Richmond Row in London, Ontario. (Credit: ontariosouthwest.com)
The population of London (including surrounding Middlesex County) is predicted to grow by 56.7% over the next 25 years. This would bring the total population up to around 880,000.
This projection is part of a recent report from Ontario’s Ministry of Finance.
Dr. Michael Haan, an associate professor and the director of the Statistics Canada Research Data Centre at Western University says that an increase in population of that proportion would be significant for London.
“If you think about the infrastructure that we have in London, the size of the roads–we lack a light rail transit system or anything like that–it’s a big deal,” he says. “It means we need to start thinking more of ourselves as a grown-up city, rather than as a verging city. We’re there, we’ve arrived.”
Haan says the main things London would need to fix to absorb that many people effectively are roads, transit, and housing. In his opinion, none of those things are where they need to be if the population were to increase that much.
While population increase is sure to come no matter what, Haan does point out that these predictions are not always accurate.
“The one thing we always say about population projections is that they’re likely to be wrong,” he says. “And this may well be one of those instances. Will London’s population grow by the rate that’s projected? Maybe, maybe not.”
