Town Focus - Cobourg, Ont (Images)
 

Canada's major cities are awesome but there are also some lesser known gems in Canada we don't often see. Lets change that!

I'm a homer so I'll focus on my hometown which is Cobourg.

Start with a bit of a history lesson.

Cobourg is located on the north shore of Lake Ontario, 1 hour east of Toronto with a current pop. of 18,000. The area was settled around 1798 originally as a group of small villages. The small villages eventually joined together and formed a town called Hamilton, interestingly enough. The town officially changed its name to Cobourg in 1818 in recognition of the marriage of Princess Charlotte to Prince Leopold of Saxe-Coburg-Saalfeld. Little bit of a note...I've read Cobourg is spelt with an O rather than as Coburg because of a typo. Whether that's true or not I'm not sure. Meh. that's enough history on with the pics!

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Cobourg Town Hall #2 by T a k, on Flickr

This is Cobourg's most important and prominent building, Victoria Hall. Built in the 1850s. The town had great aspirations when it was built and Victoria Hall was to symbolize that. After many years the building had began to deteriorate and was on the verge of being TORN DOWN in the 1970s and replaced with a PARKING LOT. Cooler heads prevailed and rather than tear it down they restored it, thank god. It currently serves as the town hall and also contains a concert hall and art gallery.


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Victoria Hall, Cobourg by Ross Dunn, on Flickr


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Victoria Hall by demon_moon, on Flickr

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_DSC0602Anx2-Q50 by edk7, on Flickr

Victoria Hall lies directly in the middle of downtown Cobourg on King St. This is King St...

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Downtown Cobourg by Kiril Strax, on Flickr

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Downtown, Small-scale, Pedestrian-oriented Commercial Street, King Street Cobourg, ON by Ministry of Infrastructure, on Flickr

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Downtown, Small-scale Commercial Street, King Street Cobourg, ON by Ministry of Infrastructure, on Flickr

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P6250003 by gaffer1956, on Flickr

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Downtown, Small-scale, Pedestrian-oriented Commercial Street, Division Street Cobourg, ON by Ministry of Infrastructure, on Flickr

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Cobourg 5 by Sean_Marshall, on Flickr

If you can't read it Cobourg had a ferry to Rochester, NY.
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Cobourg to Rochester: The Ontario Car Ferry Co. 1905-1950 by Will S., on Flickr

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Downtown Cobourg by sayuri_30, on Flickr


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DSCN0132 Street fair, Cobourg, Ontario by pvalentine1, on Flickr


Cobourg's harbour/marina is to the immediate south of the downtown. Like most places on the Great Lakes it was once an industrial wasteland composed of railways, coal piles and large oil drums. The town, realizing the potential of the land, started slowly buying back the waterfront and turning it into what you see today which is open natural areas, condos and parks.

Not sure the date here.
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http://www.cobourghistory.ca/harbour3.htm

Early 1980s
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http://www.cobourghistory.ca/harbour3.htm

Nowadays

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Cobourg Harbour in Canada by BlueSkies705, on Flickr

The condos on the left in this picture lie directly where the large oil drums above once stood.
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Cobourg Marina by Pouncer 2, on Flickr

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Cobourg Marina by justin.fitchett, on Flickr


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The Sylphide by Ramblings From The 4th Concession, on Flickr

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P8244317 by nodomain.cc, on Flickr


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Cobourg, ON by salgal2008, on Flickr

Just to the east of the harbour and downtown is Victoria Park which includes one the nicer beaches you'll find in Ontario.

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Cobourg Beach by mengesphotos, on Flickr

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Victoria Park Pavilion Cobourg Beach by Bobcatnorth, on Flickr


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05062403 by The Blogless One, on Flickr

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20100829 119 Cobourg Triathlon by scottdm, on Flickr


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Cobourg Beach by Saugh30, on Flickr

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Victoria Park gazebo, Cobourg, Ont. by trulygreenfish, on Flickr

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Cobourg Beach & Trailer Camp by demon_moon, on Flickr

One of Cobourg's more popular summer festivals is the Sandcastle Festival...

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IMG_4574 by Yan Simkin, on Flickr

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IMG_4783 by Yan Simkin, on Flickr

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IMG_4581 by Yan Simkin, on Flickr

That concludes the tour for now. Oh and in case you're wondering, yes, Cobourg has the usual big box stores and sprawl. Yay! Although somewhat contained.

Farewell
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Cobourg Sunset by PJMixer, on Flickr

Just gorgeous.

Nice town ;)

Man I love the charm of small towns.:)

BTW, TownGuy... PLEASE repeat this thread in the My City Photos section. I've posted threads for small towns in Newfoundland (Bonavista, Trinity, etc.) that were VERY well received. But they were NOTHING like Coburg, this is a whole other thing. PLEASE do post your thread there. :) It will impress people.

Cobourg is a lovely town and Port Hope just down the road is not bad either. Both have maintained really decent downtowns.

This is motivating me to do something similar for Kingston, which is full of great architecture and a great downtown.

Maybe we should start a "small town" thread, for photos of small towns across Canada. I could easily collect some pictures for 2 or 3 different towns in my area this summer.

Cobourg is a very nice town. I was only there once to do a sight lines study for a new residential development and I was impressed with all the nice old architecture there.

I think I will. Only thing is I didn't take them myself so I have to put it in the Found Photos section which doesn't look like many people visit, lol.

Looks much bigger than 18,000.

Looks like a very well kept town, very pretty!

Good idea. Southern Ontario in particular is just completely covered in little towns no one has really heard of.

Thanks so much for posting these pics. It's true, Cobourg doesn't get the credit it deserves. A very pretty town. Good beach. Neither too close nor too far from Toronto. The perfect little package.

Yeah you're right. Sort of in a sweet spot. Not close enough to turn into a sprawling hellhole but the close enough to enjoy Toronto for the day and be back.

Wow, I had no idea there was such an impressive downtown. I'm gonna have to make a little detour off the 401 next time. Looks amazing.

Wow...

So, what's real estate values like in Cobourg?

Not bad. You can a decent house for $200,000-300,000 although the price goes up dramatically the closer you get to the waterfront and or downtown.

Nice pictures but should it be in the national section? :shrug: I only count 3 posters not from Ontario and none west of Ontario in this thread.

Well, here is one from west of Ontario!

I have been looking to move to the GTA for quite a while now. Last spring on one of my trips there we decided that living in Toronto, for all its advantages would end up making us house poor due to the rapidly rising prices. We started looking outside but didn't really consider Cobourg at that time.

I had heard from several people since that it was a very nice town so July long weekend I went to have a look. Needless to say I was blown away! I immediately retained an agent and started looking for a house, went back on September long weekend with my wife and she loved the place too.

On December 20th we took possession of our next home in Cobourg, and arranged to have it rented until our retirement in 2018. Can't wait to move!

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