Talk:Greater Toronto Area/Archive 1

Archive 1

Archive 2

Greater Toronto Area Transportation

When are the Greater Toronto Municipalities going to collaborate and set up a plan to implement a high speed solution to the intracity traffic congestion? People cannot use public transportation because there are places which are inaccessible if you work in one area and live in another (for example: how does one commute from Guelph to Mississauga without driving?)

I don't think the GTA is the same as the "Census Metropolitan Area of Toronto". The GTA means Toronto, Peel, Halton, York, & Durham (see [1], [2], [3], [4]). - Efghij 06:49 15 Jul 2003 (UTC)

The Greater Toronto Area is the Toronto CMA. There are also cities that are in the Toronto CMA that are in Simcoe County and Dufferin County. Bradford, for example, has a greater tie to Toronto then Oshawa does. Snickerdo

What makes you think that the GTA is the same thing as the Toronto CMA? As shown in the above links, the GTA is a area difined by the provincial government, including the entirity of the four regional municipalities, and no part of Simcoe County or Dufferin County. Efghij 22:20 15 Jul 2003 (UTC)

The Federal Government is what makes me think the Greater Toronto Area is the Toronto CMA. CMAs are the accepted standard of the 'Metropolitan Area' and are used for census purposes. The member municipalities of the CMA are locations that rely on Toronto, while areas outside of the CMA rely on other centres. That is what is officially accepted by all major bodies, and not just for Toronto (e.g. The Greater Vancouver Regional District, Vancouver's version of the GTA, is no different then the Vancouver CMA). Burlington, Oshawa, Pickering, etc can't even call Toronto toll-free, you think that makes them a suburb? Hardly. The first link you provided has the exact same municipalities listed as what I've placed on the page. The MTO also includes the Niagara Peninsula and Hamilton as part of the GTA when issuing traffic advisories, so that there is moot. The last item isn't even a government body. Many people forget about Simcoe County and Differin County, but saying Bradford is not part of the GTA because it isn't in York Region while Oshawa is part of the GTA is just insane. Snickerdo

The GTA and the Toronto CMA are different regions diffined by different governments for different reasons. It doesn't matter if you think it's insane that Bradford is not part of the GTA and Oshawa is. That's the way it is, and wikipedia must reflect that. The first link does list Oshawa and Clarington, but not one municipality in Simcoe or Dufferin County. The last link is a page on the Toronto Public Library site that talks about the provincial government's transportation policy; it says:

The GTA consists of 24 municipalities in 5 regions, including Metro Toronto, York, Durham, Peel and Halton. ... Planning for the region as a whole is done by the Office of the GTA (OGTA), a body set up by the Province of Ontario to "coordinate and support regional planning decisions."

- Efghij 01:50 16 Jul 2003 (UTC)

I modified the page to reflect the differences between what the provincial government and federal government consider to be the GTA. Also added additional notes about when Hamilton and Niagara are considered part of the GTA (e.g. MTO planning, etc). This way readers can decide for themselves what is the GTA and what isn't. - Snickerdo

That's fine with me. - Efghij 02:06 16 Jul 2003 (UTC)

Ermm... what sort of residents consider Barrie unofficially part of the GTA? I've lived in Barrie since 1989 and this is the first I've heard of it. I think this must be some kind of mistake, unless someone can provide some sort of article. - Mattt

Guys the gta goes from burlington to north to Orangeville and up north to Aurora and down back to oshawa. Its a really large area but massive gorwth is starting up in those places.

The version of this page prior to November 2, 2005 is highly inaccurate. It includes information not about the GTA. If people wish to include such information they should create a page specfically for that. The GTA is simply the City of Toronto and 4 surrounding regions (Halton, Peel, York and Durham), no more no less. Also, the information posted in my corrections to the page are not copywritten, get better information before overwriting a page. -- Greater Toronto Marketing Alliance (comment by User:GTMA)

There is a page for the Golden Horseshoe. Your contribution was deleted because it reads like an advertisement, and contains far too many links to one website. This is generally considered spam. You're welcome to re-introduce material written in a more encyclopedic manner.

As far as copyrights go, the greatertoronto.org site clearly states "All rights reserved." So if there is anything from that website, it can't be kept (for example, the map you added). On the other hand, if it is material you wrote, then Wikipedia can of course accept it. But not if it contains things like The Greater Toronto Area offers more for those businesses who aspire to accomplish more. Greater choice. Greater advantages. Greater opportunities to succeed in the competitive and fast paced global economy. That's pure marketing fluff. Mindmatrix 00:46, 3 November 2005 (UTC)

Dumfuck

"For their part, although the surrounding GTA cities are free of the financial problems that Toronto often faces, they resent their dependency on Toronto for both economic support and recognition. The "905" municipalities are all of bereft of cultural institutions due to their proximity to Toronto, despite their significant size. Mississauga for instance is the largest city in Canada with no daily newspaper, television stations, or commercial radio stations. Despite having attracted significant investment over the last few decades, the surrounding cities are still considered bedroom suburbs to Toronto rather than independent municipalities, and as a result they are virtually unknown outside of Ontario."

I deleted it because it's not true. Mississauga is obviously not the largest city in Canada, you moron. Moreover, it's simply not true that Mississauga has no newspaper or television stations. Did the writer of this even bother to fucking look at Wikipedia's page on Mississauga? - —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.203.124.97 (talk • contribs)

It would be great if you could take a look at Wikipedia:Assume good faith, Wikipedia:Civility and Wikipedia:Etiquette. Thanks! Skeezix1000 21:05, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

Whoever wrote that Mississauga has no newspaper or television stations is very poorly educated on Mississauga. There is a paper called "The Mississauga News" and it get's delivered 3 or 4 times a week. Now please stop making Mississauga look like a small little hick town. - —Preceding unsigned comment added by [[User:{{{1}}}|{{{1}}}]] ([[User talk:{{{1}}}|talk]] • [[Special:Contributions/{{{1}}}|contribs]])

To be honest the user is sort of true. Mississauga is Canada's largest city without a 7 day week newspaper. Read it in the Toronto Star. Although most suberbs around Toronto are considered bedroom suberbs, cities such as Mississauga, Markham, Vaughan and Brampton have since evolved from this state. CuffX

Apples to Apples Comparison re City of Toronto/Greater Toronto Area

Torontoboosters at the entry for "Toronto" insist that that page is an inappropriate place to state that the Greater Toronto Area is only the 7th-largest metro area in N. America - they naturally prefer to highlight that the City of Toronto is the 5-th largest (central, originating) city in N. America. Fair enough. But playing by those rules, this Greater Toronto Area entry should indicate that the metro is 7th largest on the continent, rather than pointing out only the more impressive 5th-largest stat that applies only to the central city. The Bay Area and DC-Baltimore-NoVa regions are big, complicated and (economically, culturally) heavyhitting metros that deserve due recogition. Not to mention Mexico City!! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.181.203.139 (talk • contribs)

There's a difference between being a Toronto-booster and a fact-booster. In the Toronto talk page, I specifically cited a change that was made to city rankings based on metropolitan area populations. Nothing more.

As far as the GTA is concerned, there is the problem of determining the equivalence of American Combined Metropolitan Statistical Areas (CMSAs) and Canadian Census Metropolitan Areas (CMAs). They do not have a direct correspondence, which makes comparisons somewhat suspect. I don't know what definition is used in Mexico, but Mexico City certainly deserves inclusion (I even said so in the Toronto talk page). I have no problem with the ranking, but we should take some care in determing the extent of the ares, and explaining any differences in the way the data is aggregated. Mindmatrix 14:33, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

By the way, have a look at List of metropolitan areas by population, which is based on dozens of different definitions of metropolitan area. Everybody seems to want their favourite city to be ranked higher. I think that list is nonsense because of the differences in definition. Mindmatrix 14:42, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

It is important to ensure that the comparison is apples to apples. It's nonsensical to compare a Canadian CMA to an American CMSA or MCSA, when the former is a much narrower concept than the latter two. The population of the Greater Toronto CMA is 5.6 million, but when Statistics Canada used parametres roughly equivalent to those used in the U.S. for CMSA, it came up with a 2001 population of 6.7 million for the Toronto region (as indicated in this article), which exceeds the 2004 populations of the respective Washington–Arlington–Alexandria, San Francisco–Oakland–Fremont, and Baltimore–Towson CMSAs. Following the American MCSA guidelines, the Toronto/Golden Horseshoe population at 7.9 million still exceeds the populations of the respective Washington-Baltimore-Northern Virginia and San Jose-San Francisco-Oakland MCSAs. So, when using roughly the same census guidelines, neither the Bay Area nor DC-Baltimore-NoVa are larger. Skeezix1000 20:54, 12 March 2006 (UTC)

population rank

Philadelphia metro area (with a 2004 MSA population of 5.8 million) is probably larger than the GTA. Dallas metro area is also potentially larger (5.7 million in 2004). The text "5th largest metropolitan region" should probably be reworded to be more vague or changed to something like "6th". Polaron | Talk 15:03, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

• Not really. Canadian CMA stats are not equivalent to American CMSA stats. When you do use comparable figures, however, it would appear (based on the populations that you have cited), that the GTA has a larger pop than both the Philadelphia and Dallas areas. See the "Apples to Apples" discussion above. --Skeezix1000 11:51, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

I understand the CSAs are different conceptually but MSAs are very similar. The GTA is a little bit larger than the Toronto CMA so it should be on par with an MSA in the US. This still makes the claim of 5th not very solid so should be softened at the very least. Polaron | Talk 13:52, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

Here are MSA (not CSA) populations of Philadelphia and Dallas

• Philadelphia MSA: 5,713,579 (2001); 5,857,272 (2006 est)
• Dallas MSA: 5,349,790 (2001); 5,928,990 (2006 est)
• Toronto CMA: 4,883,800 (2001); 5,394,200 (2006 est)

(I am aware that the GTA is slightly larger so if you tell me which CSDs are in the GTA, I can get the exact figure. If it was indeed 5.6 million in 2005, it should be 5.75 to 5.8 million in 2006). Polaron | Talk 14:06, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

There is no basis to assume that the GTA, just because it is slightly larger than the Toronto CMA, is on par with an American MSA. When Statscan used roughly the same parametres as the MSA, they came up with a population of 6.7 million. As for "softening" the claim, the article already states: "...although one should use care in comparing statistics of metropolitan census regions from different countries which may be based on different boundary systems and definitions of terms". --Skeezix1000 11:48, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

If you're referring to the Golden Horseshoe Census Region, that is a combination of several CMAs. While the building blocks are different, the delineation method of CMAs and MSAs are very similar and should be comparable in terms of population. Both CMAs and MSAs center around a single urban core and included adjacent territory that has strong socio-economic ties with the urban core. It is inappropriate to compare Canadian Census Regions with MSAs. They are comparable to CSAs. Polaron | Talk 21:13, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

Here is a more objective way to look at it. The Geopolis database, compiled every 10 years by the University of Avignon, defines urban areas for all countries in the world using the same definition for all countries. They determine the limits of urban areas using satellite pictures. I have the 2000 Geopolis database with me. According to the list, in 2000 the Toronto urban area had 5.1 million inhabitants and was the 7th most populated urban area in Northern America, behind NY-Philadelphia (26.5 million), Los Angeles (14.0 million), Chicago (8.3 million), Boston (6.2 million), Washington (6.1 million), and San Francisco (5.3 million). Hardouin 00:59, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

Sure, but I can't seem to get that information from their website (which may or may not be this), which means we'd have to take your word on it. Can you provide a link to the data? We have information from Statistics Canada and US Census Bureau already. Mindmatrix 01:08, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

The correct link to their website is: http://www.geo.univ-avignon.fr/Site%20Avignon/pages/labo/index%20geopolis.html. Unfortunately their website only contains figures for some European countries. For other countries, figures are only available in the paper version. You can send them an email about US and Canadian urban areas, they might answer you. Alternatively, you can find the ranking of the 74 largest urban areas as from the 2000 Geopolis database if you buy Tableaux de l'économie française published by INSEE. Hardouin 01:14, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. I'll look into it. I was way off on the link, wasn't I? Mindmatrix 01:39, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

Mindmatrix, that link doesn't work for me! Dennis7410

Politics section

The first part is fine other than that it is not strong enough.

This:

"Most of the "905" municipalities have few cultural institutions, despite their significant populations. For instance, Mississauga is one of the largest cities in Canada by population but has no daily newspaper, television stations, or commercial radio stations. Despite having attracted significant investment over the last few decades, the surrounding cities are still considered bedroom suburbs of Toronto rather than independent municipalities, and as a result many are virtually unknown outside of Ontario. Prior to the municipal amalagamations that took place with the introduction of regional government, Oshawa was the only nearby city with a significant population and recognition."

Is nothing but irrelevant whining that pretty much makes the section state that the City of Toronto gets ripped off, but because the bubble-world "bedroom suburbs" don't need (or go to it, get the market studies/business plans and financing lined up, and open TV, radio and whatever else y'all want to; or move so that you're not so close to poor, poor you having to be "unknown") TV or radio stations (show a profit and the investors will line up, but will likely use the existing infrastructure in Toronto instead of re-inventing the wheel for no apparent reason), so everything is even?

It makes no sense at all. "GTA politics" amount to the 24 city/town halls of the "greater area" and their four regional governments/councils against "little Toronto's" 1 city hall and no regional government. And is "York Region" paying for the subway extension to York University -- through the City of Toronto? Why would we need more commuters, inbound or outbound, without collecting user fees from y'all?

Then you go ahead and charge those living in the City of Toronto user fees to enter your ... "bedroom suburbs"/municipalities, deserted wastelands for the most part and we'll see which municipality makes the most money in user fees to use the public goods/infrastructure of each municipality (and "region" for y'all) in the GTA.

The "Politics" section looks like two different posts on some phpBB2 "discussion" board, not an encyclopedia. Perhaps everyone in every municipality in the GTA should be thinking about forming up a real Greater Toronto Area (to-be South Ontario) Association of Municipalities to take on the ridiculous Association of Municipalities of "Ontario" (AMO) that your mayors and councils back all the time, because it always means "screw the City of Toronto."

The AMO, CUPE (the former six municipalities of Toronto all had different contracts with CUPE outdoor workers; which has still not been solved, but either has the other Bay Street stopped receiving mail that is supposed to be going to the CIBC head office downtown.

Wait until we amalgamate all of you up into one municipality with no regional government and we'll see how y'all do.

Can't even get near an enclopedia without having to listen to the "Ontario" (particularly Toronto) hate clubs, right on the GTA article.

The solution for the City of Toronto to get a decent share of its own revenues back is very simple: Tell the "Ontario" feds that they are finished and can move to the Timmonses or Kapuskasings whenever they want to, as long as it's within the next 30 days, get rid of the confederates if they don't turn the "municipality" of Toronto into a province with extra-special status, or we wipe their bonds off the TSX, sieze, not freeze, our assets that they think are theirs, refuse to process any financial transactions for them, cut all communications, electricity, freshwater/sewage, garbage pick-up -- or go after the government(s) and/or businesses that won't do it for some unknown reasons.

Then we keep all of our municipal and provincial revenues and only pay for the totally essential union services we need. We finally lower our taxes, finally start rebuilding from the rubble -- and charge user fees (particularly to slow-up traffic into, through, out of Toronto) to every "Ontarian" who doesn't have a province of Toronto smartcard. And we impose massive user fees on any developer thinking that suburban sprawl, paving over farmland instead of re-using brownlands in the City of Toronto, either does so or has to find another city state to develop in, once the South Ontarios have been turned into a city state.

Then, with proper political structures and systems, y'all might figure out that it's not a good idea to kill the Golden Goose; let alone take such great pleasure in it. --S-Ranger 03:41, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

Is anyone fond of this in the second paragraph/intro to the GTA?

As an economic area, the GTA consists of 25 municipalities and four regions in a total approx. area of over 7,000 km². This translates into one of the lowest densities for an urban area in the world at 800 people per km²...

Population Counts, Land Area, Population Density, Greater Toronto Area, Census Divisions and Census Subdivisions (Municipalities), 2001 and 1996 Censuses - 100% Data

It's a bit lenghy to show all of the oh so important separate municipalities out in the "greater, much greater, area":

_______________________________________________________________________________
                                          Population          Land       Pop
Name                       Type   2001       1996    %Change   KM2     Density
_______________________________________________________________________________
Ontario †                      11,410,046 10,753,573   6.1  907,655.59     12.6
_______________________________________________________________________________

_______________________________________________________________________________
01-Toronto Division             2,481,494  2,385,421   4.0      629.91  3,939.4
_______________________________________________________________________________
 Toronto ...................  C 2,481,494  2,385,421   4.0      629.91  3,939.4

_______________________________________________________________________________
02-Peel Regional Municipality     988,948    852,526  16.0    1,241.99    796.3
_______________________________________________________________________________
 Mississauga ...............  C   612,925    544,382  12.6      288.42  2,125.1
 Brampton ..................  C   325,428    268,251  21.3      266.53  1,221.0
 Caledon ...................  T    50,595     39,893  26.8      687.04     73.6

_______________________________________________________________________________
04-York Regional Municipality     729,254    592,445  23.1    1,761.64    414.0
_______________________________________________________________________________
 Markham ...................  T   208,615    173,383  20.3      212.47    981.8
 Vaughan ...................  C   182,022    132,549  37.3      273.50    665.5
 Richmond Hill .............  T   132,030    101,725  29.8      100.89  1,308.7
 Newmarket .................  T    65,788     57,125  15.2       38.07  1,728.0
 Aurora ....................  T    40,167     34,857  15.2       49.61    809.7
 Georgina ..................  T    39,263     34,777  12.9      287.72    136.5
 Whitchurch-Stouffville ....  T    22,008     19,835  11.0      206.74    106.5
 East Gwillimbury ..........  T    20,555     19,770   4.0      245.06     83.9
 King ...................... TP    18,533     18,223   1.7      333.04     55.6
 Chippewas of Georgina
  Island First Nation ......  R       273        201  35.8       14.55     18.8

_______________________________________________________________________________
05-Durham Regional Municipality   506,901    458,616  10.5    2,523.48    200.9
_______________________________________________________________________________
 Oshawa ....................  C   139,051    134,364   3.5      145.65    954.7
 Whitby ....................  T    87,413     73,794  18.5      146.52    596.6
 Pickering .................  C    87,139     78,989  10.3      231.58    376.3
 Ajax ......................  T    73,753     64,430  14.5       67.09  1,099.3
 Clarington ................  T    69,834     60,615  15.2      611.06    114.3
 Scugog .................... TP    20,173     18,837   7.1      474.62     42.5
 Uxbridge .................. TP    17,377     15,882   9.4      420.65     41.3
 Brock ..................... TP    12,110     11,705   3.5      423.73     28.6
 Mississaugas of
  Scugog Island ............  R        51          ¶     ¶        2.58     19.7

_______________________________________________________________________________
11-Halton Regional Municipality   375,229    339,875  10.4      967.04    388.0
_______________________________________________________________________________
 Burlington ................  C   150,836    136,976  10.1      185.71    812.2
 Oakville ..................  T   144,738    128,405  12.7      138.51  1,044.9
 Halton Hills ..............  T    48,184     42,390  13.7      276.35    174.4
 Milton ....................  T    31,471     32,104  -2.0      366.46     85.9

_______________________________________________________________________________
Municipality of Toronto         2,481,494  2,385,421   4.0      629.91  3,939.4
_______________________________________________________________________________
Rest of GTA                     2,600,332  2,243,462  15.9    6,494.15    400.4
_______________________________________________________________________________
TOTAL                           5,081,826  4,628,883   9.8    7,124.06    713.3
_______________________________________________________________________________

Source: Statistics Canada - Population, Dwellings and Geography - Data Tables - Census Subdivisions (CSDs) - Municipalities
Date modified (by source): 2002-07-16
Last updated/checked: 2005-02-18
_____

The above is quite an illusion, as usual around percentages when comparing such wildly different numbers. How about real population growth (2001 population - 1996 population or 1991 would be even better, a whole ten-year trend) in each real municipality, not counties made up of municipalities with an extra level of government that the municipality of Toronto doesn't have. A pitiful 4.0% growth rate in "the real Toronto" and a whopping 15.9% in the rest of the "GTA thing" -- and with "the real Toronto" dragging that (irrelevant) 15.9% growth rate down when it's added in.

Take a look at the source, well you have to go back a bit. The real source is the Statistics Canada - Census - Population and Dwellings home page/index but it has a lot of links on it and can be confusing to those who aren't past the chaos of it all; go to it and get the list of CSDs (municipalities) for all of the Canadas up, then click on the "%change" heading then the down arrow to sort all municipalities in the Canadas by %change, descending, and see what you end up with worth mentioning.

Try the Census Subdivisions (CSDs) - Municipalities link, then the View Nationally (All Census Subdivisions) link (or just click on it right <-- there) and you'll get the usual around StatsCon to sort numbers by -- alphabetical order instead of east to west, then west to east (because they're not "provinces" and territories).

Click on the "%change" column/link and you'll get the always worthless ascending, lowest to highest % change (or anything else). Then click on the down arrow (then write an email to StatsCan't to complain about their interface web insanity and all the work you had to do to get something so simple done -- if you would ever have found the links above to begin with given that the entire site is a disaster area/nightmare of "design" as usual -- because it's "Canadian" and is paid for out of taxes, public sector -- disasters) to get what should be the default sort order but on the 2001 population column (by numbers, total 2001 population, GDP, unemployment rate, whatever, from highest to lowest -- descending), and you'll find many types of "municipalities" that you'll have to read a book about to find out what they even are.

Kshish 4 (B.C.) with a whole 58 people comes in at #1 with a massive FIVE THOUSAND AND SEVEN HUNDRED PERCENT CHANGE IN POPULATION (!) Fifty seven people moved there from the 1996 Census to the 2001 Census; or 57 more people actually filled out and returned their Census forms.

UNO = Unorganized Area, as in it's not a municipality of any type: It's unorganized and no one knows what it is. It could be a field or five, a bunch of rocks, tundra, who knows, but people live in whatever is -- nothing. First Nations/"Indian" Reserves are not municipalities either. The link is right at the bottom of the page to find out what the "Type" (of CSD) column letters mean; go to it and look them all up. You won't find them all.

And look at the whopping populations, and apparently StatsCON has never heard of scrolling beyond a screen page (around some things; it has around other things; disorganized chaos, another feature of government everything in the Canadas) so click on page ... well the next page at the list along the bottom is page 11 (to confuse you, as usual; it's what the confederates do best) but if you look at the top of the table on the right-hand side you'll see "< Previous | Index | Next >" (don't click on the arrows, they don't work and are only there to confuse you; click on "Next") and you can use that to get to page 2 instead of page 11 and keep going until you find something with a population worth mentioning; like 100,000+ people at bare minimum.

And you can't skip a page because it's not sorted by total population but by "%change" and if you think you're going to run across anything with a population change of 177.1%, like the one at the bottom of the page, "Northwest Angle 33B (Ont.)", Reserve, population 97 -- with 100,000 or more people in it and a "% change" of over 30% (see Barrie, Ontario; not quite 30%, 25.9% and it's a "census agglomeration" for no apparent reason with well over the 100,000 person limit for it to be a [census] metroplitan area, 148,480 in 2001 and if that thing were sitting anywhere but near Toronto -- it would be a [C]MA like Abbotsford, B.C. is (since the 2001 Census), with a population of 147,370 and only an 8.0% change in population from the 1996 Census) -- think more clearly.

Infamous "Keeseekoose 66-KE-04 (Sask.)" (note the use of wasted storage space/bandwidth after every single CMA; is something wrong with the real shortforms for provinces and territories? ON, QC, BC, AB, MB, SK, NS, NB, PE, NL, NT, YT, NU? They use them on other pages and with no "legend" as to what the letters mean, so why the big fat mess around this? To waste our time and money, of course) is BOOMING with a massive 150.0% change in population in only 5 years, from the 1996 Census to the 2001 Census -- it went from 2 people up to 5 people. That's a whole 3 person increase and is shifting the power balance of the entire world, let alone the Canadas.

Same source as the table above, but with a proper format around populations. It's still not "proper" for any "GTA thing" though. Keep an eye out for a municipality (not a county that contains more than one municipality that happens to be called a "regional municipality" with a level of government/expenses that Toronto doesn't have or need; they can merge up their municipalities into one just as Toronto did and be rid of lots of worthless city/town halls/councils and just use the regional government/council in the city it already exists in to govern the things; none of them have anywhere near the popoulation of the municipality of Toronto. What's the problem out there?) of 96,073 in real growth.

Population Counts, Land Area, Population Density, Greater Toronto Area, Census Divisions and Census Subdivisions (Municipalities), 2001 and 1996 Censuses - 100% Data

___________________________________________________________________
                                          Population           % of
Name                       Type   2001       1996    GROWTH    GTA*
___________________________________________________________________
Ontario                        11,410,046 10,753,573 656,473   N/A

___________________________________________________________________
01-Toronto Division             2,481,494  2,385,421  96,073  48.83
___________________________________________________________________
 Toronto ...................  C 2,481,494  2,385,421  96,073  48.83

___________________________________________________________________
02-Peel Regional Municipality     988,948    852,526 136,422  19.46
___________________________________________________________________
 Mississauga ...............  C   612,925    544,382  68,543  12.06
 Brampton ..................  C   325,428    268,251  57,177   6.40
 Caledon ...................  T    50,595     39,893  10,702   1.00

___________________________________________________________________
04-York Regional Municipality     729,254    592,445 136,809  14.35
___________________________________________________________________
 Markham ...................  T   208,615    173,383  35,232   4.11
 Vaughan ...................  C   182,022    132,549  49,473   3.58
 Richmond Hill .............  T   132,030    101,725  30,305   2.60
 Newmarket .................  T    65,788     57,125   8,663   1.29
 Aurora ....................  T    40,167     34,857   5,310   0.79
 Georgina ..................  T    39,263     34,777   4,486   0.77
 Whitchurch-Stouffville ....  T    22,008     19,835   2,173   0.43
 East Gwillimbury ..........  T    20,555     19,770     785   0.40
 King ...................... TP    18,533     18,223     310   0.36
 Chippewas of Georgina
  Island First Nation ......  R       273        201      72   0.01

___________________________________________________________________
05-Durham Regional Municipality   506,901    458,616  48,285   9.97
___________________________________________________________________
 Oshawa ....................  C   139,051    134,364   4,687   2.74
 Whitby ....................  T    87,413     73,794  13,619   1.72
 Pickering .................  C    87,139     78,989   8,150   1.71
 Ajax ......................  T    73,753     64,430   9,323   1.45
 Clarington ................  T    69,834     60,615   9,219   1.37
 Scugog .................... TP    20,173     18,837   1,336   0.40
 Uxbridge .................. TP    17,377     15,882   1,495   0.34
 Brock ..................... TP    12,110     11,705     405   0.24
 Mississaugas of
  Scugog Island ............  R        51          ¶       ¶   0.00

___________________________________________________________________
11-Halton Regional Municipality   375,229    339,875  35,354   7.38
___________________________________________________________________
 Burlington ................  C   150,836    136,976  13,860   2.97
 Oakville ..................  T   144,738    128,405  16,333   2.85
 Halton Hills ..............  T    48,184     42,390   5,794   0.95
 Milton ....................  T    31,471     32,104    -633   0.62

___________________________________________________________________
Municipality of Toronto         2,481,494  2,385,421  96,073  48.83
___________________________________________________________________
Rest of GTA                     2,600,332  2,243,462 356,870  51.17
___________________________________________________________________
TOTAL                           5,081,826  4,628,883 452,943 100.00
___________________________________________________________________

* "% of GTA" is the 2001 population total as a percentage of the population total of the Municipality of Toronto + Rest of GTA; the TOTAL 2001 population of the entire "GTA thing."

Derived from: Statistics Canada - Population, Dwellings and Geography - Data Tables - Census Subdivisions (CSDs) - Municipalities
Date modified (by source): 2002-07-16
Last updated/checked: 2005-02-18
_____

The population growth of the rest of "greater area" is higher but land area has to be added to them to show why it should be a lot higher outside little Toronto compared to the "Greater Area":

Greater Toronto Area Population Density by Census Division

Sorted by 2001 population

________________________________________________________________
                                               Land
                          Population           Area   Population
Name              2001       1996    Growth     Km2    Density
________________________________________________________________
Toronto        2,481,494  2,385,421  96,073    629.91  3,939.4
Peel Region      988,948    852,526 136,422  1,241.99    796.3
York Region      729,254    592,445 136,809  1,761.64    414.0
Durham Region    506,901    458,616  48,285  2,523.48    200.9
Halton Region    375,229    339,875  35,354    967.04    388.0
______________________________________________________________
Toronto        2,481,494  2,385,421  96,073    629.91  3,939.4
______________________________________________________________
Rest of GTA    2,600,332  2,243,462 356,870  6,494.15    400.4
______________________________________________________________
TOTAL          5,081,826  4,628,883 452,943  7,124.06    713.3
______________________________________________________________

Source: See above.

I wonder where that "low population density" is coming from? Perhaps the above, in a proper wiki-table could explain it. Or perhaps, population density should be moved out of the intro and into the "Irrelevant GTA Factoids" section; with the data in a wiki-table above to "explain" it quite clearly.

See, right outside the real GTA, which is defined by economic geographers but also by hicks who live in little towns in the GTA thing and don't even have one traffic signal, have no real jobs, make no real money, begins a new bunch of Toronto (and south Ontario city) haters who think that a trip to Stouffville is 'going downtown to Terahnto'.

Maybe if your "regions" out there weren't so massive, if they cut the borders to the north, west and east to get rid of the dead wood, the km² would also go down and the population densities would go up. And cities would deal with global city-region issues and hicks would deal with the usual, separately, not under one government. Then the whole population density of the GTA thing would go up, instead of 4 massive and largely deserted "regions" dragging the City of Toronto's population density down. --S-Ranger 05:01, 7 September 2006 (UTC)

Population ranking seems wrong

I'm going to take the number in this article as "correct". If this is true, then it should rank significantly higher than 13th, according to other up-to-date articles here on the wiki.

Clearly larger:

New York City, 18.7 million (2005 est) Mexico City, 17.8 million (2000) Greater Los Angeles Area, 17.6 million (2005 est) Baltimore-Washington Metropolitan Area, 8 million (2004) Greater Boston, 7.4 million (2005 est), 4.4 for Boston area itself

Us or close to it: Philadelphia metro area, 5.8 million (2005 est) Toronto 5.7 million, 5.3 for "census area" only

Apparently smaller: Miami area, 5.4 million (2005 est) Greater Houston, 5.3 million (2005 est) Metro Detroit, 5.4 million (unknown year, decreases every census though) Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex, 5.1 million (2000)

San Fran is likely a matter of some debate. No one I know there would consider Oakland or San Jose to be part of a "greater san fran", unlike Toronto where people certainly consider Oakville to be a part of the city. Additionally, if you drive out of the city going south you come to an extended area of non-city empty areas, like the areas between Toronto and Hamilton.

Maury 22:59, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

You're right. In terms of traditional metropolitan areas (those with a single urban core, e.g. MSAs in the US), the GTA is 7th in North America (the CMA is 8th). There's some unclear text about urban core vs. metropolitan area in the "General information" section as well. In terms of either urban area population or extent, it is definitely not fifth either. --Polaron | Talk 23:30, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

if we do msa toronto population 5,9 million2006 behind

1 new-york 21 million 2 los angeles 17,7 million 3 chicago 9,7 million 4 dallas 6,0 million 5 toronto 5,9 million

OK, The GTA is clearly much larger than the 13th largest metropolitan area in North America. Even going by the source where the GTA is listed as 13th, this list includes all cities in THE AMERICAS, not just NORTH AMERICA. I have nothing against this source, just whoever keeps changing the rank back to 13th please read what the list is before you post information in the article. Using the same source, only reading it properly and excluding south american cities, i beleive the GTA ranks 8th. I will check this again and adjust the ranking accordingly....Also, I do not beleive that Greater Boston is clearly larger than the GTA. Even on the greater Boston article the population is only listed as 4.4 million. Even if there is some other boston area it surely isnt CLEARLY larger than the GTA. —Preceding unsigned comment added by T.O.ntario (talk • contribs) 14:39, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

York and the GTA

Since when does the GTA include the york region? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 139.57.46.38 (talk • contribs)

Regional Municipality of York, Ontario, which borders Toronto, has been a part of the GTA for as long as that entity has been defined. If you're thinking of York, Ontario instead, since it's a part of Toronto, it's clearly part of the GTA. Mindmatrix 14:56, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Biased POV on GTA Abbreviation?

No one outside Toronto uses the ridiculous abbreviation "GTA". The article doesn't explain this. In contrast, the abbreviations "L.A." and "D.C." are commonly used outside Los Angeles and Washington.—Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.198.54.124 (talk • contribs)

Not GTA

I'm sorry, but York, Halton, Peel and Durham are not part of the Greater Toronto Area... It's East York, North York, York, Scarborough, Etobicoke and Toronto. No one would even consider it being outside of there until after the Harris Gov. All those regions are outside suburbs and towns; and I suspect calling them "GTA" is just a way for real estate agents to sell houses to middle-class morons and the government to convince them to ride the Go afterwards! --Mista-X (talk) 01:26, 28 February 2008 (UTC)

Please read the comment above the immediately above comment. It is about York Region being part of the Greater Toronto Area. An IP user, who is in Brock University in St. Catherines according to WHOIS, asked that question and Mindmatrix answered that it is. Johnny Au (talk) 02:20, 28 February 2008 (UTC)

Note that the entities you list were part of the old Metropolitan Toronto, and were considered the original suburbs of the city. Metropolitan Toronto has always been a central component of the GTA, but not its only component. The GTA has always consisted of Toronto, York, Durham, Peel and Halton. Mindmatrix 04:15, 28 February 2008 (UTC)

Yup. MIsta X im afraid mindmatrix is correct. You are clearly confusing Metropolitan Toronto and the Greater Toronto Area. They are two completely different things. Metropolitan Toronto was amalgomated in 1998 and is now simply called the City of Toronto, While the GTA is a much larger region surrounding Toronto and includes the Regional Municipalities mentioned above. —Preceding unsigned comment added by T.O.ntario (talk • contribs) 14:29, 9 June 2008 (UTC)

Hamilton? Oshawa?

I believe, than Hamilton and Oshawa should be part of the GTA! How is it the the Federal Government got 25% of commuters coming from Orangville, Brock, Scugog and Mono which is 1 hour 10 minutes(1 hour 35 in the case of Brock) from downtown Toronto, but Hamilton isn't despite only being 45 minutes. Note that when you call from Orangeville to Toronto you have to pay because its out of the provincial area. Dennis7410 —Preceding undated comment was added at 16:10, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

None of us at Wikipedia get to define what a region is or is not. A definition for Greater Toronto Area already exists, encompassing the city and four regional municipalities. Whether we agree with this or not is irrelevant - Wikipedia simply delivers information about it, not about "what should be". Hamilton is not included in the GTA per any known reliable definition. Mindmatrix 19:55, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

World Gazeteer

The site world gazeteer list Toronto Hamilton at 6 324 456 in the article the List of the largest metropolitan areas in the Americas why can't we use this for the Toronto Hamilton and Oshawa articles. It seems to be a number that is agreeded on here. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dennis7410 (talk • contribs)

The World Gazetteer uses its own definition of metropolitan and urban areas, and they don't match the region defined by any defining body in Canada. This makes their data somewhat suspect and unreliable. Mindmatrix 19:55, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

What they did is took the numbers form the 1991 census and they multiplied year by year, until they got to 1996 where they used offical numbers again, and so on. My question is why use the List of the largest metropolitan areas in the Americas Dennis7410

Frankly, I wouldn't use that list, and would be quite happy if it was deleted from WP. The problem with it is that it tries to compare disparate urban areas. The figures it uses for GTA are not, in fact, for the same GTA as this article (at least, it doesn't appear to be). There's discussion on that article's talk page about the relevance and accuracy of the data. I'll investigate this further sometime when I get the chance. Mindmatrix 14:44, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Why not this?

Put Together the CMA and Provincial GTA West Gwillimbury, Mono, Orangville, New Tecumseth + GTA= 5,641,648 Dennis7410

New Number?

I saw this on the talk: toronto page a few days ago. This new number for the four regions + Toronto is 5,639,274. Does anyone have a source for this? Dennis7410 —Preceding undated comment added 18:01, 30 May 2009 (UTC).

General information section - land area

I'm looking at this edit which is largely necessary and good cleanup. However it introduces a comparison "which is approximately 10% larger than the state of Delaware". This type of comparison always strikes me as rather useless, since it presupposes that the reader of this article knows how big the state of Delaware is or even knows "what" the state of Delaware is. Why is Delaware used for the comparison, is there a reason to link it here? Can I change it to "56.5% smaller than the municipality of East Sweat Stain" and link our East Sweat Stain article instead?

I'm using silly examples, but only to illustrate my point. We should either compare geographic size to something immediately comprehensible to a global readership or not make comparisons at all. Alternatively, comprehensible to the potential local readership, such as the (wildly inaccurate) comparison to the size of Lake Simcoe. An equally relevant global comparison could be to the island of Zeeland or the sultanate of Brunei. So my questions are: what do we compare size to; and why do we compare sizes at all? Franamax (talk) 03:37, 27 November 2009 (UTC)

• I agree. The only reason to make comparisons is when your audience all have the same reference point, which isn't true in Wikipedia. The prior edit had a size comparison that was incorrect and I searched hard to find a more accurate replacement, but in retrospect it would have been better to remove it completely. I don't feel strongly enough about it to start a campaign on the issue, since it's not "incorrect" to make the comparison. But when the area is given in sq.km., that is universally understood, and people can make their own comparisons for their context. Slowmover (talk) 17:43, 11 January 2010 (UTC)

OK, I took the comparison out. I see in the lede there is a comparison to the size of PEI. But everything is bigger than PEI - except for things that are smaller than PEI or the exact same size. Not sure whether to take that out too or not. Franamax (talk) 18:22, 11 January 2010 (UTC)

Lede section - distinct identity

The lede contains the sentence "The entire region ... share an identity different to the rest of the province". I question what exact "identity" is different. Some residents of Metro Toronto itself (and The Toronto Star) claim a difference on behalf of the entire GTA, often involving a claim on greater taxation revenues. There is certainly recognition with the actual urban parts of the agglomeration that fortunes are mutual. However, political choices are often different between the "416" and the "905", so no commonality there. And having lived in the rural areas I can say for sure that identities are not shared across the entire region. Residents of Scugog and Brock townships or those living at the corner of Bathurst & Yonge (yes, they do intersect) do not share a distinct identity with residents of Cabbagetown. I'm thinking a reword to "the area is often considered as a distinct subset of the province of Ontario due to its central urban concentration" - but worded way better than that. Franamax (talk) 18:45, 11 January 2010 (UTC)