The Top Questions We Get Asked

Barrie is a constantly growing city, designated as an Urban Growth Centre by the Province of Ontario, due to it’s proximity to Toronto. Currently, just over 140,000 people live here, in a geographical area of approximately 100 square kilometres.

We see our reputation proceeds us! Barrie is located on the Southern edge of Ontario’s snow belt region, getting an average of 238 centimetres of snow per year. What does that mean? Well, you’ll want to invest in a snow blower or get an awesome shovel! It also means that there are tons of great opportunities for winter fun! Within Barrie, or at most only minutes outside of the city, you can find downhill and cross-country skiing, tubing, skating, tobogganing, snowshoeing and ice fishing venues. Barrie residents don’t let a little snow phase them, people flock to the waterfront to take advantage of the weather with festivals and events, like winterfest, celebrating the great outdoors.

The commute to Toronto is often one of the biggest concerns people have when moving to Barrie. Toronto is 90 kilometres from Barrie and is best accessed via Highway 400 (or a number of smaller highways) or via GO Transit. Depending on your final destination in Toronto, a commute can take as few as 45 minutes on Highway 400, however, the time of day can have a substantial effect on traffic. Many people who work a typical 9-5 job choose to take the GO Train from one of Barrie’s two train stations. In the spring of 2015, Kathleen Wynne announced a major investment in GO Transit which will see the number of trains in and out of Barrie more than double, while the length of the trips will be more than cut in half at peak times.

Like most other large cities, Barrie offers Public, Catholic, and French schools, as well as a variety of private and religion-based schools. The community oriented culture of Barrie can be found thriving within the school system as well, many having active sporting teams, clubs and volunteer committees.

Moving from the GTA ourselves, we were concerned about our children having access to a wide variety of extracurricular activities (think trampoline classes to pottery painting) and we haven’t been disappointed! The City of Barrie offers an amazing number and variety of classes for people of all ages, as well as many private clubs, rinks and teachers. As an added bonus, many of the activities, like summer camps, are more affordable in Barrie.