Toronto Star

York Region is planning a series of `transit villages' — four regional downtown centres where people can live, work, shop, dine and play — without ever getting into a car. Welcome to downtown suburbia! The words have a heavily oxymoronic ring, but if York Region officials get their way, it's only a matter of time before they come true. Seems that the promise of the `burbs — all that space so close to the city but far enough away to be safe and separate — is being crushed beneath the weight of gridlock. The car, which made the suburbs possible, will also be their downfall. The result is a forward-looking region-wide plan to create a string of "transit villages" — formerly known as downtowns — that will enable residents to get out of their cars and use public transit. Of course, public transit and suburbia are not normally mentioned in the same breath; they are polar opposites, an either/or kind of thing.