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How much growth in Toronto is too much? That’s a complicated debate, and Doug Ford’s Ontario government just blew it up.

When the pieces land – and we understand the details of the Ontario government’s plan to shake up planning rules in high-growth areas of Toronto – they will anger people at city hall. Indeed, the backlash has already begun.

That reaction, as much as these changes, leaves me worried for the city’s future. It seems that few people have a realistic sense of how the city is growing and the kind of physical change that will be needed. In short, lots, and the changes under discussion this week would barely begin to make a dent.

This week’s provincial changes, some details still unclear at press time, would increase the number of homes to be built around the intersection of Yonge Street and Eglinton Avenue and in Toronto’s downtown. That will add thousands of new people in the zones where lots of new people are already moving. This is not ideal.

It’s also not the end of the world. Though this government is prone to populist nonsense, these changes seem to be measured and, in other places, could even be seen as progressive. Toronto is the fastest-growing city in North America. It is going to need hundreds of thousands of new homes in the next generation, and it’s not clear at the moment where they are going.

A recent analysis from the Canadian Centre for Economic Analysis and the Canadian Urban Institute, done for the city’s affordable housing office, paints a dramatic picture: that Toronto will grow from its current population of 2.7 million to more than 3.9 million by 2041. That’s double the growth anticipated by current plans. This means prosperity and strife; there will be higher rents and home prices, and people will suffer, most of all the city’s most vulnerable.

A progressive and thoughtful response to this would involve large-scale social housing, which Mayor John Tory and the City of Toronto are manifestly not building. Doug Ford’s Progressive Conservatives, needless to say, show no interest in this.

It would also involve opening up the Yellowbelt, the 200 square kilometres of city neighbourhoods where only detached houses are allowed. Thanks to 50-year-old rules, these areas are thinly populated and shrinking. That’s right: while a few areas of Toronto are getting much more crowded, big swaths of the city are losing people.

Good news on that front. This week’s policy changes, which also permit some tall buildings where mid-rise only had been allowed, talk about “encouraging compatible intensification” in some Neighbourhoods. That’s capital-N, a category in the city’s official plan, and such areas are generally untouchable.

The political backlash from city politicians deserves some serious skepticism. The protests from city councillors in midtown, led by councillor Josh Matlow, are particularly rich. While Yonge and Eglinton has seen a lot of condo development, it is tightly contained in a few areas that are defined by the city’s own rules. This area has had apartment buildings, and apartment-building zoning, for half a century.

And if you look outside the gerrymandered area of the city’s “Midtown in Focus” plan, you find neighbourhoods that have, according to that CANCEA analysis, added no people at all since 2001. This isn’t surprising; visit any side street near Avenue Road and Eglinton and look around. You will find 4000-square-foot houses, shiny Range Rovers, and zero new condos.

I understand why some people want to keep it that way. The community consultation processes of which planners are so fond have enabled such people to have their say. But bringing more people to live in this spot is a goal that makes sense, and is largely in keeping with the progressive planning agenda that Ontario Liberals introduced during their dozen years in power.

Of course, this isn’t the whole story. The Tories are doing other things: their omnibus Bill 108 also allows for more sprawl, guts environmental protections, and attacks heritage protections. None of that is necessary or helpful. But the broad theme of allowing more “infill” housing – above all, in Toronto – could be.

The situation downtown is less clear. Details of the government’s proposed changes to the downtown secondary plan, TOCore, were not yet public at press time. Much of that document makes sense, particularly the call for an expanded network of public space and public facilities. But in some respects it is out of touch with the realities of a very fast-growing, increasingly expensive city. Its mandate for “family” apartments of more than 1,000 square feet – affordable only to a family that can pay over $1-million for a condo – is a worthy target for the province.

These are complicated times. Toronto is in a unique spot within Ontario, and within Canada. It is going to have a hard time dealing with the growth of the next generation. Politicians of all stripes should be working to find ways to make that growth as widespread and inclusive as possible. This is going to mean some happy developers, and some angry homeowners. But, with luck, enough room for new arrivals, even in North Toronto.

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