I like Montreal and Toronto. I live in Toronto because I like the diversity, but I'm sure I would happily live in Montreal too.
That said, it isn't fair to compare housing costs between Quebec cities and Ontario ones. Land tax is much, much higher in Quebec to the point where even just across the river from Ottawa you'll see 2x housing differentials. Add in language laws of Quebec which, I'm actually in favour of, and you'll end up with parents preferring Ontario even when they have a choice of where to live for work.
Lastly, the scale on those maps matter. Montreal is much smaller than Toronto. My home city has a bunch of condo buildings, yes, but they aren't all surrounded directly by suburban homes. There are a decent number of midrises and row houses, though not as much as I would hope for. But when looking at maps, it's important to keep in mind the absolute SCALE of Toronto. Toronto is HUGE. Only two American cities beat it out in size, New York and LA. Montreal has more midrises around its core in large part because its core is so small and that is the natural function of the mathematics of things. In Toronto we build our core up, up, up. Over twenty-five buildings are over 200 meters tall, compared to Montreal's measly two.
We can learn from some of the things Montreal does right, and I agree their midrises are generally speaking better than ours, but it's more complicated than this article makes it out to be, even if there are real lessons to glean from its good faith take.
The scale on the maps I showed is the same, which is the point. Toronto, as you point out, has a built up core, but Montreal spreads its density wider.
That said, it isn't fair to compare housing costs between Quebec cities and Ontario ones. Land tax is much, much higher in Quebec to the point where even just across the river from Ottawa you'll see 2x housing differentials. Add in language laws of Quebec which, I'm actually in favour of, and you'll end up with parents preferring Ontario even when they have a choice of where to live for work.
Lastly, the scale on those maps matter. Montreal is much smaller than Toronto. My home city has a bunch of condo buildings, yes, but they aren't all surrounded directly by suburban homes. There are a decent number of midrises and row houses, though not as much as I would hope for. But when looking at maps, it's important to keep in mind the absolute SCALE of Toronto. Toronto is HUGE. Only two American cities beat it out in size, New York and LA. Montreal has more midrises around its core in large part because its core is so small and that is the natural function of the mathematics of things. In Toronto we build our core up, up, up. Over twenty-five buildings are over 200 meters tall, compared to Montreal's measly two.
We can learn from some of the things Montreal does right, and I agree their midrises are generally speaking better than ours, but it's more complicated than this article makes it out to be, even if there are real lessons to glean from its good faith take.