Sir Isaac Brock Bridge

Last updated
The Sir Isaac Brock Bridge Bathurst Street Bridge.jpg
The Sir Isaac Brock Bridge
Sir Isaac Brock Bridge over Humber River in Toronto, 1910 Humber-bridge-1910.jpg
Sir Isaac Brock Bridge over Humber River in Toronto, 1910
Sir Isaac Brock Bridge
Sir Isaac Brock Bridge, Toronto

The Sir Isaac Brock Bridge is a steel Warren truss bridge in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It lies along Bathurst Street over the railway tracks between Front Street and Fort York Boulevard. The bridge carries four lanes for motor vehicles with the centre lanes containing the streetcar tracks of the Toronto Transit Commission's 511 Bathurst streetcar route.

The Bridge was formerly named The Bathurst Street Bridge before changing names and being named after Isaac Brock.

The steel truss bridge was built in 1903 and used for the Great Western Railway over the Humber River (northside of then Lakeshore Road at mouth of the river). [1] It was dis-assembled and re-located in 1916 to Bathurst Street and converted for road traffic. [1] The bridge served to connect Bathurst Street at Front Street to Fort York. [2]

In 1931, the bridge was moved and re-aligned (Bathurst Street was at an angle south of Front Street) to support streetcar service south of the railway tracks at that location. A new bridge south of the bridge was constructed to connect the south end of the bridge, connecting Bathurst to Fleet Street. Fort York lost its road access in the change, and a footbridge to the east entrance was constructed. [2]

The Tywn River Drive Bridge, Queen Street Viaduct, and the Old Eastern Avenue Bridge are other examples of steel bridges in Toronto. Lawrence Avenue Bridge was a truss bridge that took traffic over Don River, but it was replaced by the current overpass over the Don River and Don Valley Parkway in the 1960s.

In 2007, the bridge was given the official name of the "Sir Isaac Brock Bridge" by the City of Toronto. [3] This was done at the instigation of the "Friends of Fort York" organization.

The bridge is owned by Metrolinx, which owns the railway tracks below. It was formerly owned by the Canadian National Railway. [4]

From May until late-December 2020, the bridge was closed for rehabilitation work. Crews made steel and concrete repairs to the road-carrying spans and the exposed steel, replaced TTC streetcar tracks and overhead wiring, and constructed a new concrete parapet wall along the curb for improved safety. [5]

Related Research Articles

Queen Street (Toronto) thoroughfare in Toronto, Ontario

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.

Spadina Avenue thoroughfare in Toronto, Ontario

Spadina Avenue is one of the most prominent streets in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Running through the western section of downtown, the road has a very different character in different neighbourhoods.

Hoggs Hollow Neighbourhood in Toronto, Ontario, Canada

Hoggs Hollow is a residential neighbourhood in North York, Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is located in the Don River Valley and centred on the intersection of Yonge Street, York Mills Road, and Wilson Avenue.

St. Clair West station Toronto subway station

St. Clair West is a subway station on Line 1 Yonge–University in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It spans the block north of St. Clair Avenue West to Heath Street, between Bathurst Street and Tweedsmuir Avenue. The station serves the local communities of Forest Hill South, Humewood, Bracondale Hill and Casa Loma.

The Toronto Suburban Railway was a Canadian electric railway operator with local routes in west Toronto, and a radial (interurban) route to Guelph.

Bathurst Street (Toronto)

Bathurst Street is a main north-south thoroughfare in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It begins at an intersection of the Queens Quay roadway, just north of the Lake Ontario shoreline. It continues north through Toronto to the Toronto boundary at Steeles Avenue. It is a four-lane thoroughfare throughout Toronto. The roadway continues north into York Region where it is known as York Regional Road 38.

512 St. Clair Streetcar route in Toronto, Canada

The 512 St. Clair is an east–west streetcar route in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, operated by the Toronto Transit Commission (TTC). It operates on St. Clair Avenue between St. Clair station on the Line 1 Yonge–University subway and Gunns Road, just west of Keele Street.

511 Bathurst Streetcar route in Toronto, Canada

The 511 Bathurst is a streetcar route operated by the Toronto Transit Commission in Toronto, Ontario, Canada.

Queen Street Viaduct

The Queen Street Viaduct in Toronto, Canada carries vehicles and Toronto Transit Commission streetcars along Queen Street East and across the Don River. It is an example of a Pratt truss.

Exhibition Loop Toronto Transit Commission streetcar terminus

Exhibition Loop is the terminus for the 509 Harbourfront and 511 Bathurst streetcar routes, and the 307 Blue Night Bathurst bus route. Exhibition Loop serves Exhibition Place, Coca-Cola Coliseum, BMO Field and connects with GO Transit at the Exhibition GO Station.

Vaughan Road thoroughfare in Toronto, Ontario

Vaughan Road is a road in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is a contour collector road that is parallel to a buried creek to the north called Castle Frank Brook. Vaughan Road begins on Bathurst Street south of St. Clair Avenue West, then it becomes a north-south street, hence its address numbering system, then it becomes a northwest-southeast street. Finally, Vaughan Road ends in a dead-end near the intersection of Eglinton Avenue and Dufferin Street. Vaughan Road Academy is named after this road.

The Waterfront West LRT (WWLRT) is a proposed streetcar line in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The WWLRT is currently part of a City project called the Waterfront Transit Reset which also includes the East Bayfront LRT. The WWLRT was initially proposed as part of the Transit City plan to expand transit services offered by the Toronto Transit Commission that was announced March 16, 2007. The new line was to use existing parts of the Toronto streetcar system, extending from Union station to Long Branch Loop via Exhibition Place.

Toronto streetcar system loops

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.

Bloor streetcar line

The Toronto Transit Commission operated the Bloor streetcar line along Bloor Street and Danforth Avenue, extending at its longest from Jane Street in the west end of the city to Luttrell Avenue in the east. Both Luttrell and Jane loops at the termini were transfer points between streetcars and suburban bus routes. The line was abandoned in 1966 with the opening of the Bloor-Danforth subway line, except for two stubs of the line abandoned in 1968.

Yonge streetcar line

Beginning operation in 1861, the Yonge streetcar line was the first streetcar line in Toronto and the first in Canada. It started off as a horsecar line and closed in 1954 operating two-unit trains of Peter Witt motors pulling a trailer. Under the Toronto Transportation Commission, the Yonge line was the busiest and most congested streetcar line in the city leading to its replacement in 1954 by the Yonge Subway line, also Toronto's first and the first in Canada.

Hillcrest Complex

Hillcrest Complex is the Toronto Transit Commission's largest facility and is responsible for most of the maintenance work on the system's surface vehicles, including heavy overhauls, repairs and repainting. It is located adjacent to the intersection of Bathurst Street and Davenport Road. The site is also home to the TTC's Transit Control Centre, but the operational headquarters of the organization remain at the McBrien Building at 1900 Yonge Street.

Harbord streetcar line

The Harbord streetcar line was an east-west line within the Toronto streetcar system. The route was named after Harbord Street even though only a small portion of the route was along the namesake street. One distinct characteristic of the route was its zip-zag nature, making many 90-degree turns onto the various streets along its route. The route was retired in 1966 when the Toronto Transit Commission (TTC) opened the Bloor–Danforth subway line, the city's first east-west subway line.

St. Clair Carhouse

The St. Clair Carhouse was a streetcar facility in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It was located south of St. Clair Avenue on a parcel of land bounded by Wychwood Avenue on the east, Benson Avenue on its north side and Christie Street on the west side. It was opened by the Toronto Civic Railways in 1913, taken over by the Toronto Transportation Commission in 1921 and closed by its successor, the Toronto Transit Commission, in 1998. The carhouse was subsequently transformed into a community centre called the Wychwood Barns.

References

  1. 1 2 Filey, Mike (1996). The TTC Story: The First Seventy-five Years. Toronto, Ontario: Dundurn Press. p. 39.
  2. 1 2 Mike Filey, Godfrey Mallion, Ray Martin, Shawn Micallef and Stephen Otto. "Searching For The Better Way: Streetcar Service To The CNE" (PDF). The Fife and Drum. Friends of Fort York (October 2007, vol. 11, no. 3): 1–2.CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  3. "Naming of Bathurst Street Bridge as Sir Isaac Brock Bridge". City of Toronto. November 27, 2007. Retrieved June 12, 2017.
  4. Otto, Stephen. "Who Maintains The Bathurst Bridge". The Fife and Drum. Friends of Fort York (September 2016, vol 20. no. 3): 3.
  5. "Upcoming City Construction on Bathurst Street" (PDF). City of Toronto. May 7, 2020. Archived from the original (PDF) on May 21, 2020. Retrieved May 21, 2020.

Coordinates: 43°38′25″N79°24′05″W / 43.640357°N 79.40127°W / 43.640357; -79.40127