A regional municipality (or region) is a type of Canadian municipal government which works much like a county; the method of government depends on how it is defined. Sometimes it is legislated or more efficient to provide certain services, such as water, emergency services, and waste management, over an area that includes more than one local municipality. For this reason, regions may be involved in providing services to residents and businesses.

Regional municipalities, where they include smaller municipalities within their boundaries, are sometimes referred to as upper-tier municipalities. Regional municipalities (or regions) generally have more servicing responsibilities than the counties. They often provide the following services: maintenance and construction of arterial roads, transit, policing, sewer and water systems, waste disposal, region-wide land use planning and development, as well as health and social services.

Regions are typically more urbanized than counties. Regional municipalities are usually implemented in census divisions where an interconnected cluster of urban centres forms the majority of the division's area and population.

Ontario

In Ontario, regional municipalities were created to provide common services to urban and rural municipalities in the way that counties typically provide common services to rural municipalities. The specific relationship of a regional government and the cities, towns, townships and villages within its borders is determined by provincial legislation; typically the regional municipality provides many core services such as police protection, waste management and public transit. Similar to counties, they also provide infrastructure for (at least some) roads, sewers, and bridges; and also handle social services. Organization of regional government has occasionally been controversial where council membership is determined by the constituent municipalities rather than elected directly.

The Regional Municipality of Ottawa-Carleton was created in 1969, following a precedent for two-tier municipal government established in 1954 by the creation of the Municipality of Metropolitan Toronto. The regional municipal structure was greatly expanded in 1973-1974 under the government of Bill Davis.

In 1998, the Municipality of Metropolitan Toronto became the amalgamated City of Toronto. In 2001, four other regional municipalities that had been dominated by a single city were amalgamated, while the Regional Municipality of Haldimand-Norfolk was split into Haldimand County and Norfolk County. See the list of Ontario regional municipalities.

Quebec, Nova Scotia, Alberta

In Quebec, regional county municipalities (French, municipalités régionales de comté) has been the 'county' level of government for the entire province since the early 1990s.

In Nova Scotia, regional municipalities are a single level of government, and provide all municipal services to their communities. As they tend to include at least some rural areas, they are not called cities nor do they refer as a place on a map or for services such as the mail. (See Halifax Regional Municipality, Cape Breton Regional Municipality, Region of Queens Municipality). Such municipalities in Nova Scotia take over the area and name within of a former county . In Alberta, Wood Buffalo is a regional municipality.

In the United States

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In the United States, the term "regional municipality" is sometimes used to describe a consolidated city-county or metropolitan municipality that is a mix of urban and/or suburban and/or rural areas, similar to Regional Municipalities in Nova Scotia and in Wood Buffalo Regional Municipality in Alberta. Completely rural areas that include a number of villages and/or small cities or towns are also called "regional municipalities" in the United States.

Subnational entities | Census divisions of Canada

Regional Municipality