Rental cars don't get winter tires unless forced to by law (e.g. Quebec). It's pretty likely that this car had so-called all-seasons on it.
Almost certainly did, and also a second-worst case vehicle with a big, heavy lump of a motor up front making lots of torque at low RPM (worst is a pickup, no weight over the rear tires if unloaded).
I got caught out by an early blast of snow a few years ago and couldn't get into my gently-sloped driveway with the summer tires still on the car. Useless. Given the location ... I got out the jack and swapped over to winter tires in the spot where the car was stuck, and then parked the car where it was supposed to be with no issue. LOL
Had to do the same in BC with my Accord coming home late from a business dinner in the middle of an early-December blizzard. Naturally, I had procrastinated getting the winters on. Couldn't get up the very gentle hills on the route home, had to get the wife to dig out and deliver two winter tires for the front and change them roadside at 1 am in a suit as the snow dumped down. No fun, but it got me home. Definitely a tangible experience in the value of winter tires.
I wouldn't fret about rear-drive only on modern EVs in the Toronto area if you don't spend the extra coin for AWD.
I also wonder if having the weight distributed more evenly front to rear helps, instead of having the big lump of a motor square over the front like in a typical ICE vehicle. It's pretty standard for pickup drivers to fill the bed with patio stones or bags of cement for the same reason.
Bolt is front-drive, and acceleration off the line is traction limited. Oh well.
Reading reviews of the new Kona, one common theme is being happy with the reduced power, as the old one loved to spin coming off the line (FWD). Still, I wouldn't be buying an EV for the driving dynamics. It's more of an appliance to me, so I could genuinely care less about drive out of corners etc.
Fwiw, a few years ago I needed to rent a vehicle in Calgary to drive into interior BC in the winter. Highway requires winter tires. Not a single rental car in Calgary had winter tires. I rolled the dice and didn't get a ticket/tow.
Law in BC is snowflake or M+S on highways outside of the lower mainland and southeast coast of the island from October through start of May. Nobody will check, but if you get into a crash, insurers may not pay out if you don't have them on. And a cop will probably issue another fine if pulled over for something else.
When I had a truck, I used to buy all-weather tires (not all-season!), as they had an M+S logo, so I could keep the nicer rims on year-round not have to swap to steels for 7 months a year for the occasional trip away. They worked okay, but aren't real winter tires, that's for sure. Probably ideal for the cool and wet shoulder seasons that make up more than half the year in the lower mainland, though.
