Are Canadians Paying More to Build a Stronger Canada?

Around the Coffee Table with Dale Jodoin Are Canadians Paying More to Build a Stronger Canada?   By Dale Jodoin Columnist                                               We Built the Housing. Where Do We Put the Cars? More housing is needed. But when we put more people into smaller spaces, the cars, school traffic, and charging problems do not simply disappear. Come home tonight and look down your street. Not at the houses. Look at the cars. Maybe there are two in a driveway, another at the curb, and one squeezed in front of a neighbour's house. Perhaps visitor parking is full. Now think about that street five or ten years ago. Something has changed. Cities across Canada and the United States need housing. Apartments are going higher. Townhouses are being built closer together. More people are living on the same amount of land. We need those homes. But families have changed too. Housing costs mean adult children may stay home longer. Several generations can live together. Working adults may share a rental because living alone costs too much. Four adults can easily mean three or four cars. Give that household one parking space, and the other cars do not vanish. They go somewhere. Usually, that means the street. Now picture 3:15 outside a school. Parents arrive for pickup. Cars line the curb. Someone stops near a roundabout. Another driver tries to turn around on a dead end street. A homeowner is trying to reach the driveway. Then add a delivery truck, garbage truck, snowplow, or emergency vehicle. Suddenly a street that worked perfectly well for years feels completely different. People get frustrated. Neighbours blame neighbours. Bylaw gets called. But maybe we are blaming the wrong people. Planners face a real problem. Governments want more housing, land is expensive, and parking takes space and money. Ontario has removed minimum parking requirements near major transit stations as part of its effort to lower housing costs. The province has said an underground parking space in a new development can cost as much as $100,000. That deserves to be part of this conversation. Some rental developments also encourage transit use, including programs that can make taking the bus or train more attractive. Good idea, when it works. But not everybody works nine to five. Some people work nights, carry tools, or travel between communities. A transit option only replaces a car if it can take someone where they need to go, when they need to get there. Then comes another question. Electric vehicles. Natural Resources Canada recognizes that people living in apartments and other multi unit buildings can face problems getting access to home charging. The federal government has supported work aimed at improving charging for buildings without individual driveways or garages. So why are we not planning for that before construction? Without proper charging, residents are left searching for practical places to plug in. That can lead to cords, questions about electricity, and arguments over who can charge where. Some high density developments work very well. Put housing near good transit, stores, schools, and jobs, and fewer cars may be needed. The problem is not density. The problem is pretending every neighbourhood works the same way. A downtown apartment beside frequent transit is different from a townhouse development where most residents drive to work. Some places need more parking. Others need better transit, visitor spaces, or EV chargers. There is no magic number. But there had better be a plan. A parking ticket cannot fix a planning decision made five years earlier. Neither can two neighbours arguing beside a blocked driveway. So tonight, look down your street. Count the cars. Look at the school corner. Look at the roundabout. Look at the driveways. If you're already thinking, “I know exactly what he's talking about,” then this problem has already reached your neighbourhood. Build the apartments. Build the townhouses. Build the homes people need. Just remember something basic. When we build housing for more people, we also have to build a community that can handle them. Housing does not end at the front door. Neither does good planning.