Mapping (legal) gun ownership in Ontario

As the destruction of the long gun registry looms, federal and Ontario cabinet ministers are in a tug-of-war over the province’s plan to require gun dealers to keep records of who buys firearms.

Before legislation to abolish the registry was passed, Global News obtained postal code data for firearms owners from the RCMP using access-to-information laws. The maps below paint a picture of the geography of gun culture in Ontario.

The province-wide map shows low gun ownership rates in urban and suburban areas (Ottawa, the GTA, Hamilton-Niagara), higher rates in surrounding rural areas, and the highest ones, roughly, north of where viable farmland gives out.

A map showing only Toronto (scroll down to the bottom of the page) shows almost no gun licence holders downtown and the north half of Scarborough, and concentrations of gun owners - by Toronto standards - in Downsview and southern Etobicoke.