Gentrification, the process of urban transformation in which lower-income residents are displaced by an influx of wealthier residents and investment, is a significant social issue that typically impacts low-income or historically under-funded urban neighborhoods. In Canadian cities such as Vancouver, Montreal, and Toronto, gentrification has influenced the development of several urban communities, which in turn has impacted the culture of cities and housing affordability. Policy decisions hold the power to not only contribute to gentrification but undo it. This section will provide information relevant to gentrification history and politics within Canada, gentrification policies, and measuring gentrification. Additionally, it will expand upon the role of government in managing and responding to the process of gentrification. By understanding gentrification in key Canadian cities, we can better assess the policies and strategies that will ensure inclusive, sustainable, and equitable urban growth for all Canadians.
The Importance of Addressing Gentrification
Gentrification has explicit and long-lasting consequences for social and cultural development within Canadian cities. As wealthy demographics move into previously affordable areas, those communities are often culturally eroded, socially marginalized, and physically displaced. This process compounds existing social inequality issues within Canada - Canadian gentrification historically has a proportionally greater impact on communities with higher concentrations of Indigenous peoples and other marginalized groups.
Section Scope & Learning Goals
✔ Understand examples of historical context and causes of gentrification.
✔ Understand measurement tools for gentrification and how they apply to Canada.
✔ Gain insight into municipal policy efforts to combat gentrification.
Gentrification in Canadian cities has complex social historical roots intertwined with economic and policy-driven changes across time. Emerging in the mid-20th century, gentrification in Canadian cities was often preceded by a departure from industrialized worker-focused urban cores. Cities like Vancouver and Montreal are examples where historically working-class areas redeveloped and transformed as wealthier residents moved in, attracted by the proximity to downtown cores, historical value, and subsequent rising property values. Across Canada, this process has displaced lower-income communities and often failed to safeguard the social equity of marginalized neighborhoods, leaving behind an intertwined inner city of the social elite and socially forgotten.
Click on the above sub-pages to learn more about city-specific gentrification history and plans.
In order to assess the impacts of gentrification, you must first be able to measure gentrification. Measuring gentrification involves assessing various economic, demographic, and cultural indicators, such as declining social mix, ethnicity diversity, immigrant concentration, housing evictions, and investment into built-environment changes. Measuring previously gentrified areas or areas susceptible to gentrification is the first step in providing communities with municipal policy support in combating gentrification.
Click on the above sub-page to learn more about GENUINE, Canada’s tool for measuring gentrification within cities.
Gentrification cannot be prevented through civilian activism and education alone. Although urban renewal projects often carry unintended consequences for equity, Municipal policy decisions, and initiatives are critical tools that can be utilized to reshape and reduce the impacts of gentrification. By prioritizing affordability and inclusivity, Municipal housing and city development can reduce the displacement of low-income residents at risk of gentrification. Housing strategies and city development action plans are tools used by municipal governments to ensure cities continue to develop without displacing vulnerable residents or diminishing community culture.
🤺Combating Gentrification Through Policy: Affordable Housing Programs and Inclusionary Zoning