# What is London Ontario like to live in?



## patoria

My family and I have been hoping to move to Canada for the past couple years and now are 100% ready to do so. We will be putting our house up for sale soon and, after looking through Ontario real estate websites, have found ourselves falling in love with London. It seems small enough to be perfect for us as we don't like the big cities.

Is there anyone in the forums that live/lived in London who can give us advice about it? What is the crime rate, is it family oriented, where NOT to live, employment and anything else would be extremely appreciated. Thank you to anyone who replies.


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## nwalker519

*London*

Hi! I am a Canadian who lived in London for 6 years during university. It is a very nice mid-size city. By living here you're going to be in a very central location, 2 hours from Toronto, 45min from the closest beach and within driving distance of ski hills as well. 

That being said, London is also a very economically diverse city as well. There are some VERY nice areas of the city, such as old north and sunnydale, as well as some very 'rough' areas (avoid East London - anywhere east of Adelaide St., and South London near White Oaks mall). The nice areas of London offer many things such as a cute downtown core and various parks (Victoria park is a favorite!). The city as a whole is also a very active one, it is easy to find running clubs as well as hockey/soccer/lacrosse teams to join. 

As far as raising a family is concerned, as long as you stay in the nicer areas there are some great schools both private and public that they could attend. In general the crime-rate is about average for Southern Ontario, and far less than Toronto. To be honest with you London does have a slight 'gang' problem, but they are mostly youths who do not cause much harm and rarely enter the nice areas of the city. 

I hope that is somewhat helpful! If you have anyother questions feel free to ask me, I currently live in Waterloo Ontario, but am moving to England in August!


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## 3zooz

patoria said:


> My family and I have been hoping to move to Canada for the past couple years and now are 100% ready to do so. We will be putting our house up for sale soon and, after looking through Ontario real estate websites, have found ourselves falling in love with London. It seems small enough to be perfect for us as we don't like the big cities.
> 
> Is there anyone in the forums that live/lived in London who can give us advice about it? What is the crime rate, is it family oriented, where NOT to live, employment and anything else would be extremely appreciated. Thank you to anyone who replies.


Patoria,

Would you mind if I ask you why do you want to leave Australia?!!
I'm in Australia as well and currently considering a move to Canada. I've been looking for someone who has the same reasons to leave Australia so that we can share thoughts!!


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## nauru

As I recall from my visits to London Ontario, it is the whitest city I've ever visited in the province (other than towns which are so small that they can't really be called cities). 

I'm not sure if my observations from biannual visits for the past 20 years is borne out in the official statistics, however the most remarkable thing I saw there was an incredibly high concentration of white people. Loads of white anglo saxon protestant middle class minivan driving suburb dwellers, although there is also a considerable number of white anglo saxon catholic middle class minivan driving suburb dwellers.


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## patoria

nwalker519 said:


> Hi! I am a Canadian who lived in London for 6 years during university. It is a very nice mid-size city. By living here you're going to be in a very central location, 2 hours from Toronto, 45min from the closest beach and within driving distance of ski hills as well.
> 
> I hope that is somewhat helpful! If you have anyother questions feel free to ask me, I currently live in Waterloo Ontario, but am moving to England in August!


nwalker519, your answer is exactly what I was looking for. As we were reading your post my wife and I were both going "wow, fantastic, someone with first hand knowledge (so many people give advice without having the knowledge to do so), this is great" then we saw the "gang problem". It might be unrealistic to move to Canada and not find some gang activity because, sadly, that is a fact of living in Canada today but we would like to be as far away as possible from it. London seems like a nice small/big town known for its university atmosphere with some pretty decent house prices. 

London is still very high on our cities to move to and with your fantastic advice we will now know where to look and, more importantly, where NOT to look for a house. Thank you for a fantastic response.


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## patoria

3zooz said:


> Patoria,
> 
> Would you mind if I ask you why do you want to leave Australia?!!
> I'm in Australia as well and currently considering a move to Canada. I've been looking for someone who has the same reasons to leave Australia so that we can share thoughts!!


hi 3zooz,

I am a Canadian raised in Ottawa, lived in Niagara Falls for many years. My wife is from England. My wife and I moved to Australia to start a new life but as much as Australia is a lovely place to visit, we wouldn't want to live here. The people are great in many ways and not so great in many others. The prices are outrageous, the living costs ridiculous, the summers are way too hot, Christmas without snow and hot chocolate is, well, just not right. I could go on but in a nutshell Canada is the best place in the world and I had to move away to realise it. My wife lived there for one year and fell in love. We should never have tried the adventure of moving. Time to go home. 

If you are Australian please don't take offence. I do not mean to bad mouth Oz as it is lovely in so many ways. Different countires means different lifestyles and Australia is just not the lifestyle for us. It might be for others but not us.


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## patoria

nauru said:


> As I recall from my visits to London Ontario, it is the whitest city I've ever visited in the province (other than towns which are so small that they can't really be called cities).
> 
> I'm not sure if my observations from biannual visits for the past 20 years is borne out in the official statistics, however the most remarkable thing I saw there was an incredibly high concentration of white people. Loads of white anglo saxon protestant middle class minivan driving suburb dwellers, although there is also a considerable number of white anglo saxon catholic middle class minivan driving suburb dwellers.


Hi Naura;

The "whitest city I've ever visite" doesnt bother us as we are white. We are not prejudice in any way and have many multicutural friends and family members. To be honest, I am looking for that whole suburbia, catholic, middle class atmosphere. The last thing I want is to be in the middle of gang town with different culturals having fights just because. I was hoping London was a small/big town with as little of that as possible.


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## 3zooz

patoria said:


> hi 3zooz,
> 
> I am a Canadian raised in Ottawa, lived in Niagara Falls for many years. My wife is from England. My wife and I moved to Australia to start a new life but as much as Australia is a lovely place to visit, we wouldn't want to live here. The people are great in many ways and not so great in many others. The prices are outrageous, the living costs ridiculous, the summers are way too hot, Christmas without snow and hot chocolate is, well, just not right. I could go on but in a nutshell Canada is the best place in the world and I had to move away to realise it. My wife lived there for one year and fell in love. We should never have tried the adventure of moving. Time to go home.
> 
> If you are Australian please don't take offence. I do not mean to bad mouth Oz as it is lovely in so many ways. Different countires means different lifestyles and Australia is just not the lifestyle for us. It might be for others but not us.


I won't take offence as I'm not Australian lol But I have to say also that this country is really beautiful and definitely a lovely place to visit.
Can you briefly compare Canada to Australia in terms of the points you mentioned (ie prices, living costs, ...etc) 'cause these are the points that are driving my thoughts and desire v. strongly towards Canada, but first I need to get a clearer picture from you or anyone who lived in both countries and is capable of explaining the real and major differences that you won't know via surfing the web !!


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## nwalker519

patoria said:


> nwalker519, your answer is exactly what I was looking for. As we were reading your post my wife and I were both going "wow, fantastic, someone with first hand knowledge (so many people give advice without having the knowledge to do so), this is great" then we saw the "gang problem". It might be unrealistic to move to Canada and not find some gang activity because, sadly, that is a fact of living in Canada today but we would like to be as far away as possible from it. London seems like a nice small/big town known for its university atmosphere with some pretty decent house prices.
> 
> London is still very high on our cities to move to and with your fantastic advice we will now know where to look and, more importantly, where NOT to look for a house. Thank you for a fantastic response.





- Just to clarify since i feel the need to, when i say 'gangs', i don't mean like what you would find in NYC or Toronto! What i meant was there is simply some teens who feel the need to vanadalize the rougher parts of the city and consider themselves 'gangs' they are by no mean violent and I honestly never came into contact with anything gang related myself. It was just something to take into consideration  

I also agree with the other people on here that London's population is comprised mostly of WASP families. As a girl from a more small town rural, very white, Christian area, I really fit in well to this while I lived there  I think a middle-class or more affluent family would fit in exceptionaly well in London.


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## patoria

3zooz said:


> I won't take offence as I'm not Australian lol But I have to say also that this country is really beautiful and definitely a lovely place to visit.
> Can you briefly compare Canada to Australia in terms of the points you mentioned (ie prices, living costs, ...etc) 'cause these are the points that are driving my thoughts and desire v. strongly towards Canada, but first I need to get a clearer picture from you or anyone who lived in both countries and is capable of explaining the real and major differences that you won't know via surfing the web !!


If you would like to start a new thread and let me know about it, say in a private message, I would more than happy to give you my personal opinions on the differences between canada and oz. After living here in Oz for the past 11 years and nearly 40 prior to that in Canada I could give you real examples. Just let me know.


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## patoria

nwalker519 said:


> - Just to clarify since i feel the need to, when i say 'gangs', i don't mean like what you would find in NYC or Toronto! What i meant was there is simply some teens who feel the need to vanadalize the rougher parts of the city and consider themselves 'gangs' they are by no mean violent and I honestly never came into contact with anything gang related myself. It was just something to take into consideration
> 
> I also agree with the other people on here that London's population is comprised mostly of WASP families. As a girl from a more small town rural, very white, Christian area, I really fit in well to this while I lived there  I think a middle-class or more affluent family would fit in exceptionaly well in London.


Thank you nwalker. That does clear it up. We were 100% planning on moving to London then had second thoughts after your email. Thanks for clearing that up. Your original response was one of the best I have seen on these forums; clear, detailed, from personal experience and not from "I think" point of view which you get alot of here. Thanks again. 

*One last question*, if you don't mind. What are the Christmas's like? Is there a regular White Christmas? As strange as this sounds, that is a major deal breaker when chosing a place to live. We MUST have white a Christmas.


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## Kurai_Killer

Christmas in London, as with almost all of Canada is normally white. Although London is further south than the northern American states, it still maintains the four seasons. In the last decade, there have been three really weak winters inwhich the southern part of Ontario recieved little to no snow all winter, but it is not the norm. London is a great choice. The "gangs" that were mentioned tend to be no more than small groups of punks that have nothing better to do than hang around in parking lots. The term "gang" shouldn't even be used in this case. 

Potential other considerations for move locations are Cambridge or Burlington. Burlington is ranked third best place to live in Canada and one of the lowest crime rates in Canada. Burlington is a 200k population city located between Toronto and the other southern Ontario mega city, Hamilton. Burlington is close enough to the major cities of Ontario, but maintains a small city charm. Burlington is very white and very rich, but it has its older part of town, Aldershot, which is a hub between Burlington and the city of Hamilton. Aldershot tends to house the lower and middle class families, with the rest throughout the town. Aldershot is also considered the criminal part of town, but you would never tell if you were just passing through. And Iuse the term "criminal" very loosely. In a town that gets no crime, it's hard to say what the bad parts of town are. The town is a mixture of urban sprawl throughout, commercial business throughout and large rural areas in the north end of town. The town is also connected along Lake Ontario, if you enjoy large bodies of water. 

Cambridge is much like London, but more farmlands, as I recall. 

Still though, London is a great choice and there is little reason you should dislike the town.


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## ClaytonP

Hey, just to put in my two cents: Check out Old south as well, it's a great neighbourhood. And even the small towns outside are really nice, like Komoka and Ilderton, and not too far a drive.


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## lond

nauru said:


> As I recall from my visits to London Ontario, it is the whitest city I've ever visited in the province (other than towns which are so small that they can't really be called cities).
> 
> I'm not sure if my observations from biannual visits for the past 20 years is borne out in the official statistics, however the most remarkable thing I saw there was an incredibly high concentration of white people. Loads of white anglo saxon protestant middle class minivan driving suburb dwellers, although there is also a considerable number of white anglo saxon catholic middle class minivan driving suburb dwellers.


This is true, depending on the areas in which you see. However, the the northwest end is more diverse.


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## luvcanada

nwalker519 said:


> - Just to clarify since i feel the need to, when i say 'gangs', i don't mean like what you would find in NYC or Toronto! What i meant was there is simply some teens who feel the need to vanadalize the rougher parts of the city and consider themselves 'gangs' they are by no mean violent and I honestly never came into contact with anything gang related myself. It was just something to take into consideration


Glad that you clarified that. We have to be careful when we talk about crime and gangs. Most people interested in moving to Canada probably think of US style crime and gangs. For the most part, Canada is so much safer than the US. The gangs here (even in Toronto) do not compare to the gangs in NYC or Los Angeles. And crime, is much less serious than in the US.

To highlight my comments see stats from Statistics Canada 
Table 5 Police-reported crime for selected offences, by census metropolitan area, 2012
and from this site:
Crime rate in New York, New York (NY): murders, rapes, robberies, assaults, burglaries, thefts, auto thefts, arson, law enforcement employees, police officers statistics

In 2012, the Toronto area had 1.4 murders / 100,000 people and New York City had 5.1. Before I get lots of complaints let me say that the comparisons are the City of New York and the metropolitan area of Toronto (including suburbs). By the way London had a murder rate of 1.6 / 100,000 - higher than Toronto.


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## luvcanada

patoria said:


> *One last question*, if you don't mind. What are the Christmas's like? Is there a regular White Christmas? As strange as this sounds, that is a major deal breaker when chosing a place to live. We MUST have white a Christmas.


Don't worry about the white Christmas. London is in the snow belt where the winter winds coming from the north pick up moisture over Lake Huron and drop it into London. London usually gets more snow than the other cities immediately east and west of it. See the lovely Christmas pic in the link below. It shows London with plenty of snow in 2010. In that storm, according to the article, it received about 48"(120 cm) in 24 hours.  But that was a record not a norm.

http://www.wunderground.com/blog/weatherhistorian/lakeeffect-snowstorms-recent-and-historical


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## colchar

lond said:


> This is true, depending on the areas in which you see. However, the the northwest end is more diverse.



You just replied to a three year old thread, I am pretty sure the conversation has long since died off.


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## gringotim

colchar said:


> You just replied to a three year old thread, I am pretty sure the conversation has long since died off.


Old, dormant threads have been a problem on here for years, they need to close a thread after its been inactive for a while, like maybe 3 months. If someone still wants more info, start a new thread, but people also need to look at how old a thread is before replying to it. One forum I use has a statement when you click on an old dormant thread, saying something like, "This topic has been inactive for over 90 days old, you may want to start a new thread in order to get up to date information.


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