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Urban sprawl is a classic concept in geography and urban planning. The term may even seem to be somewhat dated to people in Quebec and Canada. This is not to suggest that the physical reality that it describes no longer exists; it is simply because of the major difficulties encountered by urban planners trying to make it a local political priority and limit its impacts. In contrast, concern over urban sprawl is growing in France and the issue was identified by the UN in 2010 as a world -wide problem. Furthermore, the growing importance attached to sustainable development has generated renewed interest in the phenomenon and led to the development of new concepts and movements such as smart growth, new urbanism, compact cities, sustainable communities, sustainable urban development, etc. In this context, urban sprawl is a concept that needs to be fully reconsidered. This is the goal of the present article. In the first place, urban sprawl is an essential element in the fundamental debate on what constitutes good urban form. Secondly, urban sprawl still tends to be approached descriptively although the implementation of strict controls on urban development raises a significant number of ethical and political questions: what is the best kind of residential density to aim for? Can there be legitimate political intervention in response to housing preferences expressed by the majority of urban citizens? How can the concept of the ecological footprint we leave contribute to the debate? Are there alternatives to densification if we are to achieve the goal of sustainable cities? We base our discussion of these issues on a review of the literature. Put in the most simple terms, we would suggest a nuanced use of the concepts of urban sprawl and ecological footprints, while explicitly recognizing the paucity of generic urban models for the creation of sustainable cities.

Keywords: Étalement urbain, empreinte écologique, urbanisme durable, densité, forme urbaine, Urban sprawl, ecological footprint, sustainable urban planning, density, urban form, Expansión urbana, huella ecológica, urbanismo sostenible, densidad, forma urbana

The commemorative ceremonies surrounding the 100th anniversary of Toronto's incorporation in 1934 and the tercentenary of Montreal's foundation in 1942 were opportune moments to produce discourses which underline the importance of the urban experience in the creation and the transformation of national identities during the 20th century. A rabbi, Maurice N. Eisendrath, and an abbé, Lionel Groulx, broadcast, within a few years, speeches which put the past at the service of the present and of the future, with the goal of promoting an urban identity as guarantee of the flourishing of their respective nations. Beyond important differences between the two men and their ideologies, fundamental similarities appear upon analyzing them: both use similar discursive strategies, with the ultimate goal of linking an uncertain present to a stronger past, to create and reinforce the collective identity, as much urban as national.

This article tracks the morphogenesis of one of the birthplaces of Canadian industry: the Lachine Canal corridor in Montreal. The authors propose a reading of the evolution of the artifacts and spatial forms to be found along the canal from its construction starting in 1819. This work complements the history of Montreal's industrialization and working-class communities by offering the untold story of a piece of the city whose birth and long sedimentation of built forms testifies to the emergence, peak, and decline of a new industrial order. The urbanization of the Lachine Canal corridor is, we argue, the result of a complex dialectic between a residential spatial order of the faubourg and a first- and second-generation industrial spatial order. Accordingly, the fine folds and articulations of domestic space and the sidewalks, streets, and church steps that are the sites of socialization and exchange succeed, or have imposed upon them a divided space organized by the flows of goods, materials, and energy destined to serve the industrial machine. The urban tissues, residential and industrial, today testify through their artifacts and spatial configurations to the historical conditions that saw them created and transformed.

There has been an outburst of scholarship on world and global cities in recent years, though cities under the guise of political entities—that is, municipal urban governments—have not been considered by this literature as having a relevant degree of agency in the process of interconnection that has been named globalisation. While they are both agents and subjects of this process, their part has been neglected or considered under a very limited chronological angle. This article offers an approach to the “municipal web” that has developed between and about municipal urban governments in the modern era. This web includes municipal governments, municipal officials and technicians as well as scholars, experts and lay reformers; intergovernmental organizations, domestic and transnational non governmental organisations as well as sections of national or infra national governments; firms as well as non profit groups. The article pays special attention to those who weaved this web and the material they used, to the items that travelled through this web of municipal interchange. It insists on the importance of studying current interconnections among and about cities in the historical perspective.

In this report, the authors summarize the well-known historic conditions underpinning the current fiscal plight of Canadian municipalities. Within this overall context the austerity strategies employed by local government officials elsewhere in the world become increasingly suggestive for authorities desperately trying to reconcile service demands with fiscal prudence. Some general observations from recent reports to the generation-old Fiscal Austerity and Urban Innovation project, coupled with preliminary results of the authors' own field research, are advanced.