Lamilla

Hi all,

We just moved to Toronto from London, and are temporarily settled in Etobico. Now, while this area seemed to have a Downtown'ish feel, we're not entirely happy with the social aspect.
What would be the best place in your opinion to live in for a young family with a child? We're looking for a similar feel to Kent (Sevenoaks/ Tunbridge Wells)?

Thanks in advance for all recommendations.

dbd33

Caledon.

scilly

You are in a different country now. Why would you want to replicate what you left behind???

Why move if you want to live somewhere with the "similar feel" to where you lived before?

Embrace the difference!

plasticcanuck

dbd33

Car assembly has to feature as well as a significant Indian population. Traditionally cider making. Brampton offers a car plant and lots of Indians while to the northeast of there decent is made from local apples. The mention of Sevenoaks/Tunbridge Wells suggests that the OP is not looking to mash applies nor mount wheels but wants an address to impress so, Caledon, near to a car factory, near to cider, near to korma, desperately up itself.

Lamilla

Thank you all for your replies.

By Kent lifestyle I meant beautiful nature, good quality schools, decent people to talk to at the backyard or local playground about politics/finance/law.

Plus, reasonable commute time to financial district (i.e. City in London or Downtown Toronto) and safe community.

Lamilla

And if I wanted an address to impress I believe Sevenoaks or Tunbridge Wells would not top my list.

scilly

1. Schools in Canada do not vary as much as they apparently now do in the UK. You send your kid to the school that has the catchment area for where your house is situated, and the schools within a school district really do not vary that much, except maybe in the incomes of the parents. The education works out to be about the same.

2. People in Canada don't gab over the backyard (or front yard) fence. You'll be sadly disappointed if that is what you want.

3. Doubt very much that you will get discussions going about those topics ................ at the playground much more likely to be the difficulties of getting day care! You might a discussion on how expensive things are, but it won't be "finance"!

4. Crime ... read the crime reports. You'll get different stories from different people!

Vulcanoid

As in

Sir,

I was terribly disappointed when I attended the local school intending an inspection, and was greeted by the Headmaster's secretary, rather than the Chair of the Board of Governors. Worse still, the insolent woman had taken to substituting her maiden name as an additional middle name after her Christian names, instead of double-barrelling. Indeed, when I had tea with the PTA, the average surname had barely two hyphens. I am astonished that the neighbours would think this institution decent enough for poor Camilla and Jacinda.

Yours truly,

Disgusted of Tunbridge Wells

?

K, now I've got that out the way, because frankly I couldn't resist - it's in no way clear what you want, or why you might expect it. And you might think you've explained yourself, but you really haven't.

Honestly, reading the two posts, what you appear to me to mean is "I want upper middle class people with centre-right to right-wing political views who can afford big houses in the country-ish but please not too far away from a city to have things, just far enough that I don't have to live among people who are different." And you might well mean that, and if so then I'm not even going to judge and complain because people are made happy in different ways, and if people want that then more power to them. But you might not mean that at all, and if not that's fine too, but it's really hard to be sure what it is you actually want.

So at the moment people just have to guess based on stereotypes of people who use descriptors like "decent people". Pro-tip: Canada has them, just like everywhere else. They normally don't say they want to live among 'decent people'.

Most Canadian schools are much of a muchness. You might not want your sons to go to an expensive one that just became quite famous.

Atlantic Xpat

What car assembly takes place (or has ever taken place) in Kent? The one in England that is?

dbd33

Caterham. But I was, of course, thinking of the Ford Kent engine which didn't come from Kent at all.

I stand by the suggestion of Caledon and would add Mono, which is pronounced Moh-no by those in the know and Mon-o by those who think the inhabitants diseased.

You may be certain that no one in Caledon or Mono thinks schools to be equal.

Howefamily

They sometimes go even further. I recall we had been living on our house for about a few weeks and my husband was outside trying for the first time in his life to decide how to open the pool. I was, unhelpfully, inside on FB (thats another thread). When I looked out the neighbours from all around were helping him pull the leaf net off the pool, including one holding a glass of wine in the other hand. They couldnt have been lovelier. We regularly chat around the fire pit in whoevers back yard happens to have one, at the weekend.

Kentonmag

If I was moving to Ontario tomorrow and had a choice of where to live, and money not being an issue, I would probably choose somewhere along, or close to, Lakeshore. The section from Guelph Line in Burlington to Port Credit has plenty of niche shops and cafe's and some nice waterfront for walks. Can't comment on the Schools in that area but it's close to the Go Train, so having a nice option to work in or visit Toronto. When we moved over to Canada in 1991 we developed most of our friendships as our kids went to School and got into hockey and football, just meeting up with neighbors & popping down to the pub isn't going to happen.

sharkus

Ah, good old "Disgusted". It's those types who I loathed having been born, and grown up in *Royal* Tunbridge Wells (The Royal bit is important to some, apparently). Oakville seems somewhat similar to RTW in quite a few ways actually. There are a lot of very genuine people living their lives quite happily, and then there are the horrific pillocks that seem to think money entitles you to act as if everyone else is something you'd scrape of your shoes.

dbd33

When my kids were of high school age we had a house in Lorne Park, about halfway between the Port Credit and Clarkson GO stations. The nearest school was called Lorne Park. At that time it had a reputation for being very snob and not being receptive to minority students. There were other schools, Clarkson was one I think, that were where the immigrant childen went. In the event, the children in question caught the GO train and went to school in Toronto.

At that time we also had a house in the Beach and in the pub on the corner there a Scottish folk singer often played. Memorably, he managed a mash up of Farewell to Nova Scotia and Stairway to Heaven. He lived, probably still lives, in Lorne Park and drank in a pub, name forgotten, in that plaza on the railroad tracks.

I type all of this by way of contradiction to the ideas that the schools are equal and there's no meeting the neighbours in the pub. For the latter you just need to live in an Anglo-Irish ghetto such as the two areas mentioned.