How Can We Build More of Canada's Most Loved Neighbourhoods?

In Ottawa, on a Saturday morning, the sidewalks of the Glebe are full. People are walking to coffee shops. Parents are pushing strollers. Cyclists move between local businesses. Friends stop to chat on street corners. A short distance away, someone is walking to the grocery store while another resident heads to a nearby park. 

The Glebe, Ottawa.

The same scene plays out in Hintonburg in Ottawa, Saint John's in Newfoundland, the Plateau in Montreal, Leslieville & Riverdale in Toronto and countless other beloved neighbourhoods across Canada. 

Hintonburg, Ottawa.

These places consistently attract residents and remain desirable generation after generation. People want to live there. Businesses want to locate there. Visitors enjoy spending time there. 

At a time when governments across Canada are searching for solutions to the housing crisis, perhaps a more important question is this: What can these neighbourhoods teach us about building communities that people want to live in? 

Saint John's, Newfoundland.

Great neighbourhoods are ultimately built on one simple principle: proximity. People, homes, businesses, services, recreation, and daily needs are located close enough together that they become part of everyday life. That proximity creates convenience.

Convenience encourages walking. Walking creates activity. Activity creates opportunities for interaction. And over time, those interactions create something increasingly rare in modern society: a strong sense of community. This is what makes so many of Canada's most desirable neighbourhoods enduringly successful. 

The Power of Mid-Density, Low-Rise Housing 

While Canada's most beloved neighbourhoods may differ in age, architecture, and geography, they share a remarkably similar physical form. They are built around a mix of housing that includes low-rise multi-unit housing. 

Mid-density, low-rise homes in Hamilton, Ontario.

Triplexes, fourplexes, townhouses, walk-up apartments, laneway homes, and small mixed-use buildings exist alongside single-family homes, parks, schools, cafés, shops, and community amenities. The result is enough population to support local businesses and transit services, while maintaining a human scale that people find comfortable and inviting. 

This is not high-rise urbanism, nor is it conventional suburban development. 

A low-rise, multi-unit home in the Glebe, Ottawa.

It's a pattern of growth centred on low-rise multi-unit housing that allows more people to live in desirable neighbourhoods without sacrificing the character, walkability, and sense of place that residents value. It’s a middle ground that allows more people to live close to one another without sacrificing neighbourhood character. 

Quebec City, Quebec.

Perhaps most importantly, this pattern creates housing choice. Young professionals, growing families, downsizing seniors, and long-time residents can often find housing options within the same community. That diversity of housing supports a diversity of people, incomes, and life stages, strengthening both the social and economic fabric of the neighbourhood. 

Pair of long semi-detached homes in Hintonburg, Ottawa, with 8 units in total.

Ironically, many of the housing forms we now describe as "missing middle" were once simply called housing. They were common features of Canadian communities for generations and helped create many of the places we now celebrate as our most successful neighbourhoods. 

Age Alone Does Not Create Great Neighbourhoods 

It would be easy to assume that the success of neighbourhoods like the Glebe, Saint John's, the Plateau, Leslieville, and Riverdale is simply a function of age. 

Row homes in the Plateau, Montreal.

But age alone does not create great neighbourhoods. 

Across Canada, countless older neighbourhoods do not attract the same level of demand, walkability, or community activity. Many consist primarily of single-detached homes on large lots, separated from shops, services, employment areas, and community amenities. While these neighbourhoods often provide stability and quiet residential streets, they can also limit housing choice, reduce opportunities for daily interaction, and make residents more dependent on automobiles for everyday activities. 

A residential neighbourhood with single-detached homes and limited housing choice.

The difference is not in when they were built. It’s how they were built. 

Canada's most desirable neighbourhoods were shaped by a pattern of development that brought people, housing, businesses, parks, and services together. They evolved with a mix of housing types and enough residents to support local amenities and transportation options. 

A multi-unit home in the Glebe, Ottawa, that fits in more units in a low-rise neighbourhood, close to shops and local amenities.

In contrast, many neighbourhoods were designed around a single housing type and lower residential densities. While these communities continue to play an important role in Canada's housing system, they often lack the critical mass needed to support walkability, transit service, local businesses, and community life that characterizes many of the country's most sought-after neighbourhoods. 

A neighbourhood designed around the single-family home.

The lesson is not that every neighbourhood should look the same. 

It is that the qualities people value most—walkability, housing choice, local amenities, and community connection—are rarely created by accident. They emerge from a pattern of development that allows enough people to live close enough together to support them. 

The Blueprint Already Exists 

Canada's housing challenge is often framed as a search for new ideas. But when it comes to housing in great neighbourhoods, we already know what works. We can see it in the neighbourhoods we love and visit. 

Hintonburg, Ottawa.

These communities demonstrate that low-rise multi-unit housing can support walkability, transit, local businesses, housing choice, and strong communities while remaining human-scaled and deeply desirable. 

The Glebe, Ottawa.

They show us that housing choice, community, and growth are not competing objectives. They are complementary ones. 

The challenge facing Canada is not discovering a new model but shifting our less desirable and fiscally unsustainable neighbourhoods to become thriving communities. 

Multi-unit low-rise housing.

If we want more affordable housing, stronger communities, and more sustainable growth, we should stop treating our favourite neighbourhoods as exceptions. 

We should start treating them as the blueprint.

Less desirable neighbourhoods can intensify to match the densities and diversity of housing in our favourite neighbourhoods by allowing new multi-unit buildings. People often respond to this suggestion with great concern. 

Old Montreal, Quebec.

After all, when Canadians imagine their ideal neighbourhood, they are often imagining a place that already exists. 

The goal is not to replicate the Glebe, the Plateau, or Saint John's block by block. The goal is to allow more neighbourhoods to evolve toward the qualities that make those places so desirable: walkability, housing choice, local amenities, strong communities, and a sense of belonging.