Volume 2: Issue 3 | Post-pandemic downtown recovery: Downtown is for people

University of Toronto faculty members working on post-pandemic downtown recovery, a key theme of focus for the School of Cities in 2022/23, are showing that the shift to remote work – rather than spelling the end of downtown – has meant changes in the form and function of central business districts that will continue to shape the future of cities in the United States and Canada. Starting in early 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic influenced major shifts to the way we work as offices emptied out and work moved online. This freed up many individuals and families previously tied to the central business district (CBD) to move to smaller cities or suburbs, and a mass exodus from urban centres ensued. More than two years later, many workers – especially professionals and knowledge workers that can easily adapt to remote work – still haven’t returned: many big cities in both the US and Canada have been stalled at around half of the workforce returning fulltime inperson to the workplace. As a result, a key debate about cities has emerged as some scholars and pundits have predicted the end of downtown and the central business district as we know it. But does a shift away from downtown as the chief location of work in urban centres really spell the death of downtown?