Toronto's Lost Streetcar Rails

There are a few spots around Toronto where you can still see old streetcar tracks from long abandoned routes. All modern photos were taken by Trevor the Time-Traveler.

dWhen the Bloor-Danforth Subway Line opened in 1966, the terminuses were Keele Station in the west and Woodbine Station in the east. Both of those stations had temporary streetcar loops attached while work continued on extending the subway line. In 1968 the Bloor-Danforth line was extended to Islington and Warden Stations, and the last of the old streetcar line was abandoned. You can still see a large section of the old "Shuttle Streetcar" loop behind Woodbine Station on Strathmore Blvd., although an upcoming development means that these long abandoned tracks may finally be removed. Go check them out before they are gone!

Streetcars once ran from the intersection of Roncesvalles, Queen and King across a bridge down to what was then Lakeshore Road. This route serviced the popular Sunnyside Amusement Park, which was located along the waterfront from 1922 to 1955. The park along with old Lakeshore Road were demolished to make way for the Gardiner Expressway and Lakeshore Blvd. 

Today you can see a small section of track poking up through the road at Parkside Drive and Lakeshore Blvd.

Old Lakeshore Road facing east towards Sunnyside Amusement Park in 1954.

While not exactly a streetcar line, its still worth noting that there are old tracks from the radial railway that operated between St. Clair & Keele in the Junction to the Grand Trunk Railway Station in Guelph. This electric railway opened in 1917 and closed in 1931. 

Today there are some left over rails from this line along Lavender Creek just west of Weston Road on the north side of Gunns Road. 

You can learn more about the Toronto Suburban Railway by visiting the Halton County Radial Railway, which is a streetcar museum built on part of the old Guelph Line right-of-way near Rockwood, Ontario.