Toronto's six former cities: which one holds your lot, and what changes?

Key takeaways

• Toronto merged six former cities on January 1, 1998, and the City says some of their old zoning by-laws remain in effect where By-law 569-2013 does not apply.
• Five or six homes in a detached building are allowed on 88.43% of Old Toronto, 63.84% of East York, 35.98% of York and in the Ward 23 area of Scarborough. Elsewhere, one building holds up to four.
• The main house zone changes with the area: R in Old Toronto, RM in York and RD in East York, North York, Etobicoke and Scarborough.
• Old Toronto holds 269.23 km of the city's 343.48 km of public lanes and 977 of the 1,938 issued garden or laneway suite permits my team could place in a former city.
• North York has the most issued permits for new buildings with three or more units, 115. York has the most for its size, 3.65 for each square kilometre.
• In 8 of the 25 wards a former city line runs through the ward, so check the neighbourhood as well as the ward.

What this overview is for

Until January 1, 1998, East York, York, North York, Etobicoke and Scarborough were separate municipalities beside the former City of Toronto, each with its own zoning rules. Those old lines are still on the City's maps, and they still change what a builder can put on a house lot.

This page is for two readers. One is a small builder who is choosing where in Toronto to look for a lot. The other is an owner who wants to know what a builder would see in their lot, and why a lot on one street can be worth a different amount to a builder than a lot of the same size a few kilometres away. Both readers need the same first answer: which former city is the lot in, and what does that change?

Each of the six areas has its own guide on this site, with its wards, neighbourhoods, zones, permits and hearing panel in detail. This page puts the six side by side, so you can see where the rules and the numbers differ, and then it sends you to the right area guide. The full multiplex rules are in my multiplex zoning guide, so I do not repeat them here.

All facts on this page come from City of Toronto pages, reports and open data files, plus TTC and Metrolinx pages for transit, read on November 1, 2026. Many figures were measured by my team from the City's own map and permit files on that date. A note under each table says so.

Six former cities, one City since 1998

The City of Toronto Archives gives the dates that explain the six areas. On April 15, 1953, the Municipality of Metropolitan Toronto Act set up Metro, made up of 13 municipalities: East York, Etobicoke, Forest Hill, Leaside, Long Branch, Mimico, New Toronto, North York, Scarborough, Swansea, Toronto, Weston and York. Metro took charge on January 1, 1954.

On January 1, 1967, the 13 became six. Forest Hill and Swansea joined Toronto. Long Branch, Mimico and New Toronto joined Etobicoke. Weston joined York, and Leaside joined East York. On January 1, 1998, Metro ceased to exist, and the six area municipalities were merged into the new City of Toronto.

Each area has older roots as well. The town of York was founded on August 27, 1793 and became the City of Toronto on March 6, 1834. York and Etobicoke were incorporated as townships on January 1, 1850, and so was Scarborough. North York was created as a township on July 18, 1922, and East York was incorporated as a township on December 31, 1923. North York became a city on February 14, 1979. York became a city on June 10, 1983, and Etobicoke on June 29, 1983. The Archives page gives no date for East York or Scarborough becoming a city, so I leave those out.

The tables below show how the areas differ today. The former City of Toronto holds most of the public lanes and the most semi-detached houses. The four outer areas, North York, Etobicoke, Scarborough and East York, have a larger share of detached houses and few lanes.

Why the old lines still matter for a lot

The City's Former Municipal Zoning By-laws page says that at amalgamation each of the six had its own zoning rules, "some of which remain in effect today". The old lines matter for a house lot in four ways.

1. The sixplex area. By-law 654-2025, enacted on June 26, 2025, allows five or six homes in a detached building in two areas only. One is the Toronto and East York Community Council area as it stood on that day. The other is an area of Scarborough around Ward 23. The Toronto and East York area covers most of the former City of Toronto and parts of East York and York, so the old lines decide who is inside.
2. The old zoning by-law. The City says most properties are under the city-wide Zoning By-law 569-2013, and some may still be affected by a former by-law, in whole or in part. Which former by-law can apply depends on the former city.
3. The hearing panel. The Committee of Adjustment is the City panel that rules on lot splits and on small exceptions to the zoning, called minor variances. It has four district panels, and each hears a fixed list of wards.
4. The community council. The City groups its 25 wards into four community council areas: Etobicoke York, North York, Toronto and East York, and Scarborough. The same four groups of wards decide the panel and, for the Toronto and East York area, the sixplex line.

The ward groups follow the old cities only in part. Etobicoke (99.99%) and Scarborough (99.94%) each sit inside one community council area. Old Toronto, East York, York and North York are split between two or three. That is why a lot's ward and its former city can point to different rules.

The six areas side by side

Areas come from the City's former municipality boundary file, laid over its community council, zoning, street, ravine and station area files. The boundary file can include some water inside the line. The zoning file has amendments up to June 18, 2023. The ravine file dates from 2019. Permit counts run to November 1, 2026 and come from the City's active and cleared permit files, which my team linked to the City's address file by exact address ID. The cleared file starts in 2017. 35 suite permits and 33 permits for new buildings with three or more units had no matching address and are left out of the area counts. The North York and Scarborough sixplex shares are small pieces in Ward 19 that my team did not check on the ground.

For Scarborough, the Ward 23 figure is the share covered by the ward's polygon in the City's ward file. By-law 654-2025 draws its own line on Diagram 1, which it titles "Scarborough North (23) Ward Area". We compared the two by eye only, so for a lot near Steeles Avenue, Neilson Road, the Rouge River, Highway 401 or Midland Avenue, read the diagram itself. My Scarborough guide covers that area in detail.

How to tell which former city your lot is in

There are three ways, and the first one works for most lots.

By ward. Toronto has 25 wards. In 17 of them, one former city holds 95% or more of the ward's land, so the ward number alone gives you the former city. In the other 8, the old line runs through the ward.

The last column gives the count the by-law allows in one detached building on a house lot. The zone rules, the lot size and the bedroom cap then decide how many homes fit. A semi-detached house or a townhouse cannot be turned into five or six homes under By-law 654-2025, even inside the six-home wards.

By neighbourhood. The City divides Toronto into 158 official neighbourhoods. My team placed each one in the former city that holds half or more of its area, and all 158 land in exactly one list. Each area guide has its full list with the City's number for each neighbourhood. If you live in one of the 8 split wards, find your neighbourhood on the Old Toronto, East York, York or North York guide.

By address. The City's address file, an open data file of every address point in Toronto, records the former city for each address in a field of its own. My team used that field to place every permit counted on this site. If your lot sits near a line, send me the address and I will check it in that file. For a lot right on the edge of the sixplex area, also read Diagram 2 of By-law 654-2025 and ask Toronto Building, the City's permit office, to confirm.

The sixplex line: three areas inside, three outside

The clearest difference between the six areas is how many homes one building can hold. Staff had recommended a city-wide approach for fiveplexes and sixplexes in their May 28, 2025 report. The by-law Council enacted on June 26, 2025 covers two areas only.

Three former cities sit wholly or partly inside the Toronto and East York area:

• Old Toronto, 88.43% inside. The parts in Wards 5, 8 and 15 are outside. See the Old Toronto guide.
• East York, 63.84% inside. The parts in Wards 15 and 16 are outside. See the East York guide.
• York, 35.98% inside, the parts in Wards 4, 9 and 12. The Ward 5 part (56.25% of York) and the Ward 8 part (7.78%) are outside. See the York guide.

Three are outside it, apart from the Ward 23 area:

• North York, 0.18% inside, a 0.32 square kilometre piece in Ward 19. See the North York guide.
• Etobicoke, 0% inside. See the Etobicoke guide.
• Scarborough, with the Ward 23 area set by the by-law's Diagram 1. See the Scarborough guide.

So in York, a detached house lot in Ward 9 or 12 can hold six homes, while a lot of the same size across the line in Ward 5 can hold four in one building. Outside the six-home areas, the City's Considerations When Building Multiplexes page says a garden or laneway suite can sit on the same lot as a fourplex if its own rules are met, which gives five homes. My multiplex zoning guide sets out the height, depth and bedroom limits that apply in both cases.

The main house zone changes from area to area

Zoning By-law 569-2013 has five residential zones, and the letters in each name show the main home type the zone allows. R is the Residential zone, RD Residential Detached, RS Residential Semi-Detached, RT Residential Townhouse and RM Residential Multiple. The City's Multiplex Housing page says four-unit multiplexes are allowed in all five. The zone still matters, because it sets the other home types a lot can hold and the lot sizes behind the label.

The R zone belongs to the old city. It covers 76.81% of Old Toronto's residential zoned land and under 0.25% in each of the other five areas. The City first allowed laneway suites in R zones in the Toronto and East York district on June 28, 2018, a year before it allowed them in all five residential zones across the city on July 16, 2019.

York is the one area where RM, the Residential Multiple zone, is the main zone, at 66.89%. My team found a u4 value on 97.62% of York's RM land, and the RM rules permit an apartment building only where the label has no u value, a u value of 5 or more, or the lot is on a Major Street. My York guide explains what that leaves for most of those lots.

RD, the Residential Detached zone, is the main zone in the other four. The lot rules behind the RD label differ by area, though. In North York, the most common label sets a 15 metre minimum frontage and a 550 square metre minimum lot area. In Etobicoke, the most common label sets 13.5 metres and 510 square metres, with a floor space limit that does not apply to a detached houseplex, which is a house holding several homes. In Scarborough, my team found an exception number on 99.99% of the RD land, so the rules for most lots sit in the exception text. The North York, Etobicoke and Scarborough guides each explain their labels. To read the label on your own lot, use my guide to checking your lot.

Old zoning by-laws that can still apply

The City lists residential zoning sheets for East York and Leaside, Etobicoke, Long Branch, Mimico, New Toronto, North York, Toronto, Scarborough and York. Each names the old by-law of that former city.

City-wide, 81.17% of the land has a 569-2013 zone in the open data file. The rest holds streets and water as well as land outside 569-2013, and the file does not separate them, so these shares cannot tell you about one lot. On the City's interactive zoning map, a property shown in grey still follows a former by-law. My lot check guide shows how to find that. If your lot is grey, ask Toronto Building at 416-397-5330 which by-law applies before you count on any rule on this page.

Lanes and back yard suites

A laneway suite is a small separate home at the back of a lot that faces a public lane. A garden suite is the same kind of home on a lot with no lane behind it. Either one adds a home to the lot.

Most of the lanes are in the old city. My team measured 343.48 km of public laneway across Toronto in the City's street centreline file. Old Toronto holds 269.23 km of it, 78.38%. York holds 27.98 km, 8.15%. The other four share the last 13.48%: North York 15.56 km, Etobicoke 14.10 km, East York 9.67 km and Scarborough 6.94 km. Old Toronto has 2.535 km of lane for each square kilometre of land and Scarborough has 0.037 km. So in the four outer areas, the back yard choice on most lots is a garden suite.

The permit counts show both suite types together, because the City's permit field does not separate them.

My team could place 1,938 issued suite permits in a former city. Old Toronto holds 977 of them, 50.41%. Per square kilometre of land, York has the most, 9.30 issued suite permits, and Old Toronto has 9.20. East York has 4.59, North York 1.47, Etobicoke 1.39 and Scarborough 1.12. In North York, applications went from 4 in 2022 to 152 in 2026 up to November 1.

The City's own garden suite review, dated June 27, 2025, noted more Committee of Adjustment applications "in older parts of the city, and parts of North York, Scarborough and Etobicoke with larger lots". As of May 8, 2025, it counted 812 building permit applications for garden suites city-wide and 480 issued permits.

New multiplex buildings: where the permits are

Two City sources count multiplex permits, and they measure different things.

The first is the City's Multiplex Monitoring Program. It counted 452 permits issued for multiplexes of two to four units between May 12, 2023 and November 2024, by ward. 74.5% of them were for a renovation or addition and 25.4% for a new house. Grouped by community council, the eight Toronto and East York wards had 251 of the 452, or 55.53%. The five Etobicoke York wards had 99, the six North York wards 53 and the six Scarborough wards 49. Ward 9, Davenport, had the most of any ward, 68. These are whole-ward counts, so they follow ward lines, which differ from the former city lines.

The second is my team's count of permits for a new building with three or more units, placed by address. It runs to November 1, 2026, and it leaves out house conversions, which use another permit type.

Across the six areas, applications went from 20 in 2023 to 343 in 2026 up to November 1. My team could place 442 issued permits of this kind in a former city. North York has the most, 115, or 26.02%, and its 106 applications in 2026 are the most of any area that year. York has 86 issued permits on 3.67% of the city's land, which is 3.65 for each square kilometre. No other area has more than 1.41.

Split by ward, the eight six-home wards hold 162 of the 442 issued permits, and the other 17 wards hold 280. Ward 23, the Scarborough sixplex area, had none issued and 1 not yet issued on November 1, 2026. The count runs back to 2016, years before the sixplex rule, so it shows where builders have worked so far. The permit files have no field that marks a fiveplex or a sixplex, so the effect of By-law 654-2025 on its own cannot be read from them yet.

Ravines, heritage districts and secondary plans

Three kinds of City rule can add to the zoning and bring a permit, a study or a design limit to a project.

Ravine land. The City's Ravine and Natural Feature Protection by-law covers land in and near ravines, and work inside that area needs extra City permits. East York has the largest share inside it, 29.8%. York has 23.69%, Scarborough 22.58%, North York 16.04%, Etobicoke 15.11% and Old Toronto 8.39%. By land, Scarborough holds the most, 42.509 square kilometres, which is 38.31% of all such land in Toronto. The file is from 2019, so check the City's current map for any lot that backs onto a valley.

Heritage conservation districts. These are areas Council protects for their history, each under its own by-law. By the City's June 23, 2026 file, Old Toronto has 30 districts with half or more of their area inside it and York has 2. My team found none in East York, North York, Etobicoke or Scarborough by that count. A single house can still be on the City's heritage register anywhere, so check the address.

Secondary plans. A secondary plan is a more detailed City plan for one area, with extra policies on top of the Official Plan. Old Toronto has 19 with half or more of their area inside it, North York 18, Scarborough 7, Etobicoke 6, York 1 and East York none. If a lot is inside one, read that plan before you price the lot.

My site screening guide covers what to check for each of these on a single lot.

Station areas and transit

The province has approved 120 areas around subway, GO and LRT stations where the City must plan for more homes. The City's page describes each one as the land within 500 to 800 metres of a station, which it calls a 10 minute walk. The City calls them Major Transit Station Areas, or MTSAs. Of the 120, 95 are Protected Major Transit Station Areas, or PMTSAs, the type where the City can apply its affordable housing rule for larger buildings.

Station areas cross the old lines, so one area can be counted in two former cities, and the station counts add up to more than 120.

For land the Official Plan calls Neighbourhoods inside a station area, the City's page says the zoning must be updated to allow homes in buildings of up to 6 storeys within 200 metres of a station and on Major Streets, and up to 4 storeys in the rest of the station area. On the page's date, June 30, 2026, those rules were still missing from the zoning by-law, and the City said it would set a timeline once staff finish an updated work plan. Two things have already changed. Since August 15, 2025, minimum parking rules no longer apply inside station areas, though accessible parking is still required. Ontario Regulation 15/26 pauses the affordable housing rule in Toronto until July 1, 2027.

The transit facts I could confirm on November 1, 2026: the TTC began an introductory service period on Line 5 Eglinton, 19 km from Mount Dennis Station to Kennedy Station, on February 8, 2026. Line 6 Finch West, 11 km from Finch West Station to Humber College Station, started service on December 7, 2025. Metrolinx says construction is underway on the Ontario Line and the Eglinton Crosstown West Extension, and that tunnelling for the Scarborough Subway Extension began in January 2023. None of the Metrolinx pages gives an opening date. Lots on Major Streets have their own rules, covered in my Major Streets guide.

Who lives in each area

The 2021 Census can be summed by neighbourhood. My team added up the City's Neighbourhood Profiles for the neighbourhoods placed in each former city. The six sums add to 2,761,290 people. The City's own total is 2,761,285, and Statistics Canada's random rounding explains the gap of 5. Neighbourhood lines and former city lines differ where a neighbourhood is split, so read each column as the sum of whole neighbourhoods.

Detached houses matter here because a detached building is the type By-law 654-2025 lets hold five or six homes. Old Toronto has the largest number of semi-detached houses, 31,575, and the smallest share of detached houses, 9.5%. Scarborough has the largest share of detached houses, 37.2%, and the largest share of owners, 64.1%. Most Old Toronto households rent, 57.0% of them. East York is close to even, with 24,080 renter households and 22,205 owners.

Four hearing panels

If a design needs a minor variance, or a lot needs to be split, the application goes to the Committee of Adjustment panel for the lot's ward. My severance and minor variance guide covers the tests, the fees and the appeal rules.

Hearings are held in person and by Webex. Etobicoke goes to one panel, and so does Scarborough. Old Toronto and York each split across three panels, and East York and North York across two. The number of hearing dates matters for a builder's schedule: the Scarborough panel lists one hearing a month in 2026, and the Toronto and East York panel lists 35.

Across the city, the Multiplex Monitoring report found 290 minor variance applications for duplexes, triplexes and fourplexes between May 2023 and April 2025. 72% were approved, 10% refused, and 18% were under review or deferred.

What the comparison means if you own a house

A family buyer compares your house with the houses that sold on your street. A builder compares your lot with lots across the city. The tables above are part of that second comparison, and it helps to know where your lot sits in them before you talk to anyone about a price.

Start with three facts. Is your lot inside a six-home area or a four-home area? Is the house detached, or half of a semi? Does the lot back onto a public lane, a ravine or a heritage district? Two lots of the same size can hold a different number of homes because of those three facts alone. My guide to checking your lot shows how to look them up, and how builders price land shows how a builder turns the home count into an offer.

If your lot is narrow or half of a semi, a builder may want to plan it with the lot next door. My guide on selling with your neighbours covers how that works. Before you sign, read builder offers and conditions, because a sale that needs a City approval often closes later than a family sale.

What the comparison means if you build

Each area has a different mix of rules for a builder. Old Toronto and the six-home parts of East York and York allow the largest building on a detached lot, and Old Toronto has the lanes for laneway suites. They also have the most heritage districts, the most semi-detached houses and the panel with the most hearing dates. North York, Etobicoke and most of Scarborough hold one building to four homes. They have a larger share of detached houses, and North York had the most applications for new buildings with three or more units in 2026, 106. York has the most permits for its size, on RM land with a u4 cap.

Whichever area you look at, check the lot against the same list: the sixplex line, the zone label and any exception, a former by-law, ravine land, a heritage district, a secondary plan, a station area and trees. My site screening guide covers each one, and my feasibility guide shows how to test whether the project pays. Then read the area guide for the lot's former city before you make an offer.

Questions to ask when you compare two lots

• Which former city and which ward is each lot in, and does a former city line run through that ward?
• Is each lot inside a six-home area under By-law 654-2025, or held to four homes in one building?
• What is the zone label, and does it carry a u value or an exception number?
• Does the zoning map show either lot in grey, under a former by-law?
• Does either lot share a property line with a public lane?
• Is either lot in a ravine area, a heritage district, a secondary plan or a station area?
• Which Committee of Adjustment panel would hear each one, and how many hearing dates are left this year?

A house price tells you what one family paid on one street. Across six former cities, what could your lot hold?