Montreal and Toronto are teaming up, really
It could actually be the start of an important relationship
Hey, what do you know? Montreal and Toronto are talking to each other again. Not only that, they’re working together. Imagine that.
“The two solitudes are over,” declared Montreal Mayor Denis Coderre at a press conference at Toronto City Hall last week to announce a new era of cooperation between Canada’s two largest cities. Standing next to Toronto Mayor John Tory, Coderre said: “I think what people are expecting is to work together.”
Wednesday’s meeting had the mayors debuting a united front ahead of the upcoming federal election. They argue that this “strategic alliance” will be “winwin” for both cities. Tory will be travelling to Montreal in the coming months to finalize the details.
Whether or not this “strategic alliance” between Toronto and Montreal results in any promises of increased funding or investments to the cities during the federal campaign remains to be seen.
Think about it this way: the very idea of Toronto and Montreal speaking in one voice to the federal government would have been unheard of as recently as last year. A long history of rancour and political fatigue generated by two referendums, and the failed Meech and Charlottetown accords, left Montreal effectively alienated from federal scene and larger pan- Canadian initiatives for decades.
National walls were thrown up. Montreal, whether by choice or design, retreated behind them. The dysfunction and corruption that characterized recent municipal governments in both cities didn’t exactly offer fertile ground for collaboration. But things have changed. Toronto and Montreal are benefiting from having new mayors who see the value in creating partnerships with their urban counterparts. Canada’s urban shift and a burgeoning civic culture at the municipal level have combined to create new possibilities for articulating Canada and Canadian priorities. On the one hand, this new alliance between Montreal and Toronto fits within a larger movement among big city mayors to emphasize the importance of our cities to Canada’s overall health and success, and to highlight the problems with the current fiscal and constitutional arrangement that holds them down as “creatures of the province.”
But this shift is compelling for another reason, too. That Toronto and Montreal are focused on what unites rather than divides them, working together in an acknowledgment that current constitutional and fiscal structures aren’t working for either of them signals that the old national battles between Canada and Quebec are waning.
There is arguably more that connects Montreal to urban areas like Toronto and Vancouver, for example, than to other regions in the rest of the province. There are other ways to conceive of our challenges and priorities than just in terms of competing national projects between Canada and Quebec.
Provided their united front isn’t just perfunctory, real cooperation between Montreal and Toronto could have serious impact in shaping policy and investment. Both cities need increased, predictable funding in the areas of housing, infrastructure and public transportation.
What it may also do is create conditions for a new generation of civic and political leaders devoid of the scar tissue from previous constitutional battles to reframe our national debate into one based not on bitterness or rivalry but on our shared priorities. We could even go so far as to imagine that it could spawn friendships and professional relationships that could, one day, even contribute to informed policy assessments on issues of national unity, institution building and language policy.
This new era of cooperation between Montreal and Toronto is in its early days. Still, it’s a small indication that maybe — just maybe — it is our municipal governments, and not our federal government, who are the key to overriding the stale constitutional debates that have kept Canada and Quebec in a bit of a holding pattern.
Cities are playing a defining role in transforming the Canadian conversation, and they’re doing it on their own terms. Kudos to mayors Tory and Coderre for opening the door to an important relationship between Canada’s two largest cities.