Broken Zoning: Why We Can’t Fix the Housing Crisis Without a Map Artwork

The Missing Middle with Mike Moffatt and Sabrina Maddeaux

Welcome to the Missing Middle, a podcast about why the middle class in Canada is disappearing. We hope to help you understand why life is becoming unaffordable for so many in this country, and what can be done to reverse course.

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The Missing Middle with Mike Moffatt and Sabrina Maddeaux

Broken Zoning: Why We Can’t Fix the Housing Crisis Without a Map

July 09, 2025 • Cara Stern, Mike Moffatt, and Meredith Martin • Season 1 • Episode 117

In this episode of The Missing Middle, Sabrina Maddeaux and Mike Moffatt are joined by urban planner Alex Beheshti for a deep dive into one of the most overlooked barriers to solving Canada’s housing crisis: zoning data. Alex makes the case for a Canadian Zoning Atlas—an ambitious but essential tool to bring clarity, consistency, and transparency to the country’s fragmented planning systems. They explore why zoning laws are so confusing, how the lack of machine-readable data cripples good policy, and what Canada can learn from international best practices. If we can map census data, why not zoning? From obscure codes to wedding vows about development charges (really!) this is a conversation about why better data might just be the key to better housing.

Chapters

00:00 Introduction

01:00 Canada needs a housing crisis map

01:29 Alex shares his wedding vows

02:48 Previous Alex B episode

02:53 Mike’s philosophy of experimentation and failure

04:05 Understanding zoning: definitions and complexities

07:01 The need for centralized zoning data

09:19 The massive gap in urban planning data

10:30 Envisioning a Canadian zoning atlas

12:16 Canada should emulate the US and Australia

13:49 Future planning tools for Canada