Without getting into a huge argument. Blame your government.

The reason there are so many choices in mapping software in the US is that the US government gives away vector street map data to anyone who asks. It is not incredibly accurate (it is from the US Census, not the USGS, although you can get free Topographic data from them too). Some of the electronic map companies then enhance this data from their own field surveys, but others just package it directly so their only cost is developing the user interface.

All of the map data sources in Canada have some cost associated with them, so you will never get free software.

Alan