Canada’s Settlement Patterns Where do Canadians live?

Population Discussion  Where would you like to live in Canada?  Why?  What features are found in this area that you like?  Do you think that a majority of Canadians would chose the same place or area as you?

Population Change in Canada Urbanization in Canada  Over the past 150 years, the ratio of Canadians living in urban areas vs. rural areas has reversed itself:

Why Has This Happened?  A) Push Factors:- Mechanization of farms, forestry, mining, etc. = fewer jobs  B) Pull Factors:- Jobs & wealth are increasingly concentrated in the cities New immigrants are generally professionals and want to live in cities

What is the result?  Uneven population distribution  Canada's settlement pattern is linear. To what?  Over 90% of Canadians live within a 6 hour drive of the United States  Almost 90% of Canada is empty of human settlement (less than 0.4 people / km 2 )

Population Density  A mathematical measure of the number of people living in each square kilometre of land.  A measure of "how crowded" a place is.  It tells us nothing about where people live.  Population Density = Population  Area  Canada's Population Density  = people  km 2   3.1 people / km 2  Brampton's Population Density  = people  km 2   1575 people / km 2

Population Distribution  Describes the pattern of where people live in a region or country  Environmental and human factors can affect the distribution (i.e. water bodies, hills, railways, resource deposits, etc.).  Each of these areas has a population density of 4 people / km 2, but their population distribution is different ☻ ☻ ☻☻ ☻☻☻☻