Canadian Maps and Graphics

[GlassCity]

Originally Posted by Acajack

I think there is probably a tremendous amount of regional variability on that one. In some parts of Canada that's starkly true, but in others not so much.

Yeah you're right, along with what JHikka said about the Maritimes. I should have softened my statement. It's not that Canada vs. US differences are always larger than regional differences within the two, but they're often more significant than people claim.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by GlassCity

Yeah you're right, along with what JHikka said about the Maritimes. I should have softened my statement. It's not that Canada vs. US differences are always larger than regional differences within the two, but they're often more significant than people claim.

I think Maritimers find historical ties to New England interesting but the fact is that today they are more likely to have relatives in Ontario or Alberta than in Massachusetts or Rhode Island. Confederation was 150 years ago, and the American Revolution which severed trading ties between New England from the Maritimes (at the time a separate colony of Nova Scotia) was almost 250 years ago. NS, PEI, and Acadian NB are also less closely aligned with New England. Southwestern NB is just one small part of the Maritimes which is also in relative decline and somewhat of an oddball culturally and politically.

Another practical reality is that New England these days is mostly just metro Boston. Maritimers already find Halifax annoying and it is far less dominant than Boston would be in a combined region.

[GlassCity]

Originally Posted by someone123

I think Maritimers find historical ties to New England interesting but the fact is that today they are more likely to have relatives in Ontario or Alberta than in Massachusetts or Rhode Island. Confederation was 150 years ago, and the American Revolution which split New England from the Maritimes was almost 250 years ago. NS, PEI, and Acadian NB are also less closely aligned with New England. Southwestern NB is just one small part of the Maritimes (which is also in relative decline).

Another practical reality is that New England these days is mostly just metro Boston. Maritimers already find Halifax annoying and it is far less dominant than Boston would be in a combined region.

Yeah that's kind of what I meant. I don't want to talk about the Maritimes because I've never even been there, but while there may be things familiar in New England, there may also be other things just as familiar in Canada.

Closer to what I actually know, Vancouver and Seattle are obviously similar, but would a Vancouverite really feel significantly more familiar in Seattle than in Calgary or Toronto? I'm not so sure. Culture is more than surface level things like yoga and coffee. There are cross-Canada connections that are stronger than one might think, and that would be missed if North America was rejigged into that region-based system. At the very least, it wouldn't be an immediate and natural transition.

[MolsonExport]

Aside from the geographic similarities (proximity to the sea), I find Atlantic Canada more similar to central Canada than to New England. OK, maybe there are built-form similarities along the coast, but the feel of Atlantic Canada is distinctly Canadian. Boston is just a different league.

[MonctonRad]

Originally Posted by MolsonExport

Aside from the geographic similarities (proximity to the sea), I find Atlantic Canada more similar to central Canada than to New England. OK, maybe there are built-form similarities along the coast, but the feel of Atlantic Canada is distinctly Canadian. Boston is just a different league.

There are differences in architecture even between St Stephen NB and Calais ME, and these are sister communities on either side of the St Croix River!! Speech is also different. In Calais, there is a heavy "downeast" accent, while in St. Stephen the accent is much more like the Canadian mainstream. Every time I cross the border, you notice the differences immediately.

someone123 is correct. The "ties that bind" started unravelling in the Revolutionary War, and were completely gutted by Sir John A's National Policy. There continued to be extensive family connections to New England, even up to the mid 20th century (mostly due to the Canadian diaspora migrating to New England factory towns), but the old folks have died off, and the cousins don't know each other any more.

The Maritimes are much more firmly linked to Ontario and Alberta now than they are to New England. I think with the overall thickening of the border, and the increasing cultural dissimilarities between Canada and the US, that the two countries will continue to drift apart over the next century.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by MonctonRad

There are differences in architecture even between St Stephen NB and Calais ME, and these are sister communities on either side of the St Croix River!! Speech is also different. In Calais, there is a heavy "downeast" accent, while in St. Stephen the accent is much more like the Canadian mainstream. Every time I cross the border, you notice the differences immediately.

The early settlers in Atlantic Canada mostly came directly from Europe rather than from New England. The features that people think of as being specific to Atlantic Canadian dialects are mostly from Scottish and Irish settlers. Yankee type accents in the Maritimes are rare. Americans were a small part of the settler mix, and mostly moved to Western NS and Southwestern NB during a brief window in the second half of the 18th century.

One simple historical observation is that the Maritimes were mostly French-speaking into the 1750's and then at war with the American colonies by the 1770's.

It's true that more and more people have more generic Canadian or North American accents today in the Maritimes, but this is from the modern influence of mass media and people moving in from other parts of Canada, not because of New Englanders moving in (which happens but is relatively rare). And there are still a lot of people in the Maritimes who have distinctive accents that are easy to distinguish from New England (or Ontario). I think a lot of people underestimate what the accents are like in the Maritimes because a lot of the people they interact with in the touristy areas aren't even from the region (people joke that part of South End Halifax is "Little Ontario"...). When I go back and visit relatives there I notice their accents a lot. This includes people from cities, not just rural areas.

[lio45]

There's a type of architecture that's common to both sides of the border in coastal New England and the Maritimes, though.

It seems that back in the 1800s and early 1900s the border was porous enough that materials and styles and ideas would go through. The same phenomenon can be observed in the Eastern Townships of Quebec in areas next to the border.

[lio45]

Originally Posted by MonctonRad

There are differences in architecture even between St Stephen NB and Calais ME

I'm curious to see examples of those differences, if possible!

One category of buildings that are pretty different is the 1950s-style "utilitarian buildings" (post office, etc.) that look the same all over the U.S.

The Google street view is 10 years old and of horrible quality, but here is one example that's about 700 m from Quebec. The architecture of this kind of building would be exactly the same in Mississippi or Wisconsin.

https://www.google.com/maps/@44.9993...!7i3328!8i1664


Old houses though are pretty identical in styles on either side. One notable difference is that where you'd find the quintessential soul-sucking 1970s Quebec bungalow rather well built and on a concrete foundation, the equivalent housing style south of the border would likely be a mobile home.

[lio45]

This style is very common in the Townships, it's a example of what I meant:

[lio45]

This late 1860s Italianate style house from northern Vermont has a couple spitting twins in Stanstead, Quebec:

[someone123]

Originally Posted by lio45

It seems that back in the 1800s and early 1900s the border was porous enough that materials and styles and ideas would go through. The same phenomenon can be observed in the Eastern Townships of Quebec in areas next to the border.

I think the amount of exchange between the Maritimes and New England was counterintuitively low during this period, and a lot of stuff that seems like it's due to cross-pollination is not.

Building materials were not shipped back and forth much. Mostly what you built with was determined by what was in your neighbourhood. The Maritimes and New England both happened to have similar building materials.

On top of this both regions inherited British styles and a similar climate. So neither region was as likely to start spontaneously building Spanish or French architecture or southern style buildings.

For most of the 19th century, I think Scottish builders had a bigger influence in the Maritimes than American builders. Here is an article about one of them: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Lang_(builder)

You can also drop a pin in streetview in Aberdeen and find building styles eerily similar to Halifax, but the buildings are made out of stone instead of wood because Scotland was deforested.

This influence lasted a long time in Canada. There are lots of 20th century examples of short British-style neoclassical commercial buildings in Canada that would have looked very different in the US.

[someone123]

Originally Posted by lio45

This style is very common in the Townships, it's a example of what I meant:

This style exists in Nova Scotia but it is not very common. Older wooden houses in Halifax for example are much more likely to either be plain boxes, boxes with bay windows, or boxes with dormers. All of these styles are near-exact replicas of Scottish building styles.

Scottish dormers in Scotland


Scottish dormers in New Scotland

[someone123]

Another pair:

Nostell Priory, West Yorkshire

Source

Province House in Halifax

Source

[kwoldtimer]

Originally Posted by lio45

This late 1860s Italianate style house from northern Vermont has a couple spitting twins in Stanstead, Quebec:

There are a number of Italianate homes in K-W, dating from the 1870s - 1880s, most of them built of buff brick.

[kwoldtimer]

[QUOTE=someone123;8125835]

Scottish dormers in Scotland


/QUOTE]

Aberdeen, by any chance?

[ainvan]

WTH, Ontarians? Colour? Come on!

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by ainvan

WTH, Ontarians? Colour? Come on!

Yeah, we know what that's all about.

[JHikka]

Originally Posted by Acajack

Yeah, we know what that's all about.

Waiting anxiously for the four page conversation about how Ontarians are basically American.

Although I will say I was in St. Catharines and saw some American spellings for things (Center, Color...). This isn't uncommon in border towns/areas.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by JHikka

Waiting anxiously for the four page conversation about how Ontarians are basically American.

.

I doubt it, but... no one forces them to spell the way they spell.

[MonctonRad]

from CBC

http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/wa...ught-1.4570333

The climate moisture index measures the difference between annual precipitation and the potential loss of water vapour from a landscape covered by vegetation. Below the zero line (yellow, orange and red areas), the conditions may be too dry to support a forest. This projection is for the years 2071-2100 assuming the world continues to increase greenhouse gas emissions. (Natural Resources Canada/CBC)

Interesting that there might be a prairie forming up the entire McKenzie River valley.......