Fixing the housing affordability crisis? It’s the density, stupid

OTTAWA—Asked a couple of months ago about giving developers in Ontario the right to build fourplexes on one residential lot, Premier Doug Ford said homeowners wouldn’t tolerate such a policy. It would be a “massive mistake,” he told the media, adding: “We’re going to build homes, single-dwelling homes, and townhomes. That’s what we’re going to focus on. “I can assure you 1,000 per cent, you get in the middle of communities and start putting up four-storey, six-storey, eight-storey buildings right deep in the communities, there’s gonna be a lot of shouting and screaming.” Although the Ford government’s long-brewing housing plan, which takes effect on Oct. 20, makes some gestures toward better housing use in Ontario’s downtown areas, it fails to adequately address the single most important issue: density. While mandating density targets for cities in general, the government’s self-proclaimed flexible approach to planning may leave decisions on expanding residential capacity up to the province’s municipalities, throwing open the door for more urban sprawl in the exurbs. Ford’s stance actually ignores the very first recommendation of the 2022 Ontario Housing Affordability Task Force that he commissioned. Under the subhead “Require greater density,” the task force said: “Land is not being used efficiently across Ontario. In too many neighbourhoods, municipal rules only allow single-family homes—not even a granny suite. Taxpayers have invested heavily in subway, light rail, bus, and rail lines and highways, and the streets nearby are ideally suited for more mid- and high-rise housing. New housing on undeveloped land should also be higher density than traditional suburbs, especially close to highways.” All indications are that when it comes to the housing shortage that has emerged as one of the country’s most pressing concerns, Ontario is providing a case study in how not to address the problem. “The Ford government has chosen to keep enriching land speculators who profit from unsustainable sprawl and farmland loss,” Ontario NDP Leader Marit Stiles commented. “It means people looking for more affordable options like semi-detached, townhome or fourplex apartments will continue to be unfairly shut out of the neighbourhoods where they want to live.” The trend toward urban sprawl is a national phenomenon that has accelerated in the past decade as the scarcity of family-appropriate downtown dwellings and sky-high housing costs have increasingly led people to seek cheaper and/or bigger houses outside of town despite the long commutes. In Canada's three largest urban centres between 2016 and 2021, the distant suburbs—30 minutes or more from downtown—grew at a faster pace than the urban fringe and suburbs closer to downtown, according to Statistics Canada. The population increases among the distant suburbs of Toronto (+9.4 per cent), Montreal (+seven per cent), and Vancouver (+9.5 per cent) all surpassed those of each city overall, the agency said. Urban spread in that period was also occurring in the intermediate suburbs—20 to 30 minutes from downtown—in Edmonton (+23.4 per cent), Calgary (+23.3 per cent) and Ottawa (+21.4 per cent). The growth in these intermediate suburbs largely surpassed that of their respective downtowns, urban fringes, and near suburbs, StatsCan reported. Besides reducing valuable agricultural acreage, urban sprawl leads to large and ongoing infrastructure costs for municipalities and taxpayers, creates traffic congestion that—among other things—hurts business productivity, and increases greenhouse gas pollution. Reversing this trend will require “gentle family-friendly densification of our cities and suburban neighbourhoods,” according to the federally commissioned Task Force for Housing and Climate. “Gentle densification means creating more family-sized units in apartment buildings, and adding more ‘missing middle’ housing types like fourplexes, townhomes, and mid-rise developments,” wrote Mike Moffatt, a Task Force housing expert. “This is the only way to provide more choice for families and other multi-member households while also improving housing affordability, providing better value for taxpayers, and creating greener neighbourhoods.” This means “legalizing density” within built-up areas by government authorities, Moffatt said. “Too many rules and perverse incentives currently make building more family-friendly density in existing cities and communities too prohibitive.” Some of Canada’s cities are moving to fix this problem, but it will take a great deal more concentrated effort on the part of the federal government, the provinces, and municipalities to reverse the urban sprawl trend, and make this change a factor in meeting the country’s house-building goals—a project that is currently way behind schedule. “While federal, provincial, and municipal governments appear to finally be getting serious about growing Canada’s housing supply, we quickly need to get serious about building the right supply,” the federal Task Force report states. “If we build the next 5.8 million homes the same way we built the last 15 million—favouring detached homes and using inefficient design, carbon-intensive materials, and predominantly low-density, car-dependent land use patterns—we won’t only miss our affordability goals, we’ll also blow by Canada’s climate targets.” Les Whittington is a regular columnist for The Hill Times. The Hill Times