The Regional Municipality of Durham, known informally as Durham Region, was founded in 1974 to address the needs of this rapidly expanding area. With a current population of more than 750,000 that is projected to reach 1.3 million by 2051, the demand for efficient, coordinated regional services continues to grow.
Today, Durham Region provides shared services and program coordination to eight local area municipalities consisting of cities, towns and townships in Ontario, Canada. These services support diverse communities and a range of economic sectors from agriculture to clean energy. With 80% of Durham Region zoned as protected green space or agricultural lands, agriculture is a major sector in the region. Durham Region is the Clean Energy Capital of Canada, providing about 30% of the province's energy needs. Energy engineering is a major employer as a result, with innovative projects like the first grid-tied small modular reactor being developed in the region. Durham is also home to automotive manufacturing, a thriving film production industry, and globally recognized research facilities such as the multi-climate ACE Climatic Aerodynamic Wind Tunnel.
Bringing Broadband to the Underserved
The rural populations of Durham, like most such areas, are generally underserved by ISPs that struggle to make an investment case for network growth. Basic internet access is available to 98% of businesses and residences, and good broadband service reaches cities, suburbs and the affluent shoreline communities of Lake Ontario. But an estimated 21% of households and more than 1,000 businesses remained underserved.
Learning from peer communities, the Region developed a plan to build a 750-km middle-mile fiber-optic network along rights of way controlled by the Region or one of its communities. Investment in a middle-mile network can substantially reduce the cost and risk to ISPs of bringing high-speed broadband to new markets. They lease capacity at attractive rates from the middle-mile provider and extend from that network to subscribers at a fraction of the cost of a complete build-out. The middle-mile, if properly planned, can also provide capacity directly to Regional and municipal facilities, universities, schools and hospitals (MUSH).
In 2020, the Region began to put the plan into practice. It held extensive meetings with all municipalities and townships to develop collaboration on managing rights of way and permitting. They led to a successful effort to create a local and regional online process that slashed turnaround time for network construction permits, which reduced risk for private-sector investors.
The Region also established a government-owned company called Durham OneNet, which developed the processes and contractor relationships to do design, construction and operation – and most importantly, to move at the speed of business. Durham OneNet completed the first 36km leg of the network in a rural area, finishing on budget and ahead of schedule. That led to deployment of high-speed service by 12 wireless ISPs to four rural communities and leasing of fiber to a mix of MUSH facilities. This was followed by the successful application for provincial and Federal funding to cover the next 250 km expansion of the middle mile network.
Durham OneNet’s broader vision is to build a 700-km Regional Broadband Network (RBN) that spans the entire Region, connecting every community and Regional site. This network is more than infrastructure – it is a high-speed data expressway that bridges the digital divide, with open access that enables ISPs to provide last-mile services. The organization is proactively responding to soaring demand for bandwidth driven by cloud services, high-quality video, data-intensive applications and emerging technologies like AI. In 2024 alone, the RBN expanded by over 70%, serving 208 municipal, regional, and private clients, generating $3.4 million in first-year sales alongside significant capital savings. Funded by taxpayers in its initial three years, Durham OneNet is profitable as of 2025 and delivering significant value under its 10-year business plan.
Building a New Economy
Agriculture may dominate the economy, but it is challenged by the reluctance of the next generation to stay on the farm. Based on the Growing Agri-Food Durham Plan 2023-2027, the Region works with the 2-year Durham College and 4-year Ontario Tech University to alert young people through videos, websites and classroom presentations to modern agriculture’s demand for marketable skills in finance, nutrition, technology and agronomy. Augmenting this core program is a precision agriculture career day and pathway programs that guide high school students to higher education in agriculture, as well as a popular training program for farmers in diversifying their businesses.
These two schools are at the heart of the Region’s efforts to create a knowledge-based, innovation ecosystem. Durham College has, over the past five years, developed partnerships with all the Boards of Trade and Chambers of Commerce in the region, which has provided membership to 3,500 students. The partnerships deploy a range of programs from invitations to chamber events, workshops on everything from critical thinking to setting up a LinkedIn profile, and invitations to established businesses and entrepreneurs to speak on campus. The FastStart program is one example, offering local businesses the opportunity to bring their challenges to the college to be addressed by a team of students led by an instructor.
Ontario Tech University has 3,000 students participating in a program called Experience Ventures, funded by the Canadian government and the University of Calgary, which provide experiential learning opportunities to students across Canada. They are designed to ignite creativity, resilience and entrepreneurship while equipping students with high-value skills. An Employment Readiness Program teaches practical job skills (aka, soft skills) and the fundamentals of networking, which are vital skills for young people. Brilliant Catalyst, an incubator at Ontario Tech, runs hackathons to attract students locally and across Canada, then guides them in developing, validating and commercializing business ideas. Like the University of Waterloo, the university does not take an ownership position in companies or their IP, so the Fund provides it with an opportunity to transparently invest in 15 companies over a 3-year period, mainly in energy, mobility and eco-tech. Ontario Tech also hosted Project Arrow, a 2022 collaboration among Canadian’ automotive manufacturers to build a complete, zero-emission concept car to jumpstart the nation’s capabilities in this future growth market.
Ontario Power Generation (OPG) is another contributor to regional innovation. It is developing a standardized design for an inherently safe, small modular reactor that can receive safety certification to speed installation wherever new generation is needed. OPG also developed a world-class training center to create the workforce it needs for a major refurbishment of its oldest reactor complex. OPG has founded the Canadian Center for Nuclear Sustainability (CCNS) as an innovation hub focused on sustainable decommissioning, waste stewardship and site repurposing of nuclear plants at end of life. At the end of 2023, OPG announced that it would move its headquarters from Toronto into Durham, bringing a meaningful percentage of its 10,000 employees there.
Aiming for further economic diversification, the Durham Region has created the Ready Set Future: A PLACE Blueprint for Durham, a bold strategy guiding economic development through 2027. This strategy identifies five priority clusters: Future Energy, Next Generation Mobility, Arts, Culture and Creative Industries, Agri-Food and Applied Digital Technologies. These sectors leverage the Region’s existing assets, infrastructure and post-secondary curriculum to create global growth opportunities, high-value jobs and innovative partnerships. The Region and its local municipalities are enhancing infrastructure, developing key sites and increasing resources to foster success in each cluster. The Arts, Culture, and Creative cluster has been particularly dynamic, with the film and television industry growing by 260% over the past decade. Since the establishment of the Film Office in 2012, production value has surged by $57.2 million, increasing at 15% annually, with a 10% yearly rise in production days. Major studios such as Disney, CBS, Paramount, Amazon, Netflix and Apple TV have chosen Durham Region for productions like The Handmaid’s Tale, Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, Schitt’s Creek, and the Oscar-winning Women Talking. The opening of the Sunbelt Filming Backlot in 2021 – now the largest in Canada – has further cemented Durham’s status as a premier filming location. In 2024 alone, 69 productions were filmed locally, generating 102 film permits, adding 21 new locations to the Film Durham and Ontario Creates Digital Library, and welcoming 23 executives from USA and UK production studios for tours of local facilities, backlots, and mixed reality capture studios.
Complementing these cluster efforts, the Region launched a comprehensive land servicing initiative in partnership with local municipalities to expand the supply of market-ready employment lands, strategically positioned to support cluster growth. This initiative has helped drive a record $1.23 billion in non-residential building permits in 2023, contributing to a total building permit activity surpassing $3 billion. Durham was ranked among Canada’s top 20 investment destinations in 2024 by Site Selection Magazine in recognition of this success.
Durham Region has three major business parks that exemplify this strategic growth. Clarington Energy Park, central to Durham’s clean energy ambitions, spans 318 acres and hosts the Darlington Nuclear Generating Station and its small modular reactor project, the Darlington Energy Complex for nuclear training, the Durham York Energy Centre waste-to-energy facility, and East Penn Canada’s national automotive battery distribution headquarters. Pickering Innovation Corridor, with over 800 acres of prestige employment land along a major highway, is positioned to create 18,000 new high-tech jobs. It has attracted FGF Brands’ Wonderbrands Innovation Business Park, Kubota Canada’s national headquarters, and more. Northwood Business Park, near Oshawa Executive Airport and key post-secondary institutions, offers 500 acres for major employers. Notable investments include Panattoni Canada’s 500,000-square-foot facility, Lactalis Canada’s 379,000-square-foot global distribution centre, and Martin Brower’s 172,000-square-foot supply chain facility, creating 175 jobs.
Bringing Opportunity to More People
At the heart of Durham Region, libraries across all eight municipalities form a digital inclusion network, offering a wealth of opportunities for residents from every corner of the region. Each library serves as a technological and creative hub, offering technology loan programs, free Wi-Fi hotspots, computer labs, makerspaces and both one-on-one and group training sessions. In Oshawa, the Public Library’s Memory Lab, opened in 2024, enables residents to digitize cherished memories stored on old photographs, VHS tapes, vinyl records and cassettes. The Ajax Public Library Makerspace is a collaborative environment where visitors explore everything from fabric arts to robotics and coding, while its partnership with Makers Making Change provides affordable assistive devices created through open-source designs, addressing a significant community need. Since late 2024, this initiative has served 70 residents, with seniors particularly benefiting from practical tools like bottle openers for arthritis and reading aids for vision challenges.
Recognizing the barriers that low-income families face in accessing education, the Region formed a partnership with multiple levels of government, school boards, businesses, and charities to simplify access to the Canada Learning Bond, a financial aid program for post-secondary education. The application process is so complicated that only 40% of eligible children were receiving the bond. The Region formed a partnership with multiple levels of government, school boards, businesses and charities to host sign up events and offer eligible families everything they needed to get the bond. It resulted 500 new children receiving the Bond in the first year.
The Region’s Diversity, Equity and Inclusion department engages with people who would otherwise be invisible and gives the Region the perspective to understand them and their needs. Programs include work experience in Region offices for students with disabilities, an athletic and teaching facility designed for people of all abilities, and housing facilities with wraparound services for long-time citizens and newcomers.
Expanding opportunities for older adults, the Oshawa Seniors Community Centre (OSCC) offers an array of inclusive leisure programs and community support services for residents aged 55 and older. With more than 6,000 members and around 400 daily visitors across its branches, the OSCC has seen program participation grow by 39% from 2022 to 2023. Its Digital Inclusion program, which began informally with basic technology classes, now provides 25 different computer and technology courses and 142 online programs, collectively reaching nearly 43,000 seniors. The introduction of free internet access at all senior facilities, along with computer labs, cyber cafés and specialized initiatives like the Brain Gym for seniors with dementia, ensures that older adults remain digitally connected and engaged.
Engaging the Community in Making Government Better
Durham Region’s approach to modernizing government services and community engagement is founded on both technological innovation and a robust commitment to transparency, inclusion, and ongoing dialogue with residents. In 2019, the Durham Region launched the myDurham 311 project to improve the customer experience for residents seeking government services and community information. By consolidating over 60 public phone numbers and more than 50 email addresses into a single 311 contact point, the Region created a streamlined, centralized system offering support via phone, online, chat, smart devices and other channels.
While 311 services are commonplace, Durham’s development process was not. The Region consulted 400 residents from diverse backgrounds on what the project should deliver. This input led to a design for myDurham 311 that uses the latest technology to provide multiple, easy-to-use paths to the right information or service. It is based on a centralized customer management database that automatically creates work orders and service requests in municipal and regional systems, as well as powering an intuitive user portal where customers can track their engagement with the Region, check bills and learn transaction status. A follow-on partnership with a Federal innovation center and local company added access by Google Home and Amazon Echo.
myDurham 311 has since become an award-winning model of municipal service, with an average call wait time of just 14 seconds – one of the best in Ontario – and over 650,000 interactions managed to date. The program has driven a 16% increase in digital self-service between 2023 and 2024 and improved the Region’s operational efficiency by 45% through the application of Six Sigma methodologies. Future enhancements to myDurham 311 include a next-generation Intelligent Virtual Agent (IVA) powered by Agentic AI, offering conversational and personalized support across channels and plans for 24/7 service supported by multilingual and inclusive outreach campaigns. The Region is also preparing to launch the “311 in Your Pocket” mobile app in 2026, alongside co-browsing technology to assist seniors, newcomers, and those less familiar with digital tools, ensuring digital inclusion remains a core priority.
Community engagement is not a one-time event but an ongoing conversation in Durham. The Region employs an omnichannel approach, including community events, classroom visits, pop-up booths, social media, newsletters and apps, to sustain dialogue with residents. The Durham Region Waste App, an integral tool in the Region’s environmental strategy, exemplifies this ongoing connection. With a 4.8/5 rating and over 136,000 subscribers, the app provides schedules, reminders, quizzes and waste management updates in multiple languages. It has become such a staple that residents often cite it in discussions about waste services.
Cleaner, Smarter Energy
In response to the growing impacts of climate change, the Regional Council declared a climate emergency in 2018 and began development of the Durham Community Energy Plan (DCEP). The plan balances environmental goals with local economic opportunities by promoting energy efficiency, renewable energy adoption and electrification of transportation and buildings. The Durham Greener Homes program, introduced in 2022, helps homeowners retrofit their properties with energy-efficient upgrades through consultations, energy assessments and rebate guidance. In 2024, the program integrated vHEAT AI, an artificial intelligence tool that provides digital energy scores and personalized retrofit plans, achieving an average 76% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions across more than 2,000 participating homes.
In 2025, the program expanded to include weather-ready home retrofits that protect against flooding, heat waves and high winds. A new municipal financing model, leveraging Durham’s AAA credit rating, enables homeowners to access low-interest loans repaid via property taxes, making resilience upgrades more affordable. Complementing this, the Durham Greener Buildings program drives energy efficiency in institutional and commercial properties, surpassing participation targets in its first year with 487 buildings enrolled. The program’s Buildings Challenge and accompanying Evening of Recognition celebrate leadership in reducing emissions and optimizing energy performance.
The Durham Region began working with ICF in 2020 and has steadily applied the lessons its leaders have learned. An informal gathering of advisors has become a formal steering committee for transformation. ICF’s Community Accelerator strategy has been adopted as its economic and community development framework. And through Community Assessments and participation in the Awards program, the Region has learned how to leverage its public, private and nonprofit resources to create the innovative, inclusive economy taking shape across the municipalities and townships it serves.
Population: 750,000
Website: www.durham.ca/en/index
Intelligent Community of the Year 2025
Smart21 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025
Top7 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025
Photo by Chris Harte