Transportation in Toronto
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
There are many forms of transportation in the city of Toronto. These include highways and public transit. Toronto's primary airport is Toronto Pearson International Airport (YYZ). It is along the western boundary with Mississauga. Toronto also has bike lanes which are used by cyclists in the city to get from place to place safely.
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[edit] Railways
Toronto is a major rail transportation hub in central North America, with most rail lines owned and operated by two Class I railways, CN and CPR. Both companies operate major yard and intermodal facilities in various parts of the GTA to serve manufacturing and logistics customers. Most waterfront trackage has been scaled back and abandoned in favour of real-estate development, with the remaining main lines in this area being almost the exclusive domain of passenger carriers.
Most freight lines, aside from yard and industrial trackage, also host passenger rail. Toronto is served by inter-city VIA Rail, Ontario Northland, and Amtrak trains through Union Station, a grand neoclassical structure in the heart of the city's downtown, which is shared with GO Transit's commuter trains. GO Transit also owns some of the rail lines it operates upon, however, like VIA and ONR, it usually depends upon trackage rights from the freight railways.
Toronto may soon have its own high-speed rail link from Lester B. Pearson International Airport to the central business district, with the proposed construction of the Blue22 transit route, although this project has not met final approval.
[edit] Bus terminals
A large GO bus terminal is located next to Union Station. However, the main inter-city bus terminal is at Bay & Dundas.
[edit] Highways
There are a number of freeways that serve both the city proper and the Greater Toronto Area. Bisecting the city from west to east across its inner suburbs, Highway 401 (or simply, "the 401") acts as a bypass of the downtown core, and is both the busiest and widest highway in Canada. At its intersection with Highway 400, where it spans 22 lanes, it sees over 400,000 vehicles on an average day.
At the western edge of the city, the 401 meets Highway 427, an important north-south artery between Toronto Pearson International Airport and downtown. In the same area, the short length of Highway 409 connects the airport directly to the traffic flow of the 401. Moving east, the 401 then intersects Highway 400, which leads north to Barrie, the recreational areas of Ontario's "Cottage Country" and beyond, to the northern reaches of the province. East of the 400, the 401 meets William R. Allen Road, and then the Don Valley Parkway/Highway 404, before continuing eastwards out of Toronto into the suburbs of Pickering, Ajax and Oshawa.
Forming part of Toronto's municipal expressway system, the Don Valley Parkway (or colloquially, the DVP, or sarcastically, the 'Don Valley Parking Lot' because of its constant congestion) links downtown to the old inner suburbs immediately to the north and east. Beyond the 401, this route is known as Highway 404, and connects the more distant suburbs of Markham, Richmond Hill, Aurora, and Newmarket to the city.
The Gardiner Expressway (or colloquially, "the Gardiner") roughly follows the northern shore of Lake Ontario, and connects the western suburbs to the downtown core. West of Highway 427, the Gardiner becomes Queen Elizabeth Way (often called the QEW, or simply "The Q.E."), which heads towards Hamilton, Niagara, and Fort Erie (bordering New York State in the vicinity of Buffalo).
Highway 407 ETR is not located within Toronto proper, but is a major highway in the Greater Toronto Area that acts as a secondary bypass around the northern end of the city, stretching from Burlington in the west to Pickering in the east. It is an electronic toll road with no physical toll booths, instead depending on automatic recognition of vehicle plates or electronic toll collection.
[edit] Roads
Roads in Toronto follow a grid system, with a few notable exceptions. The main north-south arteries, from west to east, are Kipling Ave., Islington Ave., Royal York Rd., Jane St., Keele St./Weston Rd., Dufferin St., Bathurst St., Yonge St., Don Mills Rd., Victoria Park Ave., Warden Ave, Kennedy Rd., McCowan Road, Markham Rd., and Morningside Avenue. The main east-west arteries, from north to south, are Steeles Ave., Finch Ave., Sheppard Ave., Wilson Ave./York Mills Rd./Ellsemere Rd., Lawrence Ave., Eglinton Ave., St. Clair Ave., Bloor St./Danforth Ave., Dundas St., Queen St., and Lakeshore Blvd./Kingston Rd.
Outside the downtown core, most of these roads have 2 or 3 lanes of traffic in each direction. Toronto's road system was mainly designed for cars, and is quite easy to navigate. There are some anomalies; for example, Lawrence Ave. and St. Clair Ave. are both split into two sections by the Don Valley, and, in the case of St. Clair Ave., the drive between the two sections is almost 15 minutes. Roads sometimes change names, and the 1999 Amalgamation has caused some doubling in road names, although this is usually confined to smaller, residential, roads.
[edit] Public transport
Within the city, the Toronto Transit Commission (TTC) operates an extensive system of subways, buses, RTs, and streetcars, covering 1,200 km (754 miles) of routes and heavily used by people who live in or near the city. A single flat fare is good for any trip within the city regardless of distance or transfers required with the exception of contracted routes that travel outside of the city and downtown express routes. Toronto has the third highest transit system ridership in North America (after the Mexico City Metro and New York City's New York City Transit Authority).
[edit] Subway
See Also: Toronto subway and RT
The backbone of the TTC is a relatively simple subway system with two main lines, the U-shaped Yonge-University-Spadina Line and the east-west Bloor-Danforth Line, running along principal streets and connecting Toronto's outlying areas with its downtown core. Each line also connects to a secondary feeder near one of its outer ends: the Sheppard subway line in the north and the Scarborough RT in the east making it the most extensive in Canada.
[edit] Bus and Streetcar
The rest of the city is primarily served by a network of about 150 bus routes, many of them forming a grid along main streets, and all of them (except for the #99 route) connecting to one or more subway or RT stations. A more distinctive feature of the TTC is the streetcar system, one of the few remaining in North America with a substantial amount of in-street operation. Most of the 11 streetcar routes are concentrated in the downtown core, and all connect to the subway.
Inter-regional commuter train and bus service is provided by GO Transit. GO trains and buses connect the city to the rest of the Greater Toronto Area.
[edit] Airports
[edit] Toronto Pearson International Airport
Toronto's primary airport is Toronto Pearson International Airport (YYZ), straddling Toronto's western boundary with Mississauga. Pearson's air traffic is just under 30 million passengers annually [1] and it is the world's largest originator of air traffic into the U.S.
[edit] Toronto City Centre Airport
The city also has a smaller commercial airport, the Toronto City Centre Airport (YTZ). Situated on the Toronto Islands, the City Centre Airport is primarily a general aviation airport. Air Canada Jazz operated commercial flights out of YTZ until February 2006. In recent years the destinations served from YTZ have been reduced, and Ottawa was the only destination for commercial flights. The airport is connected to the mainland by a short ferry that is free to airline passengers.
[edit] Nearby Airports
The Hamilton International Airport is an alternate, relief airport to Pearson, but not in the GTA. Situated in Hamilton, 85 km (53 miles) southwest of Toronto, it is also a terminus for low-cost carrier, charter airline, and courier traffic.
Travellers from Toronto to the US are increasingly using Buffalo-Niagara International Airport (BUF). Located outside of Buffalo, New York, the lower airfares offered to US destinations make travelling from BUF a cost effective alternative, despite the time needed to make the 170 km trip by car. Detroit, some 400km distant by road is also used as an alternative for air travel within the US, especially to western US destinations.
There are a number of other general aviation airports in and around the city, including Buttonville Municipal Airport, Markham Airport, Oshawa Airport, Brampton Airport, and Burlington Airpark.
[edit] Cycling
Toronto has a major program in place to dramatically expand the network through on-road separate bike lanes, with the goal of having any cyclist in the city proper within a five minute ride of a designated bike route. The network includes a planned 500 km of on-street bike lanes, and another 250 km of off-road paved trails.
To date, only a tiny portion of the network has been built. Gaining approval to put in the on-street bike lanes has proven to be a serious problem, and less than 90 km of the planned 500 km have been set up so far. The small coverage also reduces the overall usefulness of the network, as many of the lanes do not connect with each other (see Metcalf's Law).
Two major off-road paved trails along the Don and Humber river valleys provide a backbone for transport on the east and west side of the downtown area. However, both trails are non-continuous and quite narrow in areas, making them unsuitable as major transport routes. The two trails are ostensibly connected together via a lakeshore route, but due to a massive build-out of this area during the 1990s, the "trail" through much of the downtown area exists in name only.
Nevertheless, Toronto has an extensive bicycle culture, and most areas of the city are reasonably bicycle-friendly. The municipal government encourages bicycle use through its Toronto Bike Plan. Community groups sponsor activities such as a Yellow bicycle program. Some TTC buses have bicycle racks attached to their fronts. Bicycles are allowed on the subway outside of the morning and evening rush hours.
An extensive City of Toronto Bicycle Map is available from the City of Toronto free of charge as well as from their website.
[edit] Ferries
Passenger ferry service to the Toronto Islands is provided by the city's Parks, Forestry and Recreation division. Ferries run year-round from the Toronto Ferry Docks at the foot of Bay Street to Hanlan's Point, Centre Island, and Ward's Island. A very short ferry run is provided by the Toronto Port Authority from the foot of Bathurst street to the Toronto City Centre Airport. The port authority announced in February of 2006 that it would expand this service as part of a deal to expand flights out of the airport [2]
A high-speed passenger/vehicle ferry service across Lake Ontario to Rochester, New York was launched on June 17, 2004, using the vessel Spirit of Ontario I under the marketing term "The Breeze". After experiencing a financing-caused service interruption, it returned to service June 30, 2005, under the ownership of the City of Rochester and operated by Bay Ferries Great Lakes Limited, using the marketing term "The Cat". After an unprofitable summer of operation mostly due to delays, and despite adequate ridership, the newly elected Mayor of Rochester announced on January 10, 2006 that the service would be discontinued and the City would sell the ship, which was eventually purchased by UK-based Euroferries Ltd, for service across the English Channel.
[edit] See also
