Canadian Alternate Histories

[balletomane]

I know there was a similar thread in the City Discussions forum, but I thought it might be interesting to have a Canada-only thread.

I often imagine what Winnipeg would be like had the Panama Canal never opened, effectively stopping the city's boom era and leading to the city that we know today. Politicians in pre-WW1 Winnipeg spoke of the city becoming the "Chicago of the North" and anticipated that it would grow to about 5 million today, while others figured that it would be at least a Vancouver-sized city today. While I think this is intriguing and I've imagined the city at that size, those growth projections reflect the optimism of the era, and realistically, I figure the city would have about 1.25 - 1.5 million today had the Panama Canal never opened. The city's boom era would've continued longer, perhaps growing to about 500,000 by WW2, but the city would've likely declined in importance as happened to many rust belt cities in the US in the post-WW2 era. That and the rise of oil in Alberta, the city would still have declined in relative importance on the national stage, but would be more prominent than today if were roughly the same size Calgary, Ottawa or Edmonton.