Ashbridges Bay is a bay and park in

Toronto Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the ancho ...

, Ontario, Canada. It is located along

Lake Shore Boulevard Lake Shore Boulevard (often incorrectly compounded as Lakeshore 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 ...

next to

Woodbine Beach Woodbine Beach is the largest of the four beaches in the Beaches in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Located along Lake Shore Boulevard at the foot of Woodbine Avenue, it is next to Ashbridge's Bay and Kew-Balmy Beach. Woodbine beach is the westernmost b ...

the Beaches The Beaches (also known as "The Beach") is a neighbourhood in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is so named because of its four beaches situated on Lake Ontario. It is located east of downtown within the "Old" City of Toronto. The approximate boundar ...

. The

Martin Goodman Trail The Martin Goodman Trail is a R. C. Harris Water Treatment Plant The R. C. Harris Water Treatment Plant in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, is both a crucial piece of infrastructure and an architecturally acclaimed historic building named after the longtime commissioner of Toronto's public works Roland Caldwell Harris ...

in the east along

Lake Ontario Lake Ontario is one of the five Great Lakes of North America. It is bounded on the north, west, and southwest by the Canadian province of Ontario, and on the south and east by the U.S. state of New York. The Canada–United States border sp ...

. It was once part of the marsh that lay east of

Toronto Islands The Toronto Islands are a chain of 15 small islands in Lake Ontario, south of mainland Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Comprising the only group of islands in the western part of Lake Ontario, the Toronto Islands are located just offshore from the ...

and

Toronto Harbour Toronto Harbour or Toronto Bay is a bay on the north shore of Lake Ontario, in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is a natural harbour, protected from Lake Ontario waves by the Toronto Islands. Today, the harbour is used primarily for recreational b ...

History

The bay is named for Sarah Ashbridge, a British loyalist from

Philadelphia Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Sinc ...

whose

family Family (from la, familia) is a Social group, group of people related either by consanguinity (by recognized birth) or Affinity (law), affinity (by marriage or other relationship). The purpose of the family is to maintain the well-being of its ...

once lived nearby on a farm. It was once a five square kilometre marsh on the Don River delta and one of the largest wetlands in

Eastern Canada Eastern Canada (also the Eastern provinces or the East) is generally considered to be the region of Canada south of the Hudson Bay/Strait and east of Manitoba, consisting of the following provinces (from east to west): Newfoundland and Labrador, ...

. A breakwall formed on the western end with an outlet into Toronto Bay. Before the 1900, the bay was used to obtain ice during the winter months and stopped after the bay became polluted to the point the water became unsafe: * Samuel Hill's Ice House at Leslie Street and Eastern Avenue * Graham's Ice House at Lake (now Knox) and Eastern Avenue * Martin McKee's Ice House at foot of Carlaw Avenue at (now infill area near Lake Shore Boulevard) Due to industrial development and sewage disposal into the marsh, in 1910 a

Toronto Board of Trade The Toronto Region Board of Trade is the principal local business community organization in the City of Toronto. It is the largest Chamber of Commerce/board of trade in Canada and one of the largest in North America. Its primary contemporary focu ...

proposal for Ashbridges Bay was for an industrial district for industrial offices and sites served by railway lines, public warehouses alongside docking facilities south of

Keating Channel The Keating Channel is a long waterway in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It connects the Don River to inner Toronto Harbour (Toronto Bay) on Lake Ontario. The channel is named after Edward Henry Keating (1844-1912), a city engineer (1892-1898) who pr ...

to the Eastern Gap and a parkland/recreational strip at the south end. In 1912, the

Toronto Harbour Commission The Toronto Harbour Commission (THC) was a joint federal-municipal government agency based in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The agency managed Toronto Harbour as well as being responsible for major works along the Toronto waterfront. It built both ...

drained it and

reclaimed Land reclamation, usually known as reclamation, and also known as land fill (not to be confused with a waste landfill), is the process of creating new Terrestrial ecoregion, land from oceans, list of seas, seas, Stream bed, riverbeds or lak ...

the land. The Ashbridges Bay Reclamation Scheme was the largest engineering project in North America at that time, filling in an area from Cherry Street to

Leslie Street Leslie may refer to: * Leslie (name), a name and list of people with the given name or surname, including fictional characters Families * Clan Leslie, a Scottish clan with the motto "grip fast" * Leslie (Russian nobility), a Russian noble famil ...

to create the Port Lands Industrial District and building the

Ashbridges Bay Wastewater Treatment Plant The Ashbridges Bay Wastewater Treatment Plant is the city of Toronto's main sewage treatment facility, and the second largest such plant in Canada after Montreal's Jean-R. Marcotte facility. One of four plants that service the city of Toronto, it t ...

. When it was completed in the 1920s, only a fragment of the original Ashbridges Bay remained, and the mouth of the

Don River The Don ( rus, Дон, p=don) is the fifth-longest river in Europe. Flowing from Central Russia to the Sea of Azov in Southern Russia, it is one of Russia's largest rivers and played an important role for traders from the Byzantine Empire. Its ...

had been dramatically altered, instead flowing through the

. The bay's size was shrunk to the area between the

Port Lands The Port Lands (also known as Portlands) of Toronto, Ontario, Canada are an industrial and recreational neighbourhood located about 5 kilometres south-east of downtown, located on the former Don River delta and most of Ashbridge's Bay. Approxi ...

and

. Ashbridges Bay Park opened in 1977. In the early 2000s the park was improved by

Waterfront Toronto Waterfront Toronto (incorporated as the Toronto Waterfront Revitalization Corporation) is an organization that oversees revitalization projects along the Toronto waterfront. Established in 2001 as a public–public partnership between the City ...

, including the building of a

skateboard park A skatepark, or skate park, is a purpose-built recreational environment made for skateboarding, BMX, Freestyle scootering, scootering, wheelchairs, and aggressive inline skating. A skatepark may contain half-pipes, handrails, funboxes, vert r ...

. The current bay is surrounded by marinas, the treatment plant and a small tree lined section along Lake Shore Boulevard East such that the original natural shoreline has disappeared completely. Ashbridges Bay is also a popular location for fireworks on

Canada Day Canada Day (french: Fête du Canada), formerly known as Dominion Day (french: Fête du Dominion), is the national day of Canada. A federal statutory holiday, it celebrates the anniversary of Canadian Confederation which occurred on July 1, 18 ...

and

Victoria Day Victoria Day (french: Fête de la Reine, lit=Celebration of the Queen) is a federal Canadian public holiday celebrated on the last Monday preceding May 25. Initially in honour of Queen Victoria's birthday, it has since been celebrated as the offi ...

References

{{Parks and squares in Toronto Parks in Toronto Bays of Ontario Redeveloped ports and waterfronts in Toronto