Originally Posted by Pretty Flowers

When I first moved to Canada I lived in Oakville south of the QEW. I would have hated to live north - to my mind it's a suburban wasteland where to get a pint of milk would have involved at least a five minute drive (and I didn't have a car when I first came to Canada)

I loved (and still love Oakville) it's a nice town, downtown is pretty pleasant, and it suits my abstract requirements for petty bourgeoisness.

However, it's a very expensive place to live and there isn't a great deal of stuff to do at night-time.

It's a very British and English location - there's a higher concentration of English expats in Oakville than anywhere else in Canada IIRC. So if you're looking for a home from home, it's likely the one place in Canada that can offer you that, but if you want to experience a new culture, it's not exactly the best.

These days I live in downtown Toronto, in Little Italy, so I get to experience both Canadian and Italian/ Portugese culture pretty much on a daily basis.

HTH

Originally Posted by Souvy

I think it's also behind Toronto

Originally Posted by dbd33

Come on. There must be more Chinese, more Indians, more Italians and perhaps even more cradles than Brits in Toronto. Even in the Brit ghetto
(http://www.toronto.ca/demographics/c...pdf2/cpa63.pdf see chart, Top 10 Ethnic Origins) there are nearly as many non-specific Europeans as people of British origin. If you count only people actually born in the UK then Oakville leads by a country mile.

Originally Posted by Souvy

According to the data, the UK was the origin of the largest number of immigrants in Canada (approx. 580,000). Most, however, have been here for a long time. Almost 90% of the total arrived before 1991.

According to the official stats, the top ten cities by Brit expat population in 2006 were:

TO - 125,980
Vancouver - 63,935
Hamilton - 29,455
Calgary - 26,065
Ottineau - 19,600
Victoria - 19,395
Edmonton - 18,825
London - 14,385
St. Catherine - 14,055
Oshawa - 13,860

Oakville's Brit population in 2006 was 8,930. Oakville is bigger than St. Catherine and Oshawa.

Originally Posted by dbd33

Toronto's population is about 2,500,000 so, based on the above, the Brit population is about .05% of the total. Rather less than the proportion of Brits in Oakville. What might be more interesting is the location of recent British immigrants, if such a figure exists.

Originally Posted by Novocastrian

<ahem> I know you'd prefer to do your mathematics in Imperial units, but 125,000 is 5% of 2.5 million, not 0.05%.

Damn metric nonsense.

Originally Posted by Oakvillian

Oh yes, and while I'm on my aggressive-defensive rant, I acknowledge that proportionately Oakville has way more than its fair share of Brit (not necessarily English) expats. But again, the general doesn't translate to the specific. I'm sure I've commented before that amongst my immediate neighbours, amongst all of whom we regularly share beer and barbecues, are first generation immigrants from Sweden, Portugal, India, Trinidad, Italy and the US, as well as half a dozen cradle-Canadian families. It's not all about wealthy WASPs.

Originally Posted by Novocastrian

<ahem> I know you'd prefer to do your mathematics in Imperial units, but 125,000 is 5% of 2.5 million, not 0.05%.

Damn metric nonsense.

Originally Posted by dbd33

Oops! Search for alternative means of demonstrating Oakville to be Tunbridge Wells in exile will resume asap.

Originally Posted by sharkus

Curious about the comparison of the two. Take a wild guess as to where I was raised, and lived until I relocated to Canada

Originally Posted by dbd33

And you're happy in Oakville, there we go, case proven.