mixed-use and people-oriented.

Emphasize design quality in new planning and development. Suburbs that are well-designed, flexible and vibrant will have a better chance of retaining young residents and their creative capital.

Work towards an “open data, open government” approach for collecting, maintaining and understanding information about the region (e.g. development statistics, demographics, etc.)

We set out to seek governance in conversation. We took the Toronto suburbs as our virtual roundtable. We hope to inspire turning talk into action.

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The full report can be downloaded for free at www.yorku.ca/suburbs .

Sean Hertel is a consulting urban planner specializing in transit-oriented development and intensification across the GTA and beyond, and also conducts suburban research at the City Institute at York University.