General Urban Kitchener Updates and Rumours

[MidTowner]

Canadians generally have the mentality that children don't belong in the centre of cities. As a result, there aren't many children in the centre of cities, and quite logically those areas have stopped catering to them, and the cycle reinforces itself.

People with children can choose to live in areas where they do not have 45 minute commutes. All sorts of things would be much better if they were doing that.

My personal experience, I live near the core of KW. I have young children. I've switched jobs while living in the same place, and because I'm in the core I've been able to take transit or walk to the new jobs. I'm a white collar professional, but that's who we're talking about here, anyway- blue collar folks whose places of employment might necessarily be very far from anywhere they're likely to live, they're not part of this debate about work from home, they just go to work.

Actually, I'd be sunk if my employer went fully remote because then I would need more space- not for my children, who don't take up that much, but for a home office.

This mentality, that "most people with kids" have long commutes, because they need to be out in the suburbs, is a problem, and it's also increasingly archaic. Canada's fertility rate is less than 1.3 now: a family with children is now very likely to have one or at most two. No need to get a big house out in the suburbs.

I wasn't speaking to what *should* happen, but what *IS* happening. I agree with you and I lived near the centre when I was in KW. But that doesn't change the fact that most people do not live that way now (nor is it really an option for most, because housing near the centre, in addition to being scarce is not designed for larger families.

As for my current situation, the Netherlands is obviously very different, and I do live in a suburb, but that isn't really relevant, I work in a different city from where I live, so does my partner (we live between our jobs) so that can't really be fixed. Certainly this will differ by profession, but it is not unusual situation, and transportation here is much more accessible and much less impactful than in Canada anyway.

There should be more three bedroom units being built in new developments. But it's not really the case in a city like KW that housing nearer to the centre is more scarce than housing away from it, and definitely not the case that it's not designed for larger families. There are few larger families, anyway- families with three or more children are getting to be quite rare in Canada.

White collar workers who have children think housing near the centre is not really an option, so they live out in the suburbs, so they demand work from home because the housing they chose don't actually allow them to get anywhere (not just the office). These housing choices contribute to poor land use which makes everyone's transportation more difficult and costly, and feeds the same cycle.