wang1
Neighbourhood Proposal
Yifei Wang
University of Toronto
CITA01 Foundation of City Studies
Killian McCormack
Oct. 16, 2023
wang2
Part 1 Identifying a neighbourhood
Regent Park is one neighbour in Toronto. It is located right in downtown. Its boundaries are along
the Gerrard Street East, River Street and Shuter Street etc. Regent Park has a large number of
residential building and residents. Before the urban development, it was completely covered by
social housing and these residents are the major citizens of the community. Nowadays, the majority
of the buildings in the area is still community housing. The neighbourhood offers low-price
accommodation to the city poor. Most buildings and units inside these buildings are run by the city
community housing companies. They are located by all the Regent Park streets such as Parliament
Street, Dundas Street etc. These apartments are in low buildings and with moderate outlooks. In
the neighbourhood, some high buildings are located but that is not common. In simple words, the
neighbourhood is Toronto’s slum with better conditions than the slums in the global South. It is
treated as a poor area in downtown Toronto. In the area, it has a large number of ethnic minorities,
immigrants and city poor. Their percentage is higher in Regent Park than other neighbourhood in
Toronto. The neighbourhood has a higher chance of crimes and drug abuse. It is an area associated
with all the problems of slums. The income level in this neighbourhood compared to others is
lower. It has a population over 10,000. The area and population is not very large compared to other
neighbourhood but its density in Toronto neighbourhoods is one of the highest. All the physical
features have contributed to the decision to choose this neighbourhood to study. Its income level
is one of the lowest with the highest population density. It is an area that has more problems in
urbanization. It is closely related to the study of problems of global urbanization covered in the
course. One of the problems in global urbanization in cities is the slums (Curtis, 2019). But slums
are mostly studied and noticeable in the global south. Yet, Toronto also has slum problem during
its urbanization. The Regent Park area is a fit topic to study the slum in the developed country. All
wang3
the features in Regent Park has matched with the definition of slums as a highly-populated area
with lower level of development and incomes but high density. Slums such as Regent Park are a
challenge to city management and the problems that government needs to solve in global
urbanization.
Part 2 Toronto in a global context
Source: Centre Island, https://cdn.britannica.com/93/94493-050-35524FED/Toronto.jpg
The picture is Toronto’s city centre and the skyline area: Centre Island. The image has shown the
skyscrapers in Toronto. It has shown the beautiful skylines at night. It has shown the results of
Toronto urbanization and development. The picture is magnificent in a way that it has shown what
the modern urbanization should be like, with skyscrapers, beautiful modern views, glass buildings.
Cities with this level of outlook and this kind of development and urbanization are usually the
global financial and business centres. These are points of cosmopolitan globalization (Sassen,
2016). Cities not just countries are the focal point and driver for globalisation. The economic
globalisation is concentrated in cities like Toronto. And the view such as the one in the picture is
wang4
a proof of whether the city is a globalization hub for business, finance and tourism. Toronto from
the picture has shown that it is one point of in the system of cities. These international professionals,
financers, lawyers and marketers in multinational corporations work in the office in these buildings
(Pickett & Zhou, 2015). They come not just from Toronto, but also other parts of Canada, North
America and the world. They are the one including their companies that are taking down the state
borders and push for further globalisation. Points like Toronto are not many. They benefit mostly
from globalisation or globalisation of cities. The wealth of globalisation is concentrated in these
cities centres. The inequality is not just between countries but also regions in a country. While
Toronto as a point in the globalization of cities has accumulated a large amount of wealth, other
cities in Canada have benefited less. Even inside the city of Toronto, there are financial and
business centres in the picture, but there are also slums such as Regent Park in part 1. The problem
of urban development in globalisation is not just the slum and poverty in cities but also the
inequality inside the cities (Wiig & Silver, 2019). And inequalities inside the cities are also a
challenge for sustainable urbanization. The disparity of urban areas and wealth behind these areas
will cause more anger, hatred and discontent among city residents. It will lead to the instability in
cities. In a word, the globalisation and urbanization have helped cities such as Toronto to be more
connected with other points in the world under the cosmopolitan international professionals
(Houessou et al., 2023). At the same time, it has left a new challenge for cities, the inequality of
urbanization in the global context between the rich neighbourhood and slums in Toronto. Toronto
is globalised and urbanized, so are the problems in global urbanization.
References
Curtis, S. (2019). Global Cities as Market Civilisation. Global Society, 33(4), 437-461.
https://doi.org/10.1080/13600826.2019.1577805
wang5
Houessou, M. D., Sonneveld, B. G. J. S., Aoudji, A. K. N., Thoto, F. S., Snelder, D. J. R. M.,
Adegbidi, A. A., & De Cock Buning, T. (2023). The urban poor: profile and constraints
affecting their participation in allotment gardens. Development in Practice, 33(3), 301-316.
https://doi.org/10.1080/09614524.2022.2066066
Pickett, S. T. A., & Zhou, W. (2015). Global urbanization as a shifting context for applying
ecological science toward the sustainable city. Ecosystem Health and Sustainability, 1(1),
1-15. https://doi.org/10.1890/EHS14-0014.1
Sassen, S. (2016). The Impact of the New Technologies and Globalization on Cities. In A.
Graafland & D. Hauptmann (Eds.), Cities in Transition (pp. 650-658). Routledge.
Wiig, A., & Silver, J. (2019). Turbulent presents, precarious futures: urbanization and the
deployment of global infrastructure. Regional Studies, 53(6), 912-923.
https://doi.org/10.1080/00343404.2019.1566703