Quote:
Originally Posted by manny_santos
There has been a trend in very recent years towards greater centralization of offices in the GTA. Another of the Big 4 accounting firms, Deloitte, centralized all seven of its GTA offices into one new Downtown Toronto office two years ago. This is the opposite of a trend I remember 10 years ago, that was even discussed on SSP, about large companies opening more and more suburban offices, allowing people living in areas like Mississauga to work in Mississauga; part of that trend even included people living in Toronto commuting to the suburbs, which was helping even out traffic flows. That still exists of course, but I foresee it will be reduced as more companies develop Downtown Toronto tunnel-vision and assume all Millennials want to live and work there.
What's lost in these types of moves is that it takes away offices from where people live. Not everyone lives, or wants to live in, or can afford to live in Downtown Toronto, and not everyone wants to spend 2-3 hours a day commuting from Hamilton, Oshawa, or even suburban parts of the City of Toronto. I know another company that undertook a consolidation similar to Deloitte's happened and a significant number of employees quit because they refused to commute to Downtown Toronto from the suburban area of the GTA where they lived and worked. It also puts massive strain on infrastructure such as the TTC and GO Transit that has been unable to keep up with increased demand.
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Yup. 10-15 years ago TD and RBC moved their mortgage admin operations to Sauga in new buildings. I worked at TD in that new building off Eglinton. The mortgage office was previously near Bay and College. And in those 10-15 years anyone could have noticed the corporate signage popping up on suburban office buildings.
Now Toronto and especially DT TO vacancy rates are historically low. Vancouver as well.
That Burlington office wasn't the only consolidation. There was an office off Vic Park that merged into the new one.
So far I know of one person that has already quit because of the move out of Burlington. She wasn't about to fight traffic on QEW, 427, 401. Especially since she already lived in Burlington like 7 minutes away. But for the rest, so many of their positions are highly specialized. And they promoted some with fancier titles and slightly more pay.
Hopefully new "downtowns" like Vaughan and Markham will attract corporations back into the burbs. Though Hwy 7 is already effed as it is now! But if I lived one stop closer on the GO line, I would be standing on the train to Downtown TO because of all the people. And trains on the LSW line run like every 10-15 minutes!
And at this point, true bedroom communities like Milton are almost a bad thing. Milton does have some industrial, but pretty much zero office. Maybe a handful of tiny offices on Main St., but I'd like to see a few low rise offices go up there so the people of fast growing Milton don't have to drive far for work. And then some people in NW Sauga can commute the other way during rush hour.
When I was at TD at Dixie and Eglinton in Sauga a decade ago, Mattamy built up all those new houses in Milton and many of my coworkers bought there for their first house purchases. And of the five or so people I directly know in Milton now that I don't work with, four of them work in Sauga and one in Brampton.
Now that I think about this even more, a guy I work with, who is from Sault Ste Marie, got a job in Guelph after school. He bought a house in Milton so he could go to Guelph and his wife could commute to Sauga. And a girl I worked with at my present company, lives in Milton and was commuting to Matheson and Dixie in Sauga. Then got the job here. Then left for a job in Guelph. And her husband worked in Scarboro but also works in Guelph now.
I literally only know one person who works in Milton, my bro in law, and he lives in Burlington. It's an industrial job. I would like to see more industrial and office jobs there! Especially since it's right on the 401.
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