Your point about transportation is key. Many of our cities are un-walk-able, un-transit-able, and sometimes even un-drive-able. If we can't easily provide multiple options for getting from A to B in a city, there is little hope of providing viable housing options.

We already have the "must own a car" requirement for most of Canada, but even that's becoming not enough thanks to the fact our roadways are under-developed and the price of gas (and owning a vehicle) is rising rapidly.

Those are some pretty massive road blocks in the way of home ownership for an average person, I can't imagine developers are keen to keep adding to the problem.