That depends very much on the season. I've lived in Toronto for 2 1/2 years, winters are doable but there are a few days when the cold is just unimaginable (until you move to Northern Ontario that is), summers are pretty hot.
Traditionally the summers are when the garbage collectors go on strike...
Other than that it's a great city to live in, for the most part nice people, great and affordable food, office space is priced reasonably.
The garbage strike was nice this year, you could see the dumps from just about every train going through the city. I'm glad I live outside of Toronto where our garbage collectors have the common decency to actually do their jobs through the summer, I'm fine with striking in the winter when the garbage will freeze though.
The whole GTA is a nice area, it goes from purely rural to purely urban in an area small enough to travel for everything.
The weather can be great, right now its being torturous. Lots of thunderstorms, rain and with humidity every temperature is +10 in the shade. God forbid you work outside in the sun, then it feels like +20. I'm amazed people don't just drop dead from the heat, but then I grew up in Northern England where temperatures (with humidity) rarely break 20C in the summer.
Winter is much more tolerable than summer, but that's because it's easier to wear 3 layers of clothes than it is to wear -2 layers of clothes. Personally I enjoy all year more than I did back in the UK, but that's probably because there is actually seasons here and not the 2 weeks of winter and 2 weeks of summer of my childhood.
Yeah, I see what you're saying. Sarajevo has a similar climate. I used to live in Florida, it was HOT 24/7 and to be honest, I'd rather live there. The thing I really love about Toronto is that it's like NYC just.....safer! :D
Toronto isn't the safest, compared to other big cities it's certainly very good, but considering the commuter regions have crime rates well below the national average it's certainly better than the other big cities.
The GTA is an amazing place to live. I'm in Halton (which has the lowest crime rate for all the GTA) and crime just isn't considered where I live. I believe the biggest crime in my area is car break-ins in the Cineplex parking lot, which now has a squad car permanently parked there every night.
Considering you can have a job in either Toronto or Hamilton and have a crime rate 1/3 the national average, or a violent crime rate of 1/10th the national average, I'd say Halton is the perfect place for anyone with kids.
Just some additional data on this for interested readers:
Chicago (2.8M) and Toronto (2.5M) are very similar cities, in size and standard of living. Toronto has about 1/7th the homicide rate. In 2008, Chicago had 509 homicides
I am constantly annoyed at all the homicides I have to step over every time I get off the homicide-laden trains in Chicago. I wish they'd do something about it. I see at least three at the Jackson stop every day. Sometimes there are even homicides in my back yard! It takes them forever to pick up, and if you just take them and put them by the garbage cans, the garbage trucks won't take them.
It's almost enough to make me want to move to Canada.
