Why are tall poles favored in Canada? In the USA they are rarely seen on city streets, mostly seen on the highways.

They never used to be in my city. My city didn't have too many before, but now every major road here has tall poles on it somewhere. MTO Polefabs were most often used but since ownership of roads changed jurisdiction from MTO to Peel Region, tall concrete or steel poles were more often installed so the polefabs would come down with knockdowns, construction, etc. I think the occasionally peel regional road may have still used polefabs a little bit after. All the projects here in the recent years with polefabs have been replaced by tall concrete or aluminium poles. The long arms seem to be the new trend too. Our highways have highmasts . The older setup of truss light poles were shorter. Theres only 2 road sections here that still install new polefabs aside from MTO highways. The newest road project with polefabs was back around 2005-2006. IIRC I think the section was still partially maintained by MTO shortly after?

Out west in Alberta their poles are reaaaalllly tall. taller than ours lol.