# How did Canada become more culturally public transit than the US? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [March 13, 2024, 5:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-canada-become-more-culturally-public-transit-than-the-us/998809 "2024-03-13T17:53:29Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 1\ **Showing post:** 128
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [March 23, 2024, 9:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-canada-become-more-culturally-public-transit-than-the-us/998809/128 "2024-03-23T21:07:27Z")
And, just because I’m bored, and because you said “We are talking 50s and 60s,” here are the 10 most-populated cities in Canada from 1961, with their population densities at that time (people per square kilometer), and the same for the ten most-populated US cities from 1960. Canada: 1. Montreal: 5,779 2. Toronto: 2,891 3. Vancouver: 6,871 4. Winnipeg: 1,030 5. Ottawa: 154 6. Hamilton: 353 7. Quebec City: 791 8. Edmonton: 441 9. Calgary: 340 10. Windsor: 1,324 U.S.: 1. New York: 10,003 2. Chicago: 6,018 3. Los Angeles: 2,039 4. Philadelphia: 5,754 5. Detroit: 4,652 6. Baltimore: 4,472 7. Houston: 566 8. Cleveland: 4,358 9. Washington, DC: 4,692 10. St. Louis: 4,688 Of the ten biggest U.S. cities, eight (excluding the sprawly Los Angeles and Houston, which had lots of empty space to grow into in that era) had population densities of over 4,000 people per square kilometer in 1960; at that same time, of the ten biggest Canadian cities, only two (Montreal and Vancouver) were comparably as dense, and five of the ten had densities under 1,000 people per square kilometer. If you have actual cites to prove otherwise, please share them. --- _[View the full topic](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-did-canada-become-more-culturally-public-transit-than-the-us/998809)._