Toronto is the largest city in Canada and the provincial capital of Ontario. It is located in Southern Ontario on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario. With over 2.5 million residents, it is the fifth most populous municipality in North America. Toronto is at the heart of the Greater Toronto Area (GTA), and is part of a densely populated region in Southern Ontario known as the Golden Horseshoe, which is home to over 8.1 million residents—approximately 25% of Canada's population. The census metropolitan area (CMA) had a population of 5,113,149, and the Greater Toronto Area had a population of 5,555,912 in the 2006 Census.
As Canada's economic capital, Toronto is considered an alpha world city by the Globalization and World Cities (GaWC) study group and is one of the top financial centres in the world.
Toronto's leading economic sectors include finance, business services,
telecommunications, aerospace, transportation, media, arts, film,
television production, publishing, software production, medical
research, education, tourism and sports industries. The Toronto Stock Exchange, the world's eighth largest in terms of market value, is headquartered in the city, along with the most Canadian corporate headquarters of a major Canadian city.
Toronto's population is cosmopolitan and international, reflecting its role as an important destination for immigrants to Canada.
Toronto is one of the world's most diverse cities by percentage of
non-native-born residents, as about 49% of the population were born
outside of Canada.
Because of the city's low crime rates, clean environment, high standard
of living, and friendly attitude to diversity, Toronto is consistently
rated as one of the world's most livable cities by the Economist Intelligence Unit and the Mercer Quality of Living Survey. In addition, Toronto was ranked as the most expensive Canadian city in which to live in 2006[update]. Residents of Toronto are called Torontonians.
History
Main articles: History of Toronto, Name of Toronto, and Amalgamation of Toronto
Before 1800
When Europeans first arrived at the site of present-day Toronto, the vicinity was inhabited by the Huron tribes, who by then had displaced the Iroquois tribes that had occupied the region for centuries before c. 1500. The name Toronto is likely derived from the Iroquois word tkaronto, meaning "place where trees stand in the water". It refers to the northern end of what is now Lake Simcoe, where the Huron had planted tree saplings to corral fish. A portage route from Lake Ontario to Lake Huron running through this point, the Toronto Carrying-Place Trail, led to widespread use of the name.
French traders founded Fort Rouillé on the current Exhibition grounds in 1750, but abandoned it in 1759. During the American Revolutionary War, the region saw an influx of British settlers as United Empire Loyalists fled for the unsettled lands north of Lake Ontario. In 1787, the British negotiated the Toronto Purchase with the Mississaugas of New Credit, thereby securing more than a quarter million acres (1000 km2) of land in the Toronto area.
In 1793, Governor John Graves Simcoe established the town of York on the existing settlement, naming it after Prince Frederick, Duke of York and Albany. Simcoe chose the town to replace Newark as the capital of Upper Canada, believing the new site would be less vulnerable to attack by the Americans. Fort York
was constructed at the entrance of the town's natural harbour,
sheltered by a long sand-bar peninsula. The town's settlement formed at
the eastern end of the harbour behind the peninsula, near the
present-day intersection of Parliament Street and Front Street (in the Corktown–St. Lawrence area).
1800–1945
o became the largest alcohol distillation (in particular
spirits) centre in North America, the
Gooderham and Worts Distillery
operations became the world's largest whiskey factory by the 1860s. A
preserved section of this once dominant local industry remains in the Distillery District,
the harbour allowed for sure access of grain and sugar imports used in
processing. Expanding port and rail facilities brought in Northern
Timber for export and imported Pennsylvania coal, industry dominated
the waterfront for the next 100 years.
Horse-drawn streetcars gave way to electric streetcars in 1891, when
the city granted the operation of the transit franchise to the Toronto Railway Company. The public transit system passed into public ownership in 1921 as the Toronto Transportation Commission, later renamed the Toronto Transit Commission. The system now has the third-highest ridership of any city public transportation system in North America.
The Great Toronto Fire
of 1904 destroyed a large section of downtown Toronto, but the city was
quickly rebuilt. The fire had cost more than $10 million in damage, led
to more stringent fire safety laws, and the expansion of the city's
fire department.
The city received new immigrant groups beginning in the late 19th century into early 20th century, particularly Germans, French, Italians, and Jews from various parts of Eastern Europe. They were soon followed by Chinese, Russians, Poles and immigrants from other Eastern European nations, as the Irish before them, many of these new migrants lived in overcrowded shanty type slums, such as "the Ward" which was centred on Bay Street,
now the heart of the country's finances. Despite its fast paced growth,
by the 1920s, Toronto's population and economic importance in Canada
remained second to the much longer established Montreal. However, by 1934, the Toronto Stock Exchange had become the largest in the country.
Since 1945
Following the Second World War
refugees from war-torn Europe and Chinese job-seekers arrived. So too
did construction labourers, particularly from Italy and Portugal.
Following elimination of racially based immigration
policies by the late 1960s, immigration began from all parts of the
world. Toronto's population grew to more than one million in 1951 when
large-scale suburbanization
began, and doubled to two million by 1971. By the 1980s, Toronto had
surpassed Montreal as Canada's most populous city and the chief
economic hub.
During this time, in part owing to the political uncertainty raised by the resurgence of the Quebec sovereignty movement,
many national and multinational corporations moved their head offices
from Montreal to Toronto and other western Canadian cities.
In 1954, the City of Toronto and 12 surrounding municipalities were federated into a regional government known as Metropolitan Toronto.
The postwar boom had resulted in rapid suburban development, and it was
believed that a coordinated land use strategy and shared services would
provide greater efficiency for the region. The metropolitan government
began to manage services that crossed municipal boundaries, including highways.
Water and public transit. In that year, a half-century after the Great Fire of 1904, disaster struck the city again when Hurricane Hazel
brought intense winds and flash flooding. In the Toronto area, 81
people were killed, nearly 1,900 families were left homeless, and the
hurricane caused more than $25 million in damage.
In 1967, the seven smallest municipalities of Metropolitan Toronto
were merged into their larger neighbours, resulting in a
six-municipality configuration that included the old, i.e. pre-1954 City of Toronto and the surrounding municipalities of East York, Etobicoke, North York, Scarborough and York.
In 1998, the metropolitan government was dissolved by the Provincial
Government in the face of vigorous opposition from the smaller
component municipalities and all six municipalities were amalgamated into a single municipality, creating the current City of Toronto, with Mel Lastman as its first mayor (after being mayor of North York) and David Miller succeeding him as the current mayor.
The city celebrated its 175th anniversary on March 6, 2009, since its in inception as the City of Toronto in 1834.
Geography
Toronto covers an area of 630 square kilometres (243 sq mi),
with a maximum north-south distance of 21 kilometres (13 mi) and a
maximum east-west distance of 43 km (27 mi). It has a 46-kilometre
(29 mi) long waterfront shoreline, on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario. The Toronto Islands and Port Lands extend some distance out into the lake, allowing for a somewhat sheltered Toronto Harbour immediately south of the downtown core. The city's borders are formed by Lake Ontario to the south, Etobicoke Creek and Highway 427 to the west, Steeles Avenue to the north and the Rouge River to the east.
Topography
The city is intersected by two rivers and numerous tributaries: the Humber River in the west end and the Don River east of downtown at opposite ends of the Toronto Harbour. The harbour was naturally created by sediment build-up from lake currents that created the Toronto Islands. The many creeks and rivers cutting from north toward the lake created large tracts of densely forested ravines, and provide ideal sites for parks and recreational trails. However, the ravines also interfere with the city's grid plan, and this results in major thoroughfares such as Finch Avenue, Leslie Street, Lawrence Avenue, and St. Clair Avenue terminating on one side of ravines and continuing on the other side. Other thoroughfares such as the Prince Edward Viaduct
are required to span above the ravines. These deep ravines prove useful
for draining the city's vast storm sewer system during heavy rains, but
some sections, particularly near the Don River are prone to sudden,
heavy floods. Storage tanks at waste treatment facilities will often
receive too much river discharge causing them to overflow, allowing
untreated sewage to escape into Lake Ontario closing local beaches for
swimming.
During the last ice age, the lower part of Toronto was beneath Glacial Lake Iroquois. Today, a series of escarpments mark the lake's former boundary, known as the Iroquois Shoreline. The escarpments are most prominent from Victoria Park Avenue to the mouth of Highland Creek, where they form the Scarborough Bluffs. Other observable sections include the area near St. Clair Avenue West between Bathurst Street and the Don River, and north of Davenport Road from Caledonia to Spadina Road; the Casa Loma
grounds sit above this escarpment. Despite its deep ravines, Toronto is
not remarkably hilly, but elevation differences range from 75 metres
(246 ft) above-sea-level at the Lake Ontario shore to 209 m (686 ft)
ASL near the York University grounds in the city's north end at the intersection of Keele Street and Steeles Avenue.
Much of the current lakeshore land area fronting the Toronto Harbour
is artificial landfill filled during the late 19th century. Until then
the lakefront docks (then known as wharves) were set back further
inland than today. Much of the adjacent Port Lands
are also fill. The Toronto Islands were a natural landspit until a
storm in 1858 severed their connection to the mainland, creating a
channel later used by shipping interests to access the docks.
Climate
Late spring scene in High Park, in Toronto's west end
Toronto's climate is moderate for Canada owing to its southerly location within the country. It has a humid continental climate (Köppen Dfa),
with warm, humid summers and cold winters. The city experiences four
distinct seasons, with considerable variance in day to day temperature,
particularly during the colder weather season. Owing to urbanization
and its proximity to water, Toronto has a fairly low diurnal
temperature range (day-night temperature difference). The denser urban
scape makes for warmer nights year around and is not as cold throughout
the winter than surrounding areas (particularly north of the city);
however, it can be noticeably cooler on many spring and early summer
afternoons under the influence of a lake breeze. Other low-scale
maritime effects on the climate include lake effect snow, fog and delaying of spring- and fall-like conditions, known as seasonal lag.
Early winter scene at the intersection of Dundas Street and University Avenue
Toronto winters sometimes feature short cold snaps where maximum
temperatures remain below −10 °C (14 °F), often made to feel colder by wind chill.
Snowstorms, sometimes mixed with ice and rain can disrupt work and
travel schedules, accumulating snow can fall any time from November
until mid-April. However, mild stretches with temperatures in the 5 to
12 °C (41 to 54 °F) range and infrequently higher also occur in most
winters melting accumulated snow. Summer in Toronto is characterized by
long stretches of humid weather. Usually in the range from 23 °C
(73 °F) to 31 °C (88 °F), daytime temperatures occasionally surpass
35 °C (95 °F) accompanied by high humidity making it feel oppressive
during these brief periods of hot weather. Spring and autumn are
transitional seasons with generally mild or cool temperatures with
alternating dry and wet periods.
Precipitation is fairly evenly distributed throughout the year, but
summer is usually the wettest season, the bulk falling during
thunderstorms. There can be periods of dry weather, but drought-like
conditions are rare. The average yearly precipitation is about 830 mm
(32.7 in), with an average annual snowfall of about 133 cm (52 in).
Toronto experiences an average of 2,038 sunshine hours, or 44% of
daylight hours, varying between a low of 27% in December to 59% in July.
