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You should try Vancouver. When I was there around 2010, average monthly housing costs exceeded 100% of median income. I hear it's gotten better and it's "only" 79% now.

Which brings up a important caveat to these type of stories. These home price to income ratios are assuming you just got a job there and need to move and buy a home in the area. If you've been living there for a while, you bought your home when the price was much lower, so it still makes sense for you to live and work there.

Pride goeth...

"Gastown is the historic centre of Vancouver. But after the 1920s, Gastown became a quiet backwater of deteriorating buildings. It wasn't until the 1960s that the public began to appreciate Gastown's distinctive architecture and role in the city's history, and undertook to revitalize the area.

Posted - 6/10/2007 1:01:27 AM: Having recently spent some time in London UK, coming back to Vancouver was a shocker. "Yes the air was cleaner and the people laid back here but woah, Vancouver felt like a rural back water."

Ocean Cement is one of the last tenants of its kind here; its lease on Granville Island expired in 1999. The occasional tugboat still makes its way in and out of False Creek with a load of sand for the city works yard, but otherwise this sheltered backwater is the playground of kayakers and canoeists...

Expo 86 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
"It remains to date the biggest event in British Columbia history and is viewed by many as the transition of Vancouver from a sleepy provincial backwater to...

Vancouver Courier.com 'SOUL FOOD FOR FESTIVE SEASON'
Whether it's music, theatre or ballet, the city has no shortage of festive entertainment to temporarily ward off the winter blahs and infuse the soul with Christmas spirit. So bah, humbug to all the Eastern Canadian culture snobs who think Vancouver is a backwater."

. . . you're wondering why a group of people would be opposed to communism would want to live in a "planned" community?

The problem is not just that Party apartments are small and uncomfortable; the opposition to communism is ideological, not only practical. I wonder why people who are ideologically opposed to central planning would want to live in a (centrally) planned community - or at least why they would not notice the inconstency. Of course, if the ideological complaint really centers on property (as you imply), not planning, then it makes sense - although in that case the arguments about the superiority of markets to central planning has been hypocritical hot air. Actually, I think this has the ring of truth to it.

There are a couple of developments here around central Virginia that have been pretty successful. The common spaces really *are* used.

The difference I see between a mall and (say) a public plaza is that the former is private property, to which you are admitted on the assumption you will help the mall owners achieve their goal (selling things). Do otherwise - playing checkers, eccentric dress, religious prosletyzing, political activites, etc. may get you kicked out. The same is not true of a public space: it is truly a place of multiple purposes and uses, in which people can meet on equal terms. If ownership of property helps people be in charge of their private lives, public spaces and institutions help them achieve the same within their society.

the kind of developers you are talking about should have no trouble getting some zone rules and other regulations changed when they are proposing a large development

I have read several instances in Canada where this has not been the case: developers have given up on innovative projects because even when the bureaucracy supports alternatives in principle, in practice it has rejected change at every step.

As for your developments in Virginia, if people really do use and appreciate them, then that's fantastic. Most (but not all) of the new urban "communities" I have seen elsewhere have failed to achieve that.

Sprawl has happened because developers were giving people what they want. Having an affordable house with a yard for the kids and decent schools are often not available in urban environments.

Probably many people have wanted those things, but many others have not. In a development monoculture it's impossible to know. Developers, like other people, often stampede to one solution, then to another. Some people may prioritize a private yards, while others may prefer shared playgrounds or courtyards. School quality is not a consequence of suburbia per-se, but correlates to the status of the people who live in an area (indeed, house prices are effectively used as a means to exclude those of lower class from schools). Given the variety of housing and urban styles around the world, it seems likely in a society of immigrants that these styles would appear. But for the most part they don't.

In the Vancouver area, where I live, we are cursed with hordes of Vancouver Specials, a kind of generic boxy house. But immigrants didn't buy them because that's what they wanted, rather because "that's what was available and they assumed it was the latest style". Now Specials are out of fashion. An architect who wanted to work with one found that "The toughest part of the challenge . . . lay in that thicket of bylaws. Robb spent all of 2000 negotiating with city-hall planners". Before you say that's just one guy, realize that innovation often starts with those on the margins. Stopping one guy from trying something new may stop

You may be expecting a joke about putting up with a bunch of unruly 14-year-olds.

Sorry, he deserves it .

Details here.

All slashdotters are welcome in Canada. The draft dodgers during the Vietnam war by-and-large went on to become professors, writers, activists and even politicians (one of them is currently on city council here in Vancouver, B.C.). I'm sure slashdotters would enrich the country to an even greater degree.

As for the new smart border and homeland security, that was a problem even then. There was an underground railroad during Vietnam that smuggled draft dodgers up. For those who are interested, it seems a new version may be started for modern draft dodgers.

Taking a stand is tough, but public opinion in Canada will support anyone who makes it here.

All slashdotters are welcome in Canada. The draft dodgers during the Vietnam war by-and-large went on to become professors, writers, activists and even politicians (one of them is currently on city council here in Vancouver, B.C.). I'm sure slashdotters would enrich the country to an even greater degree.

As for the new smart border and homeland security, that was a problem even then. There was an underground railroad during Vietnam that smuggled draft dodgers up. For those who are interested, it seems a new version may be started for modern draft dodgers.

Taking a stand is tough, but public opinion in Canada will support anyone who makes it here.

... is that when a fight breaks out at a bar, it's often somewhat difficult to prevent the people involved from leaving before the police get there. This way, besides having your info, they've got a cuurent picture of you - that picture can be used to check with the remaining patrons - "So, was this the person that smacked the guy over there with a bottle?" or with the bartender as to who the people involved were.

I believe this whole thing was triggered by shootings in a club in Vancouver - http://www.vancourier.com/083203/news/083203nn2.ht ml.

It'd make a big difference for cases like that.

About 10 years ago, a friend of mine named Joseph Wu tried to do his MSc in computing science on computer origami. After a couple of years of trying, his thesis adviser pointed out that some of the mathematical/algorithmic problems he had uncovered were beyond what would be appropriate to a PhD. He's now a professional origami artist.

To give you an idea as to his ability, He used to fold $2 bills into mules and leave them as tips for waitresses. Now that the smallest Canadian bill is $5, I'm not sure if he's still doing it. According to an online article, one of his dreams is to produce origami smoke.

I live in Vancouver, where Kim Rossmo got his Ph.d and started his geoprofiling.

He was very successful, and it led to his rapid advancement in the Vancouver Police Department. But like most police departments, it's still old-boys, and alot of them resented an educated individual rising through the ranks so quickly.

Finally, they told him they weren't extending his contract when he was promoted too far. He sued. During the trial, the senior VPD members were made to look like fools for lying under oath.

One of the interesting things that came out was that he suspected (back in June, 2001) that a serial killer was involved in the disappearance of 20 to 30 Vancouver women. Well, he was right. The Vancouver police are conducting a huge investigation at a pig farm in the Vancouver area, and Robert William Pickton is now Canada's most prolific known serial killer with 16 or so charges in the works, and more pending as they find more DNA at the farm.

I don't know much about the technology (or psychology) involved, but I do know that when he applied his software to some of Canada's other serial killers (Paul Bernardo, Cliffard Olsen, etc) his software picked a 4-block area which included the killer's home. It was also used to catch a killer in Abbotsford.

Thanks to a bunch of fat old men who's ego has extended past their intelligence, Vancouver has lost what appears to be a top-rate talent.