Rural and non-metropolitan gentrification in Canada

[Docere]

What smaller cities and rural areas are seeing gentrification in Canada?

[acottawa]

Prince Edward County in SE Ontario.

[kwoldtimer]

Originally Posted by acottawa

Prince Edward County in SE Ontario.

Big time. I was going to add "unfortunately", but it has its good and bad aspects.

[JHikka]

I'd offer Kent County in New Brunswick. It's steadily moving away from being a rural Francophone area to a commuter Anglophone area for Moncton. I find the area is being targeted by American and Anglo-Canadian migrants as an easy rural living place within a stone's throw of the province's largest city. It probably doesn't fit OP's idea of gentrification but the area as a whole is changing steadily over time.

[Nashe]

Originally Posted by JHikka

I'd offer Kent County in New Brunswick. It's steadily moving away from being a rural Francophone area to a commuter Anglophone area for Moncton. I find the area is being targeted by American and Anglo-Canadian migrants as an easy rural living place within a stone's throw of the province's largest city. It probably doesn't fit OP's idea of gentrification but the area as a whole is changing steadily over time.

I know several couples who have moved from S ON to the area around Cocagne. Cheap ownership, close to the water.

[softee]

The Muskoka Towns of Gravenhurst, Bracebridge and Huntsville. Parry Sound, too.

[Loco101]

In Northern Ontario, the only place that comes to mind is Elliot Lake but definitely not on a huge scale. It has been done mainly for the purposes of attracting retirees and also because of the shopping mall collapse. But nothing like you'd see in Southern Ontario.

The only other places here where it might be happening a tiny bit are other places with tourism and also wanting to attract retirees. Maybe Kenora, a few towns on Manitoulin Island.

Northern Ontario isn't a place where you find "cute towns." Not our thing.

[Laceoflight]

In Québec, what comes to mind :

• Some areas of Charlevoix (Baie-Saint-Paul, Saint-Irénée, Les Éboulements, Petite-Rivière-Saint-François, Port-au-Persil)
• Kamouraska / Saint-André
• Laurentian corridor (St-Sauveur, Ste-Adèle, Val-David, Saint-Adolphe-d'Howard...) + Mont-Tremblant / Saint-Faustin-Lac-Carré
• Cantons-de-l'Est (Eastern Townships) around lake Memphrémagog // The Brome-Missisquoi area : lake Brome, Bromont, Dunham, Sutton, Frelighsburg and Saint-Armand
• Montérégie / Vallée-du-Richelieu : Saint-Antoine-sur-Richelieu, Calixa-Lavallée, Saint-Charles-sur-Richelieu, Saint-Marc-sur-Richelieu...
• Southern Montérégie : Havelock and the Covey Hill area
• Orléans island except the village of Saint-Pierre
• South Shore of Québec, outside of Lévis : Lotbinière, Saint-Antoine-de-Tilly, Beaumont, Saint-Michel-de-Bellechasse...
• The list could go on...

These regions, villages and towns are all developing a comprehensive touristic offer, centered around culture, heritage and quality of life. They accomodate a fair number of neocountry dwellers every year...

[Andy6]

Originally Posted by Loco101

The only other places here where it might be happening a tiny bit are other places with tourism and also wanting to attract retirees. Maybe Kenora, a few towns on Manitoulin Island.

Northern Ontario isn't a place where you find "cute towns." Not our thing.

A partial exception to that would be Richards Landing, which is pretty cute and lightly gentrified by the thousands of mostly well-to-do summer residents in the vicinity from southern Ontario and the USA. I haven't been over to Manitoulin in years but I do hear more and more about it from Toronto people so I imagine they'll eventually do to it what they've done to Prince Edward County.

[Loco101]

Originally Posted by Andy6

A partial exception to that would be Richards Landing, which is pretty cute and lightly gentrified by the thousands of mostly well-to-do summer residents in the vicinity from southern Ontario and the USA. I haven't been over to Manitoulin in years but I do hear more and more about it from Toronto people so I imagine they'll eventually do to it what they've done to Prince Edward County.

Yes, you are right about Richards Landing! It looks more like a town in Southern Ontario. So many Southern characteristics. Banners with maple leaves on them. Maple leaf flags on many businesses and houses. And lots of houses with flags and many with flag poles. Very anglophone (or should I say very British-Canadian) and protestant. Independent shops and grocery store. A lot of people there vote conservative.

And look what flag this house has flying below the maple leaf. It's also on St. Joseph Island but in Hilton Beach.
https://goo.gl/maps/VfGi8SRZfzS2

[Andy6]

Originally Posted by Loco101

Yes, you are right about Richards Landing! It looks more like a town in Southern Ontario. So many Southern characteristics. Banners with maple leaves on them. Maple leaf flags on many businesses and houses. And lots of houses with flags and many with flag poles. Very anglophone (or should I say very British-Canadian) and protestant. Independent shops and grocery store. A lot of people there vote conservative.

And look what flag this house has flying below the maple leaf. It's also on St. Joseph Island but in Hilton Beach.
https://goo.gl/maps/VfGi8SRZfzS2

Well a large proportion of St Joe Island’s summer population is American and always has been. The permanent settlers of the area, such as my family, mainly came from loyalist eastern Ontario near Ottawa and Cornwall. It was virtually the last piece of prime agricultural land to be taken up in Ontario, I’d imagine. The flags are partly a response to all the Stars and Stripes flags that one sees across the channel. Often when you’re out in a boat, the flags are about the only way to be sure which country you’re looking at.

[Architype]

Any place that has inflated real estate prices, every bit of rural or semi rural area within one hour's drive of Vancouver.

[Docere]

Collingwood/the Blue Mountains and Niagara-on-the-Lake are obvious examples.

[kwoldtimer]

Originally Posted by Docere

Collingwood/the Blue Mountains and Niagara-on-the-Lake are obvious examples.

I would have said that Niagara-on-the-Lake gentrified decades ago.

[Docere]

Originally Posted by kwoldtimer

I would have said that Niagara-on-the-Lake gentrified decades ago.

True.

[megadude]

Penetang has undertaken a major project to revitalize their downtown. Impressive given that it's only a town of 9,000. Well, a little bigger during cottage season. I couldn't believe it when I went into town to get groceries last summer and encountered ROAD CLOSED for construction signs. Thought I was in the GTA for a second.

Their Main Street has a nice setting as it slopes down toward Penetang Harbour, but the existing DT is hardly an attraction for locals and cottagers alike. Would love to see that change and be more like a few other cottage towns where it is a charming place to visit.

Would post some renderings but they all look like they were done on MS Paint.


https://twitter.com/penetanguishene/...34284689477633

[MolsonExport]

Not Hanna, Alberta, despite Nickelback.

[SignalHillHiker]

I'm not sure if gentrification is the best descriptor for what's happening here. Basically, interior towns along the TCH are growing at the expense of coastal communities (for example, people moving from the Connaigre Peninsula to Bishop's Falls, or people moving from the Northwest Avalon Peninsula to Bay Roberts, or from the Bonavista Peninsula to Clarenville, or the Great Northern Peninsula to Deer Lake, etc.)

It's all cookie-cutter subdivisions and big box areas. The closest they get to urbanity is a stroad and the people moving in aren't different from or replacing those already there, they're just increasing the number.

[csbvan]

Tofino, Revelstoke, Nelson in BC among others.

[240glt]

Originally Posted by csbvan

Tofino, Revelstoke, Nelson in BC among others.

What you find in BC is that areas close to the really nice lakes, or the ones that are in close proximity to developing ski resorts have definitely attracted investment and residents. The most striking example would probably be Kelowna, which in the past attracted mostly retirees from Alberta, is now attracting west coast money. I don't know how much gentrification is happening in Tofino, it's always been expensive there, there's still not much housing and has attracted mostly the same demographic for decades. Same goes for Nelson, it's also always been expensive, but there's been a relatively limited amount of development and the population isn't growing that much. The million dollar properties in the area are sitting on the market, and I think this is more a reflection of what's going on in Alberta. Revelstoke strikes me as a bit of an outlier, as a few decades ago housing there was dirt cheap and there was literally no development. Nowadays with the ski resort maturing into it's own destination prices in the area have shot up and there's significant new development. So I would consider Revelstoke as gentrifying alongside Kelowna, but maybe not at that rapid pace as there isn't quite the summer draw as the Okanagan destinations. Golden might be another one as Kickinghorse has really brought people and investment to the area, but the town itself I always found to be a little depressing. Not sure if that's changed in the last while. The Columbia Valley would be another area that has attracted a lot of development and interest, mainly due to its proximity to Calgary, although personally I've never really liked the area.