Sean Marshall

Tag: Ontario

  • The complicated history of Dundas Street

    The complicated history of Dundas Street

    In June 2020, Toronto-based artist and activist Andrew Lochhead launched a petition to rename Dundas Street, one of Toronto’s oldest, longest and best-known arterial roads. Lochhead states that Henry Dundas, 1st Viscount Melville “actively participated in obstructing the abolition of slavery in the British Empire from 1791 to the end of his political career in 1806.” While some historians may argue that Dundas was a pragmatic moderate, rather than an anti-abolitionist (unlike slave-owning Torontonians like William Jarvis or Peter Russell, who have streets named after them), it’s still worth wondering why Toronto has a street named after the Scottish politician, who had nothing to do with Toronto’s colonial history.

    Until recently, I gave Dundas Street little thought. Years ago, I wrote about how the street was pieced together in the late 19th and early 20th century to provide a new through east-west route across central Toronto. Though I was aware that Dundas Street began at the present-day corner of Queen Street West and Ossington Avenue, I had long thought the road was named for the town of Dundas, to which it leads.

    The end of Desjardins Canal, in the old Town of Dundas

    Dundas Street was established as a military supply route by order of John Graves Simcoe, the first British governor of Upper Canada. At first, it was surveyed and cleared in 1794 and 1795 between Cootes Paradise (at the very end of Lake Ontario, beyond Burlington Bay) and the Upper Forks of the Thames River, at what is now Woodstock. From there, small boats could be used to travel downriver to London and to Lake St. Clair. Though there were several Indigenous trails connecting Lake Ontario and the Thames River (the western part of Mohawk Road in Hamilton follows one such route), the new British colonial government favoured a straight, direct road.

    A federal plaque on a cairn in front of Dundas Valley Secondary School in Dundas

    Though Dundas Street (which is known as Governor’s Road between Dundas and Paris) features a gentle climb up the Niagara Escarpment, detours were quickly established to get around challenging terrain, such as the confluence of Grand and Nith rivers near Paris. Dundas Street was soon extended westward, to Simcoe’s preferred capital site at London, and extended eastward, to York (Toronto).

    Yonge Street, which was originally surveyed and cleared between Lake Ontario and the Holland River near Lake Simcoe, served a similar purpose as Dundas Street. Combined with Penetanguishine Road, Yonge Street provided a military supply route to Lake Huron, though bypassing the established Toronto Carrying Place trail. Though Dundas and Yonge Streets were built with military goals in mind, they, like many other early colonization roads, helped to promote new settlement of lands claimed from local First Nations. Like Dundas Street, Yonge Street was named for a senior British official — George Yonge, who was the British Secretary of War in 1793.

    In its early years, Dundas Street’s position inland from Lake Ontario was advantageous as it provided an alternate route in case of invasion. The winding route through Etobicoke and West Toronto to Ossington Avenue allowed travellers to avoid deep ravines and Grenadier Pond.

    Lambton House, Old Dundas Street

    Other early settlement routes, such as Weston Road, branched off of Dundas Street, leading to newly settled lands to the north and northwest of Toronto. Taverns dotted the route, providing accommodation and libation to travelers, several of which — including Lambton House and Montgomery’s Inn — survive to this day.

    In London and Woodstock, Dundas Street formed the basis for each city’s downtown core. In London, it was recently rebuilt as a two-lane flexible street called Dundas Place, intended to host public events and revitalize the street, which has seen a loss of business to suburban malls and big box stores and to trendier bars and restaurants on Richmond Street, closer to Western University.

    Dundas Street in Downtown London was recently rebuilt as a flexible street

    Outside the cities, though, other routes surpassed Dundas Street in importance by the mid 1800s. The Lakeshore Road soon became the preferred route between Toronto and Hamilton (which overtook the town of Dundas in size and importance), while the railways, established between Toronto, Hamilton, and London in the 1850s, further eroded Dundas Street’s importance as a major through route until the automobile gained in popularity.

    Much of the road between Paris and London became part of interprovincial Highway 2, which extended across Eastern Canada from Windsor, Ontario to Halifax, Nova Scotia. The Waterdown-Etobicoke section became part of Highway 5, while the lesser-travelled section between Paris and Dundas (which today is known as Governor’s Road) was established first as Highway 5B in 1938, then as Highway 99 in 1940.

    The remains of the old Dundas Street bridge over the Humber, removed in 1928, looking west to the former settlement of Lambton Mills. The replacement high level bridge is seen to the left. The approaches to the old bridge are named Old Dundas Street.

    The Dundas-Waterdown section, which winded its way up the escarpment (only to descend it again a short distance east), became a minor road, with part of the original alignment abandoned by the 1850s.

    Though it never held the status of Toronto’s main street, Dundas Street would gain in importance and length in the 19th and early 20th centuries. As Toronto grew beyond its early street grid, it came up against the park lot system devised by Governor Simcoe and other officials to establish a landed gentry in the new colony (including the slaveholding Jarvis and Russell families, who worked to prevent Simcoe from instituting a complete abolition in Upper Canada). These lots which were long and narrow, extended north from Lot (now Queen) Street, and each were developed independently. This resulted in a mess of east-west streets that did not necessarily meet each other. Though College Street was laid out with minimal difficulty, there was no continuous east-west street between College and Queen Streets east of Ossington Avenue.

    Dundas Street West, looking southeast from Dovercourt Avenue towards the downtown skyline. This is part of the 220-year old western extension of Dundas Street from the head of lake to York (Toronto).

    But by the early 1910s, Dundas Street was extended eastward, at first to Bathurst Street, following Arthur Street — which was widened to permit Toronto Railway Company streetcars — and then east to Yonge via St. Patrick, Anderson, and Agnes Streets. Jogs between these streets were slowly realigned, starting with the St. Patrick-Anderson-Agnes jogs between McCaul Street and University Avenue. However, it wasn’t until 1953 that the jog between former Arthur and St. Patrick Streets at Bathurst Street was eliminated. Scadding Court Community Centre now sits on the old roadway, though a small part survives as the centre’s staff parking lot.

    Realigning Dundas Street West, looking east at Bathurst Street, June 26, 1953. From Toronto Archives, Fonds 200, Series 372, Subseries 58, Item 2401.

    East of Yonge Street, Wilton Avenue was extended across the Don River in 1911, extending just east of Broadview Avenue, incorporating Elliot and Crawford Streets. Though the new bridge was built with streetcar tracks and overhead poles, through service did not begin until 1923, as part of a major TTC route restructuring.

    Newly completed WIlton Avenue Bridge, April 1911. From City of Toronto Archives, Fonds 1231, Item 1923

    By 1920, Wilton Avenue was renamed Dundas Street East, though the through connection across Yonge Street was not completed until 1922, with the block long section east of Yonge left over from the realignment renamed Dundas Square.

    Though the early extensions of Dundas Street through the city simplified the street grid and allowed for through streetcar service between West Toronto and Broadview Avenue, the eastern extension built in the 1950s was done entirely for the benefit of the automobile.

    Though Dundas Street extended east of Broadview for one block to Boulton Avenue, it was as a narrow residential street, and did not continue beyond (this is why the Harbord Streetcar took a convoluted route via Dundas, Broadview, and Gerrard to get to Carlaw and Pape Avenues). New roadways were planned to expand traffic access to Downtown Toronto from the burgeoning suburbs, including a new extension of Dundas Street east to Kingston Road.

    Looking east on Dundas Street towards Broadview Avenue, September 1954. The drug store on the southeast corner would be soon demolished to make way for the street widening and extension eastward. From City of Toronto Archives, Fonds 200, Series 372, Subseries 58, Item 2612.

    From Boulton Avenue, a new alignment was built east to Pape Avenue, resulting in the demolition of over a dozen houses on Boulton Avenue, De Grassi Street, West Avenue, and Wardell Street, before ducking under the Canadian National mainline in a new underpass built in 1953, and through an industrial area, avoiding major factory buildings.

    East of Pape Avenue, the new roadway followed a widened Dagmar Avenue, before bending south though a former alley to Jones Avenue to connect with former Doel Avenue to Alton Avenue. Between Alton and Woodfield Road, another new section of roadway was built, through an old brickyard in the late 1940s, connecting with Applegrove Avenue to Coxwell Avenue. The final section, between Coxwell Avenue and Kingston Road, was built through a minor ravine, connecting with, and replacing part of, Maughan Crescent and Edgewood Avenue.

    Plan for Dundas Street extension through the rear yards and laneway between Dagmar and Mallon Avenues. From City of Toronto Archives, Fonds 200, Series 2277, Item 32.
    Just west of Jones Avenue, Dundas Street East is lined with garages, as it passes through an old alley between Dagmar and Mallon Avenues.

    Though Dundas Street East was shoehorned into several east-end neighbourhoods through the 1940s and 1950s to provide a new route for automobile traffic, over fifty years later it became an important cycling route. In 2003, the speed limit was reduced to 40 kilometres per hour, and the four traffic lanes reduced to two, with new bike lanes and a centre turning lane. Without streetcar tracks (unlike neighbouring Queen and Gerrard Streets), and with few storefronts, Dundas Street was simple to reconfigure. In 2020, the bike lanes were extended west across the Don River and into Regent Park, as part of the new ActiveTO measures.

    Within Toronto, Dundas Street has gone by many names: Arthur, St. Patrick, Anderson, Agnes, Wilton, Elliot, Crawford, Dagmar, Doel, Applegrove, Maughan, and Edgewood. At various times in the first half of the last century, city officials have decided to change their names to Dundas Street.

    It would not be without precedent to change Dundas Street’s name as well. Henry Dundas has no connection to local history, and even the historic road that bears his name did not extend any further east than Ossington Avenue.

    After a petition was sent to City Council on June 27, 2020 calling for the renaming of Dundas Street, city staff came back to council with a report offering four options:

    • Do nothing
    • Retain the legal street names with additional interpretation and recognitions
    • Retain the legal street names but rename those civic assets with Dundas in their name, except TTC facilities (there are three parks and one library branch that include the Dundas name, and Yonge-Dundas Square; there are two TTC subway stations and one streetcar line that also bear the Dundas name)
    • Rename the streets and all other civic assets now carrying the Dundas name (including Dundas Street East, Dundas Street West, Dundas Square, and Old Dundas Street).

    I would agree with at least the third option, and likely the fourth option, even in part. As one of the city’s most famous and popular meeting places, a better name can be found for Yonge-Dundas Square. As Dundas Street East is a 20th century construct, and less than half the age of the historical road, it too, would be a great candidate for renaming to something meaningful. There are many other streets, towns, and parks in Toronto and elsewhere in Ontario that carry names given by early colonial officials, eager to leave their mark on newly claimed lands. Some are also worthy candidates for renaming.

    Other municipalities, including Mississauga, Oakville, Burlington, Woodstock, and London, will also have to decide what they will do with their sections of Dundas Street. There is also the matter of the former Town of Dundas, the Dundas Valley, the United Counties of Stormont, Dundas, and Glengarry in Eastern Ontario (and two townships within it). There are also Dundas Streets in Belleville, Trenton, and Napanee along Highway 2, but otherwise unrelated to the historic road.

    But the process must be thoughtful and considerate, and not just a another feel-good exercise that distracts from the real economic and racial inequities in our city.

    The interactive map below illustrates the history of Dundas Street, from London to Kingston Road.

    Link to interactive map

  • All aboard the beer train

    All aboard the beer train

    A classic Brewers Retail Store in South River, Ontario featuring the 1980s-era branding

    While taking a geographic analysis program during my undergraduate years at university, I developed a fascination with retail geography. My 2005 Masters’ paper examined the geographic distribution of payday lenders — which combined my interests in retail geography, urban planning, and social justice. Though my career took me in a different direction, I have maintained my interest in the role of geography in the success — or failure — of retail businesses.

    Despite being one of Ontario’s oldest and most influential retailers, there is very little written about the history of The Beer Store. Contrary to common belief, The Beer Store is a private company — not a government monopoly. Following the end of prohibition in 1927, the provincial government established a crown corporation to distribute wine and spirits — the Liquor Control Board of Ontario, or LCBO. However, the province’s breweries were granted authorization to establish their own corporation — the Brewers Warehousing Company Ltd. — to distribute their own products. At first, alcoholic beverages were only permitted to be sold for at-home consumption (while customers were required to obtain licenses to purchase beer, wine, and spirits). Gradually, rules were slowly relaxed to permit drinking in hotels, restaurants, and taverns. Eventually, the company became known as Brewers Retail.

    Though the number of breweries declined since the 1930s due to consolidations and bankruptcies, Brewers Retail expanded its retail operations in the 1960s and 1970s. It produced highway maps showing all the locations where thirsty Ontarians could buy “ale & beer.” Customers, freed from having to write out and sign purchase orders by 1971, would place their order with a clerk, then wait for their case(s) of beer to roll out from the cold storage in the back. Though a self-serve store was introduced in December 1971, it proved to be an unpopular concept, especially as the beer was kept warm, rather than in a cold warehouse in the back.

    In 1985, Brewers Retail began rebranding its stores as “The Beer Store” with bright orange signage. Two further rebrands have occurred since (it now uses a grey and black colour scheme), yet the 1980s look can still be seen at many stores, especially in northern Ontario.

    Though the rise of small independent craft breweries in Ontario, the LCBO’s expanded beer selection, and the recent moves to allow supermarkets to sell beer in limited quantities (singles and six-packs) have made it easier to purchase beer, The Beer Store remains the dominant player in the distribution of suds.

    Brewer’s Retail, Eglinton Avenue East, 1974. Though the location has seen several renovations and rebrandings, this beer store still stands near the corner of Eglinton and Brimley in Scarborough. Toronto Archives Fonds 1257, Series 1057, Item 8260.

    Not only does Brewers Retail sell direct to consumers, it also delivers bottles and kegs to businesses, so it had to establish a distribution network across the province. Most of the large breweries were located in Toronto or in southwestern Ontario, though there were smaller, regional brands such as Soo Falls Brewing and Sudbury’s Northern Brewery. Those products had to be shipped hundreds or even thousands of kilometres. Empty bottles had to be returned to the breweries for cleaning, re-labelling and refilling. Most large breweries, like Labatt’s in London and Molson’s Fleet Street plant, were located next to rail lines for easy shipping.

    This is why, in Northern Ontario, many beer stores are found adjacent to rail lines. Though rail shipments to local beer stores have ceased — with one notable exception — this legacy can still be seen, from Pembroke to Kenora.

    In some cases, such as in New Liskeard, The Beer Store is out of the way, an unusual strategy for a consumer-focused retailer. But since Brewers Retail holds a monopoly on bulk beer sales (not needing an especially visible location), and since rail access was important for the chain until the 1970s, the location makes sense.

    In larger cities, such as North Bay, Sudbury, and Sault Ste. Marie, one Brewers Retail store would handle rail shipments, distributing products to restaurants and bars and to nearby beer stores. Thunder Bay had its own dedicated distribution centre in Port Arthur, next to the railway.

    Since the 1960s, refrigerated trucks took the place of dedicated box cars. The railway spurs are gone and the loading docks have since been covered or bricked up. Yet in many cases they remain visible, especially during this time of year, such as North Bay’s Main Street store, below.

    The Main Street beer store in North Bay has a large warehouse in the back, with the old rail docks still very visible. A 1964 topographic map shows the spur serving the store.

    There were a few regional warehouses in Southern Ontario that had rail loading docks. Ottawa’s Bank Street Brewers Retail location, built in 1958, was designed by John B. Parkin and Associates and backed on to a Canadian Pacific freight spur. The warehouse was moved to a modern suburban location and the rail line was removed, though the building survives, with a beer store still operating at the front.

    Similarly, the Ritson Road store in Oshawa was built next to the Canadian Pacific Railway, and saw rail service in its early years as it also functioned as a regional distribution centre. The store has since moved to a new big-box plaza built on an old General Motors plant to the north, with the old location now a local craft brewery.

    In Oshawa, the old railside Brewers Retail store and warehouse is now a craft brewery. The shuttered rail docks -covered with metal sheeting – are barely visible behind the trees to the rear.

    Interestingly, one Brewers Retail store still ships beer by rail — the Cochrane, Ontario location. Mike Robin kindly sent me photographs of Ontario Northland Railway box cars parked on the beer store’s spur. This allows for beer bottles and kegs to be shipped north to Moosonee, which is accessible only by rail or by plane for most of the year.

    Cochrane Beer Store, November 21, 2020 – Courtesy Mike Robin

  • The world’s smallest Union Station

    The world’s smallest Union Station

    Just south of St. Thomas — Ontario’s Railway City — sits a small stucco-clad shelter, just below the Sparta Road bridge. Until 1957, electric trains of the London & Port Stanley Railway would regularly pass this little, unstaffed station serving the nearby community of Union.

    There are dozens of union stations across North America, several of which are still in regular passenger service. Toronto’s Union Station is the continent’s second-busiest railway station, surpassed only by New York’s Penn Station. Union Stations in Chicago, Washington, and Los Angeles are among the top fifteen in Canada and the United States, while other grand union station buildings still greet rail passengers in Winnipeg, Kansas City, and Denver.

    Union Station, with Kansas City's skyline behind
    Kansas City’s Union Station, with downtown skyline backdrop

    Union stations, by definition, are passenger facilities used by two or more railways. They allowed for shared services and passenger convenience, though they required ample access to each railway’s tracks. Toronto’s Union Station, for example, was built for the Grand Trunk and Canadian Pacific Railways, which both had rail corridors following the waterfront into Downtown Toronto. Ottawa, too had a Union Station that was used by CN and CP until 1966 (and in earlier years, New York Central trains called at Ottawa’s Union Station).

    In some cases, a union station might be a small depot at the junction of two railways. The small Inglewood Station in Caledon was technically a union station as it was used by Canadian National and Canadian Pacific.

    Great Hall, Chicago’s Union Station

    Of course, the little Union Station in rural Elgin County was never a true union station. It was merely a flag stop for the L&PS, where awaiting passengers would signal their intention to board by lowering a wooden board affixed to a pole next to the station shelter.

    The L&PS Railway opened in 1856 to connect London to nearby St. Thomas and to Port Stanley, giving the growing city access to Lake Erie. In 1913, the City of London, which owned the line, upgraded and electrified the railway under the direction of then-mayor Adam Beck, who championed public hydro electricity and a proposed network of electric railways across the province.

    Though bulk freight was the railway’s bread-and-butter — it connected with a train ferry service to Ohio — the L&PS operated regular local passenger service connecting two cities, four separate railways (CN at London and the Wabash, Michigan Central, and Pere Marquette Railroads at St. Thomas), and the popular summer resorts and cottages at Port Stanley.

    With improved highways and increased auto ownership, the L&PS ceased passenger service in 1957, though there was regular bus service until the 1990s. Today, it is impossible to get between London, St. Thomas, and Port Stanley without a car. The railway was sold to CN in the early 1960s. CN used the railway to access a new Ford assembly plant as well as local industry in London and St. Thomas, but eventually ceased freight service south of St. Thomas.

    The abandoned track south of St. Thomas was acquired by the Port Stanley Terminal Railway, which today operates family-friendly excursions from the former L&PS station in Port Stanley. Though you can no longer board a train at Union, you can still watch trains go by. A restored LP&S interurban passenger car can be found at the Halton County Radial Railway museum near Rockwood.

    Passing by Union Station, riding the PTSR excursion train
  • Mapping Ontario’s transit connections

    Mapping Ontario’s transit connections

    T:GO inter-community transit van at Woodstock VIA Rail station, September 2020

    October 2021

    I made several changes to the interactive map, including a complete update of the GO Transit bus and rail network, including the most recent rail corridor extensions to Bloomington and London, and a new weekday bus route to Brock University in St. Catharines.

    Over the summer, Quinte Transit added a new route between Trenton and Belleville, Simcoe County Linx added a new route between Midland and Orillia, serving Tay Shores and Coldwater, and a new service launched between Brockville, Prescott, and Cardinal in Eastern Ontario.

    Meanwhile, several towns and cities in Southwestern Ontario remain off the map.

    The updated map can be found here.

    June 29, 2021/July 6, 2021: Beginning Monday, June 28, Rider Express, an intercity coach company based in Western Canada (which picked up several routes formerly operated by Greyhound Canada and the Saskatchewan Transportation Company), began service in Ontario. Rider Express is looking to fill some of the gaps left by the recent announcement that Greyhound will cease all domestic routes in Eastern Canada.

    That’s the good news. The bad news is that its first route in Ontario, connecting Toronto Station, Kingston, and Ottawa, replicates Megabus’ new route (which I have also added) and competes against VIA Rail’s Corridor rail service. Several of Greyhound’s daily Toronto-Ottawa buses ran through Peterborough and along Highway 7 through Eastern Ontario, leaving towns such as Norwood, Havelock, and Perth off the map. Though Peterborough is connected to Toronto by GO Transit, it is a long train and bus ride, while Greyhound offered a direct, express service to Downtown Toronto.

    Two steps forward, one step back.

    I made additional changes to the interactive map to show new GO Transit, Can-Ar Coach, Megabus, and Ontario Northland routings to the new Union Station Bus Terminal, which replaces the old GO bus terminal and the Toronto Coach Terminal on Bay Street. Meanwhile Ontario Northland moved from the now-closed Ottawa Central Bus Station to the VIA Station on Tremblay Road.

    Meanwhile, starting July 8, Orléans Express will expand into Ontario, with a new Gatineau-Ottawa-Montréal route, operating twice daily. It will join Rider Express and Ontario Northland at the VIA Rail Station in Ottawa.

    May 2, 2021: On Monday, May 3, “The Link” begins operations on two routes in Selwyn Township and Curve Lake First Nation, connecting several communities with Peterborough Transit and GO Transit at Trent University. The service, which is operated by Peterborough Transit, will run on weekdays, with five trips in each direction on both routes. Fares on “The Link” buses include a free transfer to and from Peterborough city bus routes at Trent, with direct service to downtown, major shopping centres, the hospital and Sir Stanford Fleming College.

    February 15, 2021: A few small updates, including the addition of two community routes in Muskoka District Municipality, a bus connection between North Bay and northern Quebec, and a revised bus stop location for Ontario Northland in Orillia.

    December 14, 2020: I made several updates to the interactive map, including the addition of Huron Shores Area Transit, which launches today. I made a few changes suggested by one of my readers, and added Niagara Region Transit’s on-demand service in Niagara-on-the-Lake, which replaces a fixed route that was cancelled earlier this year.

    November 9, 2020: I made several updates to the interactive map, including the addition of PC Connect in Perth County, which launches next Monday. I mapped Port Hope’s transit connection to Cobourg, as suggested by one of the readers, and corrected a few minor errors.

    October 15, 2020

    Despite the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, several new inter-community transit services launched in Ontario during the last few months.

    Last August, T:GO began service on four routes radiating from Tillsonburg, where there was already an in-town circulator service. Mondays through Fridays, twenty-seater vans operate between Tillsonburg, Norwich, Woodstock, Ingersoll, and other communities, offering connections to Woodstock Transit, the hospital, and the VIA Rail Station.

    In September, the City of Owen Sound, Grey County, Middlesex County, the town of Strathroy-Caradoc, and Prince Edward County all launched their own services, connecting rural communities and small towns to larger centres such as London, Guelph, and Belleville. In addition, Simcoe County expanded its Linx bus service to serve Alliston and Beeton, and other services, suspended during the early days of the pandemic, resumed operations. Also this year, Niagara and Durham Regions expanded their rural on-demand transit services.

    GOST minibus at Owen Sound Transit Terminal

    All these new services help to fill the gaps left behind by private coach companies; these have become especially vital as Greyhound Canada suspended all operations in Ontario and Quebec this year (after abandoning Western Canada in 2018), and Coach Canada (operating as Megabus) cut service on some of its routes.

    While these new intercommunity routes help to serve local needs, there is a wide variety of service provided in rural and small town Ontario. But without provincial coordination, it is nearly impossible to keep track of them all, never mind plan a trip.

    So I went ahead and mapped them all the best I could. Clicking on each route brings up a pop-up window containing further information, including a link to each agency’s website, where available.

    Link to interactive map

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  • Highway 401 revisited

    Highway 401 revisited

    Earlier in September, I paid a visit to Woodstock, Ontario, to check out one of several new intermunicipal transit services that launched across the province this year. While in Woodstock, I paid a visit to the Highway 401 interchange at Highway 59.

    In 1968-1969, London, Ontario artist Jack Chambers painted 401 Towards London No. 1, which depicts a tranquil scene from the Highway 59 overpass, looking west. The highway, just two lanes in each direction, bends slightly to the southwest as it heads towards London and Windsor. On either side, autumn trees, farm fields, and gentle hills stretch out. The only buildings visible are farm silos, and two truck terminals on the north side of the highway. Only a few vehicles on Highway 401 are visible in the scene.

    Chambers became well known for photorealism in his work. The scene in 401 Towards London No. 1 is slightly askew, as if this was a Kodachrome snapshot.

    Jack Chambers, 401 Towards London No. 1. Collection of the Art Gallery of Ontario.
    A larger version can be found here.

    Highway 401 was only fully completed between Windsor and the Quebec border in 1968, the year the painting was started, though the section between Woodstock and London was completed in 1957, bypassing an especially congested section of Highway 2. Like many interchanges built by the province in the 1950s and early 1960s, the junction of Highways 59 and 401 was an eight-ramp cloverleaf.

    A contemporary view towards London

    By the 1990s, Highway 401 was widened to six lanes. The cloverleaf interchange, like most others in Ontario, was removed and replaced by a simpler interchange. (As traffic levels increased, the danger of vehicles entering and exiting the highway with little space to merge became apparent.)

    Woodstock’s sprawl caught up to the highway, with new warehouses, motels, subdivisions, and a hospital joining the original freight terminals. Though the distant trees and hills are the same as those in Chambers’ painting, the gentle curve in the distance remains the easiest way to match the two views, fifty years apart. Highway 59 itself was downloaded by the province in 1997. To the south, the old highway is Oxford County Road 59. To the north, it is simply Norwich Street.

    Breezewood, Ontario: former Highway 59 looking north towards central Woodstock, where chain hotels, restaurants, and gas stations line the road

    As I climbed over guardrails and navigated sidewalk-less embankments and road shoulders to capture the contemporary image of Jack Chambers’ painting, I was surprised by two things. The first were fully AODA-compliant crossing treatments at the highway ramps, despite there being no safe and marked way to get to those crosswalks.

    I had to climb over the guardrail to get to this crosswalk at the westbound ramps to Highway 401

    I was even more surprised to see an engraved version of the Jack Chambers painting embedded in the guardrail. When the Ministry of Transportation Ontario (MTO) rebuilt the overpass in 2017-2018, it thoughtfully included this nod to a local artist.

    Plaque embedded in the guardrail at the Highway 59 overpass in Woodstock

    Unfortunately, given the isolation of the plaque, few will actually see it, even if thousands pass by it daily. Larger signs mark the overpass as the Constable Jack Ross Memorial Bridge, in honour of a Ontario Provincial Police officer.

    But it will always be the Jack Chambers bridge to me.

    A larger sign right above the Jack Chambers plaque commemorates a different Jack

    Though 401 Towards London No. 1 has long been one of my favourite Canadian paintings, it is not typically on display at the Art Gallery of Ontario. I would love to see this work put on permanent display, either at the AGO, or at another gallery that will appreciate the ode to Ontario’s mother road.

  • Room to share: How cities can make physical distancing work

    Room to share: How cities can make physical distancing work

    IMG_8405
    Blackfriars Bridge open to pedestrians and cyclists in London, Ontario

    For my latest TVO article, I spoke with Councillor Shawn Menard in Ottawa, Councillor Rowena Santos in Brampton, and Ryerson University epidemiologist Anne Harris about how cities in Ontario are reallocating road space for pedestrians and cyclists during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, or why they may be hesitant to do so.

    In Brampton, five kilometres of new bike lanes, proposed in that city’s new transportation plan, were quickly approved as part of its response to COVID-19. This benefits both pedestrians and cyclists by reducing conflicts on sidewalks, reducing congestion on city paths, and recognizing that cycling is an increasingly important mode of transportation.

    IMG_8499-001
    Cyclists on Howden Boulevard, Brampton

    In Ottawa, despite resistance from the the mayor and council, Shawn Menard, who represents an urban ward just south of Parliament Hill, was able to temporarily close two lanes of traffic on a narrow bridge on a major retail street, and worked with the National Capital Commission to re-allocate a section of parkway for active transportation.

    Meanwhile in Toronto, the mayor and medical officer of health were resistant to increasing calls for sidewalk expansions in congested urban areas, including where queues formed to enter grocery stores, pharmacies, hardware stores, and LCBO outlets.

    This was one of my favourite articles I have written so far. 

     

    Loblaws queue on Church Street
    Queue on Church Street at Carlton to enter Loblaws supermarket

    With Walk Toronto, I have been involved with pushing the City of Toronto to take action, especially in pinch points where store queues, construction barriers, and other obstructions have made it difficult — if not impossible — to safely practice physical distancing when walking or cycling for essential purposes, or even getting a little bit of fresh air or light exercise in dense urban areas.

    The good news is that ten problem areas — including the intersection of Carlton and Church — have finally been identified for curb lane closures, with potentially more on the way. This is a timid first step, made after weeks of advocacy, but it is welcome.

  • One hundred years of Ontario’s provincial highways

    One hundred years of Ontario’s provincial highways

    IMG_2956

    On February 26, 1920, Ontario’s provincial highway network was born. That year, 16 highways were established across southern Ontario, between the Ottawa and Detroit Rivers. These highways, previously maintained by townships and counties, connected the province’s largest cities and provided important links to Quebec and the United States.

    In 1925, these highways were assigned numbers 2 through 17, in rough order from west to east. There was no Highway 13; instead, the Port Hope-Peterborough Highway was assigned Route 12A. Highway 2, alternatively known as the Trans-Provincial Highway, extended from Windsor to the west to the Quebec border in the east, continuing eastwards as Quebec Highway 2. (That province renumbered its entire highway system in the 1960s and 1970s.) Meanwhile, Highway 15, connecting Kingston and Ottawa, took a deviating “S” shaped route via Perth. Highway 7 only went as far east as Brampton. While the province used triangular highway markers at the time, in 1930, they were renamed “King’s Highways” and assigned crowned highway shields still in use today.

    The map below illustrates the highway system at the time.

    1920OntarioOntario Provincial Highways, 1925 (click for larger version)

    Several of Ontario’s first highways no longer exist. Highway 12A was later renumbered to Highway 28; that first section was later downloaded to Northumberland and Peterborough Counties. The first section of Highway 14, which originally ran between Foxboro and Picton via Belleville, was later integrated with the longer and more important Highway 62. The short stub of Highway 14 between Foxboro and Marmora was also downloaded in the 1990s.

    But Highway 11, formed out of Yonge Street and the Barrie-Muskoka Highway, eventually became the province’s longest and one of its most famous highways (even if it never was the world’s longest street). To mark the occasion, I wrote about Highway 11’s history for TVO. 

    If you’re interested in learning more about Ontario’s highways, nearly 100 years of digitized provincial road maps are available on the Archives of Ontario website. I also suggest visiting The King’s Highway website, which contains histories and photographs for most of Ontario’s highways.

  • A patchwork of new intercity connections in Ontario

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    RideNorfolk buses at Norfolk County Hall, Simcoe

    Over the last three years, I wrote about the gaps in intercity rail and coach services in Ontario, and how some companies were working to fill them.

    In Northern Ontario, Ontario Northland and Kasper Transportation worked to fill the void left by Greyhound’s departure from Western Canada, with both companies offering new links to towns such as Hearst and Fort Francis.

    Unfortunately, there have also been some setbacks. Wroute, a shared taxi service in the Kitchener-Guelph-Hamilton triangle, was operational for less than a year. Though GO Transit added new weekday trains between Guelph and Kitchener, none allow for Kitchener-bound commutes, and there has not been interest in serving those gaps identified by Wroute.

    Outside of Northern Ontario and the Golden Horseshoe, many cities and towns remain disconnected from nearby communities and larger centres. Though every city and town in Ontario had daily bus and/or rail service in the 1980s, many communities are now completely inaccessible for anyone without access to a car. Though GO Transit expanded to Peterborough, Brantford, Niagara, and Kitchener in the last fifteen years, they are extensions of GO’s radial network from Toronto rather than a true intercity network.

    St. Thomas, population 41,000, is the largest city in the province without any passenger links, despite being a short drive to London. Many other cities and towns — particularly in Midwestern and Eastern Ontario — find themselves in similar situations. A few other cities, such as Sarnia (which has just one train a day each way to London and Toronto), are grossly under-served.

    But thanks to municipal innovation and a new provincial grant program, this is finally changing. Though several municipalities addressed this problem early on, three new inter-municipal bus systems began operations in 2019, with many more launching this year.

    (more…)

  • The long way to Pembroke

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    Layover at Barry’s Bay

    A few weeks ago, I went for another long-distance bus trip. I started my journey in Downtown Toronto, and continued on to Peterborough and Pembroke, before arriving in Ottawa late in the evening.  Apart from the Toronto-Peterborough leg aboard a packed, delayed bus, this was the most pleasant of all my long-distance bus trips.

    Greyhound’s Peterborough-Pembroke route only operates a few days a week, on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. It is one of the last rural bus routes operated by Greyhound Canada as most remaining routes operate on highways between large urban centres. The bus follows Highways 28, 62, and 60, stopping at small towns such as Bancroft, Maynooth and Barry’s Bay. North of Lakefield, the route passes through the Canadian Shield, with its lakes, rocks, and trees.

    As I traveled on last Friday in September, the fall colours were almost at their peak in the Haliburton Highlands, making this an especially scenic ride. There was an informal fifteen-minute stop in Barry’s Bay, enough time to get a decent coffee and a snack.

    The view from Highway 28 near Bancroft, September 27

    At Bancroft, we passed by the old Central Ontario Railway Station. Passenger service ended in the 1950s, while the tracks were torn up in the 1980s. The station was preserved and is now a local museum. In front, a dozen citizens took part in a local climate strike that took place across Canada, part of the Global Week for Future. It was nice to see residents take part, even in small town Ontario.

    Climate strikers in Bancroft. The former railway station stands behind

    At Pembroke, I had several hours before the Ontario Northland bus departed for Ottawa. While Pembroke’s downtown core could use some TLC, it has great bones and a great collection of heritage buildings, including a late Victorian post office, its late Art Moderne replacement, the historic Renfrew County courthouse, solid commercial blocks, and a fascinating library.

    IMG_4455-001Downtown Pembroke

    IMG_4478-001.JPGIMG_4420-002.JPGPembroke’s post offices. The 1888 building, designed by Thomas Fuller, is now City Hall. The 1950s replacement, on the left, still houses Canada Post. 

    Pembroke’s public library is especially unique, as it looks like it could have been designed by Frank Lloyd Wright. Built in 1914, it was designed by Francis Conroy Sullivan, a Canadian-born architect who studied under Wright in Chicago before establishing his firm in Ottawa. Expansions and renovations have remained faithful to the Prairie Style architecture.

    IMG_4475-001Entrance to the Pembroke Public Library

    IMG_4472-001.JPGLibrary interior

    Though Pembroke was served by three different railways — the Canadian Pacific transcontinental mainline, a branch of the Canada Atlantic that operated between Montreal and Parry Sound, and the Canadian Northern — all tracks were removed by 2013, when Canadian National ripped up the Beachburg Subdivision. None of the station buildings survive, but the abandoned rights-of-way are still intact. At the west end of town, a long trestle now carries a snowmobile trail where the CN mainline once crossed the Indian River.

    IMG_4437-002Former CN trestle, Pembroke

    The removal of the CN and CP routes through the Ottawa Valley were especially unfortunate, as all through freight and passenger traffic across Canada must now pass through Greater Toronto. This was the result of cost-cutting and the loss of local rail customers, such as lumber and pulp industries. The Commonwealth Plywood plant in Pembroke still stands as a reminder of the industrial past of the Upper Ottawa Valley.

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    Abandoned Commonwealth Plywood plant

    The last passenger train, VIA’s Canadian, called at Pembroke in 1990. But there are two daily bus trips in each direction between Ottawa and North Bay/Sudbury, one operated by Greyhound, the other by Ontario Northland. From Pembroke, I was able to take a Northland bus that left at 9:00 PM, arriving in Ottawa by 11:00 PM. This gave me plenty of time for dinner after a long walk around town.

    My trip to Pembroke made for a pleasant detour, giving me a chance to see another part of Ontario.

  • The road to Paris and London

    Sign with the distance to Paris and London OntarioDistance Sign on Highway 5, Clappison’s Corners

    Early European settlers to Ontario were not very imaginative when they came up with local place names. Although some towns and townships have First Nations names (Toronto, Chinguacousy, Niagara), or named for First Nations leaders allied with the British (Tecumseh, Brant), most cities, towns, and townships were given the names of European settlements, British royals and nobility, or the names of those settlers.

    The list of Ontario towns and cities includes no less than ten world capitals: Athens, Brussels, Delhi, Dublin, London, Paris, Vienna, Warsaw, Wellington, and Zurich. Other towns and cities across the province include the names of British royalty and nobility (Cobourg, Hanover, Port Arthur, Fort William, Richmond Hill) or the towns settler arrived from. These towns can be found throughout the province.

    At Clappison’s Corners, a busy intersection outside of Hamilton, Paris and London appear on the same sign, amusing the occasional visitor. By driving west on Highway 5, Paris is just 42 kilometres away, with London an additional 80 kilometres’ drive via Highway 2.

    The other Covent Garden Market, London, OntarioThe other Covent Garden Market, London

    London was named for the British city in 1793, and was chosen as the site of the new capital of Upper Canada by governor John Graves Simcoe. He felt that the interior location, on the banks of the Thames River (Simcoe named that, too), would be safe from American attack. However, York (now Toronto), became the capital. But London became the regional centre for Western Ontario, and is now the world’s second-largest London with over 350,000 residents.

    Paris OntarioParis, Ontario’s main street backs onto the Grand River

    Paris was named in the 1840s not for the French capital, but for the large gypsum deposits in the area, used to make plaster of Paris. In 2000, the town of Paris was amalgamated with rural Brant County. The community has a population of just 12,000, the third-largest Paris (between Paris, Texas and Paris, Tennessee).

    Before the provincial government downloaded thousands of highways to local municipalities in the late 1990s, Highway 5 ran from Highway 2 (Kingston Road) in Scarborough to Highway 2 again at Paris. At Paris, a motorist could continue on Highway 2 west to London and beyond. New freeways, such as Highway 403, offered a faster trip, while local roads, such as Highways 2 and 5, were downloaded as a cost-cutting measure. Today, Highway 5 runs for just 13 kilometres connecting Highways 6 and 8.

    Today, the route to Paris and London is merely an anachronism of an earlier time, when King’s Highways covered the province and when motorists passed through many small towns on their way to places like Toronto, Detroit, and Montreal. At some point, the sign at Clappison’s Corners will be removed to make way for a new interchange. Until then, this humble monument to European settlement and rural King’s Highways will stand guard.