Halifax is booming — but now it has Toronto problems

financialpost.com:

Wendy Luther was a Vancouverite, through and through. She was born in the city, went to university there and, like many get-up-and-go West Coasters, she embraced the great outdoors with gleeful abandon as a mountain biker, skier and competitive sailor and coach.

It was the sailing that initially blew Luther, who was then in her mid-20s and working for an advertising company, to Halifax for a regatta in the late 1990s. And wouldn’t you know it, she met a nice young Haligonian there named James Luther. One thing led to another, and after a brief, long-distance courtship, the diehard Vancouverite informed her disbelieving family, friends and co-workers that she was moving from the “centre of the universe” to a port city on the opposite side of the country.

“I moved to Halifax for love — apprehensively,” the chief executive of Halifax Partnership, the city’s public-private economic development agency, said. “I went from having no Halifax connections to having many, personally and professionally, and with two children born here, this is my home.”

In short, there is no place Luther would rather be, and it turns out the Vancouver expat is not the only person who feels that way. Halifax is now the country’s second-fastest growing city. In 2022, 20,713 newcomers showed up, more than double the number who arrived the previous year. The final count for 2023 isn’t in yet, but growth indicators point to the sum being closer to 30,000 — in a city of less than 500,000. What in the name of Barrett’s Privateers is going on?

We are seeing the growth of our wildest dreams

Most astonishing of all is that Halifax, which has long been known for the friendliness of its locals and its toe-tapping, foot-stomping live music scene, as well as its