There is good reason for believing that Montreal is now the largest city in the self-governing Dominions of the Empire. Only London, Glasgow, Liverpool and Manchester, in the British Isles, can claim to exceed her in population. If we exclude from the calculation the densely populated cities of the East, and Occidental cities, she will rank among the first twenty. And is there a city, among those which now surpass her in population, which is showing as large a percentage of growth? As the metropolitan city of a virgin half-continent, towards which the tide of immigration is yearly rushing with greater force, Montreal is growing with Canada’s growth, and every man who is convinced of the tremendous development Canada will witness within the next decade must realize that this development will mean that Montreal must move, in that time, close to the million mark.
In 1901 Montreal had a population of 267,000. Her suburbs then were small, but supposing we put them at 33,000, and call the greater city 300,000. If today this greater city is 625,000 the growth in eleven years has been 325,000, or about 30,000 per year. Is it unreasonable to assume that in nine years’ time we will have a million souls on this island?
The following computation also will be interesting in later years as a specimen of current speculations and prophecies in 1914 of Montreal’s growth:
“At this rate,” says a contemporary writer, “the city’s population will be considerably over the million mark in 1919. By 1931, two years would be quite sufficient to add to the population of the spreading city, more people than are at present living in both the city and suburbs. If the present rate of increase should remain constant, twenty-six years from today would see a city containing a greater population than the whole of the Dominion of Canada can boast of today, and with seven and three-quarter millions of people, exclusive of suburbs, considerably larger than the London of the present time. A trip further in the future is too dizzy for the brain of any but the trained mathematician, but the array of figures are sufficient to show that within the life-time of the present citizens the city on the shores of the St. Lawrence is likely to stand in the fore-front of the leading centers of the world. Of course, it is only natural to expect that the increase will not be maintained at the present rate, but the addition of growing suburbs will likely prevent any considerable decrease in the rate of advance.”
Before concluding these statistical pictures we may sum up the vital figures of the metropolis:
VII
THE GREATER MONTREAL OF 1912
Population of Greater Montreal, estimated, 625,000.
Assessed valuation of city nearly equals $1,000 per head of entire population of greater city.
City’s revenue from all sources, $8,200,000.