Things to do in Mississauga

Neighborhood · Lakeshore Road at the Credit River

The city's actual village — a working harbour at the river mouth, patios along Lakeshore Road, a lighthouse, and a GO station with all-day service to Union in about twenty minutes.

Local tip: This is the one part of Mississauga that behaves like a town rather than a set of arterials, and the rents reflect that. Come by GO rather than driving: parking is contested on summer weekends, and the whole point of Port Credit is walking between the harbour, the marina and the pubs without moving a car.

Landmark · City Centre, beside Square One

The civic square in front of the Central Library and City Hall, with a skating rink in winter and free events all summer — overlooked by the two twisting Absolute World towers that everyone calls the Marilyn Monroe buildings.

Local tip: The towers are the closest thing the city has to a signature, and they were the result of an international design competition won by a then-unknown Beijing practice. Come to the square in July for the food festivals and in December for the rink; it is the one place downtown that feels like a downtown.

Neighborhood · Queen Street South, north-west of the centre

A nineteenth-century village on the Credit River that the city grew around and never demolished — two-storey brick main street, independent shops, and a stubborn separate identity signposted as 'the village in the city'.

Local tip: Go on a Saturday morning for the farmers' market and walk the river trail from the old mill. It is also worth understanding as a housing decision: Streetsville is on the Milton GO line, which runs peak-only and in one direction, so it is a very different commute from Port Credit despite looking similar on a map.

Nature · Clarkson, south-west lakeshore

The last remaining lakeshore marsh between Toronto and Burlington, saved from development by a residents' campaign in the 1970s, with boardwalks through the wetland and a shingle beach on Lake Ontario.

Local tip: Walk east from the marsh along the Waterfront Trail and you can follow the lake most of the way across the city, through Jack Darling Park and on to Port Credit. In February the shoreline ice formations are extraordinary and almost nobody is there.

Food · Hurontario at Dundas

The oldest crossroads in the city and its most densely immigrant one — Polish delis that have been there fifty years alongside Pakistani, Syrian, Vietnamese and Chinese kitchens in the same strip malls.

Local tip: Mississauga's food is in plazas, not on high streets, and Cooksville is where that is most concentrated. Do not judge a place by its signage or its parking lot. The city's Polish community here predates almost everything else, and the bakeries are the proof.

Culture · Lakeview, eastern lakeshore

A restored Second World War munitions inspection plant, where a largely female workforce checked rifles by the million, now an arts and events space on the edge of the Lakeview redevelopment lands.

Local tip: It is the best surviving piece of the city's industrial past and it is a five-minute walk from where the Lakeview Generating Station's four chimneys stood until 2007. Check the programme before going — it opens for exhibitions and events rather than continuously.