Eastern Avenue | |
---|---|
Route information | |
Maintained by City of Toronto | |
Length | 4.5 km[ citation needed ] (2.8 mi) |
Major junctions | |
West end | Front Street at Erin Street |
East end | Queen Street East continues as Kingston Road |
Location | |
Country | Canada |
Province | Ontario |
Major cities | Toronto |
Highway system | |
|
Eastern Avenue is an east-west street in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It runs from just east of Parliament Street in the downtown to just west of Coxwell Avenue, near the Beaches neighbourhood. Originally Eastern crossed the Don River at the Old Eastern Avenue Bridge, but that bridge was disconnected in 1964. [1] Today, Eastern's east and west halves cross the Don River north of the old alignment via a large bridge with ramps connecting to the Don Valley Parkway, and this viaduct (known as the Eastern Avenue Bypass in some maps) forks out and becomes the eastern terminus of both Richmond and Adelaide streets.
Eastern runs through what was once the heart of Toronto's most industrial area, the region just north of Toronto Harbour and the Port Lands area. Today most of the factories have departed. [2] Some do remain, notably the large Weston bakery. Several film studios have moved into the former industrial areas near Eastern and Carlaw, and this area is today billed as the Studio District. Eastern was also home to the headquarters of the Toronto chapter of the Hells Angels, until it was raided and confiscated by police in April 2007. [3]
At its eastern terminus it now meets up at Kingston Road, once the main cross colonial route linking York to the other major Upper Canada settlement of Kingston.
Prior to 2000, however, Eastern Avenue did not meet up directly with Kingston Road, but at a point a few hundred feet west of the intersection of Kingston Road and Queen Street. Only with the demolition of Greenwood Racetrack was Eastern Avenue extended to flow directly into Kingston Road. The former terminus of Eastern Avenue still exists—it is the small unmarked (and unnamed) street that runs south off Queen Street between Coxwell and Orchard Park Avenues. A small isolated section of Eastern Avenue runs from Sumach Street to Lawren Harris Square.
Almost all the street scenes in the film Hairspray were filmed on Eastern Avenue. [4]
The TTC proposed a 150 Eastern bus in 2022, which would operate along the length of the road. [5]
A number of north-south buses use Eastern as the street they loop along before returning northwards. They include the 22 Coxwell, 31 Greenwood, and 72 Pape. [6]
In 2008 bike lanes were added to Eastern, sparking controversy regarding practicality of bike lanes on arterial roads. [7]
Landmarks and notable sites along Eastern from west to east
Landmark | Cross street | Notes | Image |
---|---|---|---|
Inglenook Community High School | Cherry St | Historic school building | |
Dominion Wheel & Foundries Limited | Rolling Mills Road | Abandoned site of a former rail parts manufacturer; includes four buildings of heritage significance [8] | |
Old Eastern Avenue Bridge | Don River | Abandoned bridge | |
Sunlight Park | Don River | First baseball park in Toronto, demolished 1896 | |
Broadview Lofts | Broadview | Former warehouse converted into lofts | |
Toronto Film Studios | Carlaw | ||
Weston Bakery | Carlaw | One of the remaining, operable factories | |
Russell Carhouse | Greenwood | TTC streetcar yard | |
South Central sorting plant | Greenwood | Main Canada Post facility for central Toronto | |
Greenwood Raceway | Greenwood | Racetrack demolished in the 1990s |
Queen Street is a major east–west thoroughfare in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It extends from Roncesvalles Avenue and King Street in the west to Victoria Park Avenue in the east. Queen Street was the cartographic baseline for the original east–west avenues of Toronto's and York County's grid pattern of major roads. The western section of Queen is a centre for Canadian broadcasting, music, fashion, performance, and the visual arts. Over the past twenty-five years, Queen West has become an international arts centre and a tourist attraction in Toronto.
Gerrard Street is a street in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It consists of two separate parts, historically referred to as Lower Gerrard and Upper Gerrard. The former stretches between University Avenue and Coxwell Avenue for 6 km, across Old Toronto. The latter portion starts 300 m north of Lower Gerrard's eastern terminus and runs between Coxwell Avenue and Clonmore Drive, between Victoria Park Avenue and Warden Avenue, in Scarborough for another 4 km.
Toronto Civic Railways (TCR) was a streetcar operator created and owned by the City of Toronto, Ontario, Canada, to serve newly annexed areas of the city that the private operator Toronto Railway Company refused to serve. When the Toronto Railway Company's franchise expired in 1921, its services were combined with those of the Toronto Civic Railways, and are now assumed by the new Toronto Transportation Commission (TTC). The first route of the TCR started operation on December 18, 1912.
The cancelled expressways in Toronto were a planned series of expressways in Toronto, Ontario, Canada that were only partially built or cancelled due to public opposition. The system of expressways was intended to spur or handle growth in the suburbs of Toronto, but were opposed by citizens within the city of Toronto proper, citing the demolition of homes and park lands, air pollution, noise and the high cost of construction. The Spadina Expressway, planned since the 1940s, was cancelled in 1971 after being only partially constructed. After the Spadina cancellation, other expressway plans, intended to create a 'ring' around the central core, were abandoned.
Bloor Street is a major east–west residential and commercial thoroughfare in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Bloor Street runs from the Prince Edward Viaduct, which spans the Don River Valley, westward into Mississauga where it ends at Central Parkway. East of the viaduct, Danforth Avenue continues along the same right-of-way. The street, approximately 25 kilometres (16 mi) long, contains a significant cross-sample of Toronto's ethnic communities. It is also home to Toronto's famous shopping street, the Mink Mile.
Lawrence Avenue is a major east–west thoroughfare in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is divided into east and west portions by Yonge Street, the dividing line of east–west streets in Toronto.
Eglinton Avenue is a major east–west arterial thoroughfare in Toronto and Mississauga in the Canadian province of Ontario. The street begins at Highway 407 at the western limits of Mississauga, as a continuation of Lower Baseline in Milton. It traverses the midsection of both cities and ends at Kingston Road. Eglinton Avenue is the only street to cross all six former cities and boroughs of Metropolitan Toronto.
Kingston Road is a major arterial road in Toronto and Durham Region, Ontario. It is the southernmost major (mainly) east-west road in the eastern portion of Toronto, specifically in the district of Scarborough, and runs east to Ajax in Durham. Until 1998, it formed a portion of Highway 2. The name of the street is derived from Kingston, Ontario as the road was the primary route used to travel from Toronto to the settlements east of it situated along the shores of Lake Ontario; in the west end of Kingston, the road was referred to as the York Road until at least 1908, and is today named Princess Street.
Lake Shore Boulevard is a major arterial road running along more than half of the Lake Ontario waterfront in the city of Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Prior to 1998, two segments of Lake Shore Boulevard were designated as part of Highway 2, with the highway following the Gardiner Expressway between these two sections.
Bayview Avenue is a major north–south route in the Greater Toronto Area of Ontario. North of Toronto, in York Region, Bayview is designated as York Regional Road 34.
506 Carlton is a Toronto streetcar route run by the Toronto Transit Commission in Ontario, Canada. It runs from Main Street station on subway Line 2 Bloor–Danforth along Gerrard, Carlton and College Streets to High Park. Despite the route's name, less than 10 percent of its length actually uses Carlton Street.
The 502 Downtowner was a streetcar route operated by the Toronto Transit Commission in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It ran from the Bingham Loop at Victoria Park Avenue and Kingston Road in the Beaches neighbourhood to McCaul Loop in downtown Toronto. Starting in September 2019, all streetcar services along Kingston Road were consolidated into the 503 Kingston Rd route.
The Upper Beaches is a neighbourhood in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is directly north of the Beaches area. It stretches from Coxwell Avenue in the west to Victoria Park in the east. The southern border is Kingston Road, while the northern boundary is generally considered to be the Canadian National Railway tracks between Gerrard Street and Danforth Avenue. The western part of the area was originally called Norway, and the larger area was once part of the Town of East Toronto. The name "Upper Beaches" was first used by developers and real estate agents around the period of 2001 to 2003 for the selling of houses on redeveloped land in the area, and was used as a marketing tag to attract buyers. The area was never considered part of the Beaches neighbourhood but was close to it. The city's current name for this area is East End Danforth, though that is rarely used. The city also includes the buildings along and just north of Danforth Avenue in the neighbourhood. The western portion between Woodbine Avenue and Coxwell is referred to by the city as Woodbine Corridor.
Woodbine Avenue is a north–south arterial road consisting of two sections in Toronto and York Region in Ontario, Canada.
Turning loops of the Toronto streetcar system serve as termini and turnback points for streetcar routes in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The single-ended streetcars require track loops in order to reverse direction. Besides short off-street track loops these can also be larger interchange points, having shelters and driver facilities, or be part of a subway station structure for convenient passenger interchange.
Bingham Loop is a station and turning loop at the eastern terminus of the 503 Kingston Rd streetcar lines of the Toronto Transit Commission (TTC). It lies between Victoria Park Avenue and Bingham Avenue, just north of Kingston Road in Toronto.
...this is back on that street that [Nikki Blonsky] rode the garbage truck down... Eastern Avenue. We shot everything on Eastern Avenue.