Data Story

In May 2023, Toronto City Council declared a homelessness emergency. According to the Street Needs Assessment by the City of Toronto (2024), there was an estimated total of 15,418 homeless people within the city in October 2024 -- over double the amount of the same estimate made in April 2021. This number is the sum of all homeless people in city-administered and provincially administered sites, in addition to an estimate of those living outside of the system. Of this number, city-administered sites made up 80% of all those within the system. The city-administered shelter system has increased capacity as demand for shelters have grown. The city views homelessness as "the result of failures across multiple systems, such as housing, health care, mental health, income support, and the justice system" (2024 Street Needs Assessment). Within this context, the shelter system is seen as the last resort for the victims of these failures. Toronto operates the largest shelter system in Canada.

In this project, I look to analyze the occupancy data provided by the City. I collected the data from the start of collection, in January 2021, to the beginning of October 2025.

The City of Toronto can be organized by Forward Sortation Addresses (FSA). These are the first 3 character codes that are part of all Canadian postal codes; each FSA is determined by the government, typically based off of the number of people living within the area: generally, FSA areas near downtown Toronto will be geographically smaller than those further away. Since the open data already provides postal code information for each data point, I decideded to use them as a way to visualize the city.

2024 Street Needs Assessment. City of Toronto. https://www.toronto.ca/wp-content/uploads/2025/07/9790-street-needs-assessment-report-2024.pdf