Preface: Why This Book?
Toronto is in trouble. People are questioning its viability and bemoaning the state of the infrastructure and the traffic. They’re shocked at the homelessness, dismayed by the type and quality of much of the development and the anti-urban provincial government, and asking what we can do to get Toronto back on track. Our goal is to provide some answers.
We are both proud Torontonians. Anne was born here; Ken is an immigrant. Anne is a Canadian public policy analyst and organizational executive with a background in history. She served as President of the United Way of Greater Toronto and President and CEO of the Conference Board of Canada. Ken trained as an architect. He founded and directed the City of Toronto’s Division of Urban Design and Architecture, serving under three mayors before launching a career as an international urban design consultant, teacher, and author.
Jane Jacobs, urbanist, author, and one of the most original thinkers on cities, had a great influence on both of us. She left the United States in 1968 for Toronto, in part to protest the Vietnam War and to protect her sons from the draft. She described Toronto to The Globe and Mail as “the most hopeful and healthy city in North America, still unmangled and still with options.” Ken, also fleeing the draft, arrived soon after and had a similar reaction. We both met Jane, becoming her friends and collaborators.
We are veterans of the urban planning and political battles of the 1960s and ’70s. Together with other “urban progressives,” we helped stop the Spadina Expressway at Eglinton Avenue, preventing the evisceration of downtown neighbourhoods. We were part of citizen-led efforts to save Toronto’s communities from aggressive high-rise developers and their block-busting tactics.
While we come from very different fields, we are united by our deep and long-standing investment in Toronto’s future. We were active in the 1972 municipal election, ensuring David Crombie’s victory as mayor and the emergence of the “Reform Council.” That campaign was about protecting neighbourhoods, respecting people’s roots and values, fostering mixed-use and mixed-income development, encouraging sensible density, and reducing dependence on cars. Our vision was, and still is, one of vibrant, livable cities. Although the world has changed dramatically, these core elements continue to inspire us.
Over the years, our paths have crossed in numerous ways, and we have collaborated on various projects. A decade ago, we co-taught a Living and Learning in Retirement course at York University’s Glendon College entitled “Successful 21st Century City Regions,” exploring what makes big cities like Toronto successful. In 2013, it seemed as though the pivotal role of cities — driving economic prosperity, nurturing innovation, supporting healthy, happy lives, and protecting ecosystems — was becoming accepted wisdom.
In 2024, we accepted an invitation to present a new course, which we titled “The World Is Changing: What It Means for Cities like Toronto.” It was striking how our concerns about Toronto’s prospects had deepened in the intervening decade. This was a critical time to revisit the issues facing Canada’s cities, including Toronto.
The underlying fundamental challenges persisted: The majority of Canada’s citizens, living in the major cities, are underrepresented in our parliaments; metropolitan areas continue to suffer from underinvestment in infrastructure; and cities lack the fiscal and governance tools needed to address growing problems. The housing crisis, infrastructure backlogs, and service deterioration were all worsening, and we felt compelled to review our earlier assessment.
We reached out to eight esteemed colleagues and city watchers to join us in this exploration, and they each agreed to present a lecture through their particular lens. Our course was received with tremendous enthusiasm by the two hundred attendees, and based on their response, the earnest messaging of our lecturers, and our own sense of urgency, we were encouraged to make its insights available to a larger audience.
Over the past decade, dramatic global changes have profoundly impacted cities, forcing them to adapt to new realities. The unprecedented growth Toronto has experienced in this time has put immense pressure on nearly every system that supports a successful, sustainable city. And now, the seismic shifts in global politics and economics — many of them originating south of the border — add new layers of uncertainty and challenge.
On April 27, 1813, in York, Ontario (now Toronto), 2,700 Americans stormed Fort York, defeating the 750 British and Ojibwe allies defending what was at the time the capital of Upper Canada. The American impulse at the beginning of the War of 1812 was one of a young country looking for room to grow. Seeing the rivers and lakes to the north as key routes for trade and transportation, Americans attempted, unsuccessfully, to gain control of Canada. But the desired outcome — American expansion and control in Canada — never came to fruition.
Who would have imagined that 212 years later, what at first seemed like provocative musing from Donald Trump about Canada becoming the fifty-first state and the elimination of the “artificial border” separating the two countries would turn into a destructive trade war and a campaign with the potential to undermine the sovereignty of Canada and cause untold damage on both sides of the border?
This onslaught emerged as we were writing this book. It served to underscore the importance of Canada’s major cities — Toronto in particular — and their success and survival in the face of the geopolitical destabilization that was occurring as a result of the Trump presidency.
When we talk about “saving Toronto” we mean the entire Toronto cityregion. It can be defined in several ways, depending on the context. The most common definition from a governance perspective is the Greater Toronto Area (GTA), which comprises the City of Toronto and the surrounding regional municipalities of Durham, Halton, Peel, and York. The Census Metropolitan Area (CMA) includes the City of Toronto and surrounding areas and is used for statistical purposes. For our book, we are not bound by these formal boundaries. There is no single definition of “Toronto,” and our meaning of the word may vary depending on what is being discussed: for example, regional economies are intertwined; urbanized areas are co-dependent; natural systems and watersheds extend up to the Oak Ridges Moraine; transportation is regional; and the relationship between urban and farmland includes the Greenbelt and beyond.
In her sweeping opening chapter, “What We Are Up Against,” Anne Golden traces Toronto’s transformation from a city that once “worked” to one facing acute challenges. Drawing on decades of leadership in public policy and urban advocacy, she diagnoses the crises undermining the region: political dysfunction, financial constraints, crumbling infrastructure, unaffordable housing, and regional sprawl — exacerbated by megatrends like AI, climate change, identity politics, and economic turmoil, including Trump’s second term. Yet, she argues, Toronto’s vibrant diversity, creativity, and resilience offer hope. She calls for bold reforms in governance, finance, and planning to avoid decline and to rebuild Toronto as a sustainable, inclusive, and livable city-region.
Councillor Josh Matlow, in “Making Local Government Work,” recounts how Premier Doug Ford’s 2018 decision to slash Toronto’s council size mid-election exemplifies the province’s overreach into local democracy. Drawing on his experiences as a city councillor and former school trustee, Matlow shows how successive provincial governments have systematically undermined Toronto’s autonomy — on everything from land-use planning to bike lanes and social services. He argues that Toronto lacks the powers it needs to address complex urban challenges, and he calls for a city charter to ensure real self-governance. His chapter is a passionate call to reclaim local democracy and empower Toronto to chart its own course.
In “Finding the Money,” Enid Slack explores the chronic mismatch between the services Canadian cities are expected to deliver and the outdated financial tools at their disposal. Cities like Toronto face growing infrastructure needs, climate challenges, population pressures, and cyber threats while relying on nineteenth-century revenue tools — mainly property taxes and user fees. Slack explains the constitutional and legislative context limiting municipal autonomy and advocates for a reassessment of “who does what,” urging updated responsibilities and revenue sources. She proposes aligning revenues with expenditures, expanding access to progressive taxes, and introducing regional approaches to tax policy as necessary steps toward fiscal sustainability for cities.
Franz Hartmann, in “Fixing the Housing Crisis,” exposes Ontario’s housing crisis as a largely self-inflicted emergency, driven by outdated policies favouring suburban sprawl, the financialization of housing, and a misplaced reliance on the private sector. He shows how single-family homes built on farmland and natural areas worsen affordability, climate resilience, and municipal budgets. Hartmann champions an evidence-based, community-driven alternative: building a mix of housing types within existing urban areas, scaling up non-market housing, and changing land-use planning rules. His chapter outlines five strategic actions for a livable, inclusive, and sustainable housing future anchored in civic engagement and collective political pressure to shift government priorities.
In “Unclogging the City,” Matti Siemiatycki paints a vivid picture of Toronto’s transportation crisis. He describes a region gridlocked by car dependence, where transit is underfunded, biking is politicized, and pedestrian infrastructure is unsafe. He argues that past decisions prioritized cars, creating a sprawling region where most people drive. Meanwhile, transit lags with delayed projects, maintenance backlogs, and declining reliability. He calls for urgent fixes — repairing transit, installing bike lanes, managing construction — and bold long-term reforms such as xv Preface:Why This Book? road pricing and the creation of dense, transit-oriented communities. He concludes that without shifting away from car dominance, Toronto cannot become a truly livable, mobile city.
Tim Gray, in “Protecting Our Shared Ecosystem,” delivers a powerful indictment of urban sprawl’s ecological, climatic, and social impacts on the Greater Toronto Area. He outlines how sprawl fragments forests, destroys wetlands, increases emissions, depletes farmland, and overloads natural systems, threatening biodiversity and climate resilience. Tracing historical shifts in land-use policy, he highlights the backsliding since 2018 under Ontario’s current government, which has gutted environmental protections and empowered developers. Yet he offers a hopeful path forward: Reinforce the Greenbelt, restore regional planning, protect wetlands and natural heritage, implement green building practices, and harness smart energy technologies to support livable, climate-resilient, and ecologically sound urban development.
In “Challenging Technology,” Bianca Wylie critiques the unchecked influence of technology on public life and democracy, warning against prescriptive, efficiency-driven systems that bypass local context and erode public institutions. Drawing on the Sidewalk Toronto case, she highlights the danger of surrendering governance to venture-backed tech companies, urging instead a shift toward holistic, participatory, and democratic approaches to technology. She emphasizes that true progress requires slowing down, fostering trust, and reclaiming public control over systems. Wylie advocates for preserving “friction” in civic processes as essential to accountability, justice, and reciprocity — arguing that democratic life must remain intentionally inefficient, grounded in local wisdom and care.
Zahra Ebrahim, in “Building Solidarity,” emphasizes the critical importance of social cohesion, illustrating through vivid neighbourhood stories how supportive community networks — termed “social infrastructure” — can transform cities by fostering resilience, empathy, and solidarity among diverse groups. Ebrahim highlights challenges such as racial, economic, and geographic segregation, which are exacerbated by digital isolation and divisive online culture. Advocating for intentional public and private spaces for meaningful interaction, she underscores that overcoming social divides requires active engagement, patience, kindness, and collective responsibility. Ultimately, her vision is a compassionate, connected Toronto, built through sustained dialogue, shared spaces, and inclusive participatory design.
Ilana Altman, in her chapter, “Unlocking the Public Realm,” explores how Toronto’s public spaces — essential to democratic life, social cohesion, and environmental resilience — are underfunded and undervalued, despite their growing importance amid urban densification, rising loneliness, and climate threats. She traces a paradigm shift from rigid modernist planning to landscape urbanism, where spaces like the Toronto waterfront, The Bentway, and Ookwemin Minising and Biidaasige Park demonstrate how public space can lead city building. These spaces are no longer “nice to have” but are critical infrastructure. Ilana calls for new governance, sustained investment, programming, and partnerships — public and private — to maintain these multi-solving assets and ensure they evolve alongside a changing, diverse, urban society.
Each of these chapters identifies major challenges that individually and in combination could be cause for serious pessimism. It is impossible to downplay that, potentially foretelling a darker future. Yet in every case there are glimmers of a more hopeful way forward if we do certain, often difficult things.
In his concluding chapter, “A Call to Action,” Ken Greenberg asks whether Toronto is truly facing a dark future or if it can forge a more hopeful path. He shows how threats and solutions are interdependent and how resilience necessitates breaking out of silos and finding lateral solutions. He argues that decline is not inevitable and that hope, even amid external threats, governance failures, and regressive provincial policies, is justified. The path forward demands that we keep showing up, acknowledge our strengths and weaknesses, and continue advocating for what we believe in. The outcome depends on what we do next together.
In times of great uncertainty when things go awry, cities are the fundamental repositories of culture, identity, and innovation, places where faith is kept, where the spirit is kindled, and where values that we cherish are preserved. It is our belief that certain events in this particular troubled time have only upped the ante around the challenges we are identifying and the urgent need for solutions. The success of Toronto as a city and city-region becomes even more important as a bulwark of Canadian distinctiveness. As our cities go, so goes the nation.
Toronto’s future is on the line. We hope this book will inspire Torontonians — and all those invested in urban life — to reflect, engage, and act. Cities are among humanity’s most remarkable creations, but they flourish only when we allow them to. Saving Toronto: Ten City Builders Tell Us How speaks to our conviction that our future is not preordained, that we have the ideas and the talent to make a course correction if we can summon the will.
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