Belt Line Railway (Toronto)

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Belt Line Railway
Locale Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Dates of operation 1892–1894
Track gauge 4 ft 8½ in (1435 mm) (standard gauge)
Headquarters Toronto, Ontario, Canada

The Belt Line Railway was built in Toronto, Ontario, Canada in the 1890s by a railway entrepreneur, James David Edgar. It was constructed as a commuter railway line to service and promote suburban neighbourhoods just subdivided north of the city limits. It ran through the communities that eventually became Rosedale, Moore Park, Forest Hill, and Swansea. The railroad was necessary because many of the current bridges did not exist at time, and access to areas like Moore Park was very difficult, requiring repeated trips up and down steep ravine roads. Belt Line Railway brochures [1]) used 'Spring Valley' instead of 'Mud Creek' as the name for what is now Moore Park Ravine. Currently, it is known as Mud Creek.

The railway consisted of two separate loops both starting and ending at Union Station. The larger loop went east to the Don River. It turned north following the river before journeying up a steep grade through the Moore Park Ravine beside the Don Valley Brick Works. It then turned west at the north edge of the Mount Pleasant Cemetery along Merton St. At Yonge Street it turned northwest travelling through Forest Hill until just north of Eglinton Avenue West. There, it turned west again before returning to Union Station via the CNR line at Caledonia Road. A complete trip was approximately 40 km (25 miles).

A second, smaller loop headed west along the regular northwest rail corridor. It turned west just north of St. Clair Avenue and then turned south at Lambton Mills, just east of the Humber River. It ran south following the edge of the Humber River valley. It followed the route now occupied by the South Kingsway just west of High Park. It returned east along Lake Ontario.

The railway was conceived of by James David Edgar, a politician and railway financier. It started running in 1892 and ran for two years, four months before it ceased operations. It never made a profit. There were a number of reasons for this - the fare prices were too high at the time (25 cents) and the country was experiencing a financial depression in the 1890s. The drive to develop these new communities was blunted by the depression of the time, and it took longer to open up the new neighborhoods than the developers hoped.

Although passenger service had ended, the Belt Line Railway Company continued to exist. It was eventually sold on December 31, 1943 to Canadian National Railway (CNR) for $410,000 CAD. Three of the five 4-4-2T commuter tank locomotives specially built for the Belt Line were eventually used on the Thousand Islands Railway in Gananoque, Ontario [2].

In 1906, the section in the Don Valley south of Winchester St. was used as part of a new line by the CNR connecting Toronto to Parry Sound. The tracks on the steep grade (4%) in the Moore Park Ravine were pulled up during World War I due to a shortage of iron. The remaining spur line was used by an occasional freight train, servicing lumber and coal yards along Merton St, and the new TTC subway yards at Yonge St. The red 'Gloucester' subway cars were delivered to TTC Davisville yards using the route, and freight service ended in the early 1960s. Track on the western loop was pulled up shortly after service ended, but part of the right of way was later used by the Toronto Suburban Railway and some other lands were sold off to local developers.

After passenger trains stopped operating, parts of the rail line sat unused for several years. In the late 1960s part of the right-of-way was expropriated to build the Spadina Expressway.

In the 1970s, CNR tried to sell the right-of-way for housing since the land was quite valuable. Most home owners adjacent to the line wished to buy the land to extend their backyards. A local citizen, Esther Carin, successfully lobbied city council to turn the section east of the Allen Road into a walking trail. The land was purchased by the city in 1972 as part of a land swap with CN which included the Metro Toronto Convention Centre on Front Street. In 1999-2000 the trail was named the Kay Gardner Beltline Park after a local councillor who was also involved with the negotiations.[3] It now forms part of a trail network called Discovery Walks.

The section west of Allen Road sat empty and unused but recently has been turned into a new path called the York Beltline Trail. Except for a short section west of Allen Road the new trail reuses almost all of the old railway space. The trail goes over an iron bridge that crosses Dufferin Street (in the 2400 block) as well as the original bridge over Yonge Street (in the 1700 block). Other roads are crossed at grade although there are no formal pedestrian crosswalks.

Most of the train stations were torn down. The only one that was saved from demolition was the Don Station which was located at the Don River and Queen Street East. When it was slated for destruction, local naturalist Charles Sauriol persuaded the city to preserve it. It was moved to Todmorden Mills where it now forms part of a heritage museum.

Don Station at Todmorden Mills
Don Station at Todmorden Mills

Contents

[edit] Stations

  • Don Station
  • Moore Park Station
  • Forest Hill Station
  • Fairbanks Station
  • Eglinton
  • Yonge

[edit] Bridges

  • Mount Pleasant Road bridge
  • Moore Avenue bridge
  • Clarence Avenue/Heath Street bridge
  • Davisville Avenue bridge
  • Winchester Street bridge

[edit] References

  1. ^ Local Interest Collection of the Deer Park Library, Toronto
  2. ^ Douglas N W, Smith, "By Rail, Road and Water to Gananoque", Pictures: Pages72, 104. Trackside Canada, 1995
  3. ^ Minutes of the Council of the City of Toronto, October 26, 1999 and October 27, 1999, item 12.40 [1]; clause no. 35 of report no. 13 of the Toronto Community Council, September 27, 1999 [2]; press release May 26, 2000 [3]
  • Akler, H., and S.B. Hood. 2003. Toronto, the Unknown City. Arsenal Pulp Press. ISBN 1-55152-146-6
  • Central Ravines, Belt Line & Gardens Discovery Walks. Retrieved Jan. 16, 2006.
  • Russell, C.H. 1996. Tightening the belt: a history of the Toronto Belt Line Railway. City of Toronto Archives
  • Sauriol, Charles. 1981. Remembering the Don: A Rare Record of Earlier Times Within the Don River Valley. Consolidated Amethyst Communications. ISBN 0-920474-22-5
  • Sauriol, Charles. 1984. Tales of the Don. Natural Heritage/Natural History. ISBN 0-920474-30-6

[edit] Archival photographs

[edit] External links