Browse Our Research 

This paper explores the place of municipalities in Canada’s democratic system and constitution, arguing that their status in Canada’s constitutional order ought to be recognized and secured.
Find out more »

This paper examines the current state of property tax policy across Canada and finds that municipalities and provinces are facing a number of shared challenges and questions, including: whether to apply progressive property tax rates, the volatility of property taxes, the benefits and drawbacks of using property tax incentives to attract businesses, and the role of provincial property taxes
Find out more »

To tackle our modern challenges – population growth and changing demographics, climate change, aging infrastructure, congestion, and poverty – Toronto and the region‘s success decades from now will hinge on how we work together.
Find out more »

In this video, Chris Murray, Toronto’s City Manager, spoke about how challenges require municipalities not only to set their own priorities, but to work together and with other governments, institutions, the private sector, community partners and Indigenous peoples to improve quality of life.
Find out more »

IMFG Post-Doctoral Fellow Nick Lombardo presented on New York’s experience and drew lessons for how different levels of government can cooperate – or not – to provide large-scale infrastructure in cities today.
Find out more »

In this presentation on his new book, Shaping the Metropolis: Institutions and Urbanization in the United States and Canada, Zack Taylor compares the historical development of intergovernmental policymaking for Canadian and American cities since the 19th century with a particular focus on Toronto, Vancouver, Portland, and Minneapolis–St. Paul.
Find out more »

Toronto is an emerging global city. Yet the failure to build rapid transit in step with the explosive growth of the past 40 years is one of the city-region’s biggest impediments to inclusive development and prosperity. This paper outlines how transit planning in the Greater Toronto Area can be improved through changes to governance and the role of evidence in decision-making.
Find out more »

In this video, Alan Harding assesses the arguments produced in favour of metropolitan governance, the extent to which real-world reforms have been driven by these arguments, the barriers that stand in the way of “rational” reform, and how Greater Manchester’s experience with metropolitan governance points to ways of overcoming at least some of those barriers.
Find out more »