Main Street is a
station on
Line 2 Bloor–Danforth
Line 2 Bloor–Danforth is a subway line in the Toronto subway system, operated by the Toronto Transit Commission (TTC). It has 31 stations and is in length. It opened on February 26, 1966, and extensions at both ends were completed in 1968 a ...
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 and is located on the east side of
Main Street a short distance north of
Danforth Avenue
Danforth Avenue (informally also known as the Danforth) and Danforth Road are two historically-related arterial streets in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Danforth ''Avenue'' is an east-west street that begins in Old Toronto at the Prince Edward ...
. Connections to
GO Transit
GO Transit is a regional public transit system serving the Greater Golden Horseshoe region of Ontario, Canada. With its hub at Union Station in Toronto, GO Transit's green-and-white trains and buses serve a population of more than seven millio ...
's commuter train service on the
Lakeshore East line
Lakeshore East is one of the seven commuter rail lines of GO Transit in the Greater Toronto Area, Ontario, Canada. It extends from Union Station in Toronto to in Durham Region. Buses from Oshawa connect to communities further east in Newcastle, B ...
can be made at
Danforth GO Station
Danforth GO Station is a railway station on GO Transit's Lakeshore East line in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The station is situated in the east end of Old Toronto, south west of the intersection of Main Street and Danforth Avenue. The station is a ...
, approximately 300 metres to the south on the east side of Main Street. Wi-Fi service is available at this station.
Description
The TTC station is roughly rectangular in shape and has 3 levels: street level, concourse level and platform level. The bus bays, streetcar platform and fare gates are located at street level. There are 5 bus bays on the north and east sides of the station building. The south side of the building is occupied by a single, long streetcar platform on the inside of a clockwise streetcar loop encircling the building that serves as the eastern terminus of the
506 Carlton
506 Carlton (306 Carlton during overnight periods) 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 Str ...
streetcar (306 Carlton at night).The bus bays and streetcar platform are behind the fare gates inside the fare-paid area. A set of 2 opposing stairwells lead down to the concourse level, where a single up-only escalator leads back to street level. The concourse level is home to a Gateway Newsstand. From the concourse, 2 more sets of opposing stairwells on the north and south sides of the concourse level lead down to the platforms, with up-only escalators connecting both platforms to the concourse.
This station became wheelchair accessible in 2004. One elevator near the southeast corner of the station building provides access from street level to the concourse level of the eastbound subway platform; a second elevator in the northwest corner provides a connection between the concourse level and the westbound subway platform. To facilitate accessibility, automatic sliding doors were added at the street entrance and on the north side of the station building to access the bus bays, along with an accessible fare gate and improved signage. A space is reserved for
Wheel-Trans
Wheel-Trans is a paratransit system in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, provided by the Toronto Transit Commission (TTC). It provides specialized door-to-door accessible transit services for persons with physical disabilities using its fleet of accessibl ...
vehicles.
History
![Main Street TTC platform eastbound](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/91/Main_Street_TTC_platform_eastbound.jpg)
Main Street station opened on May 10, 1968, as part of the first round of extensions to Line 2, which had opened 2 years earlier between Keele and Woodbine. Line 2 opened between Warden and Islington in 1968, with 1-stop extensions to Kennedy and Kipling opening in 1980.
Main Street station was built on the site of the former Main streetcar loop that opened on May 15, 1955, as the eastern terminus of the Carlton streetcar line (today route
506 Carlton
506 Carlton (306 Carlton during overnight periods) 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 Str ...
). Main Loop was built to relieve congestion at
Luttrell Loop
The Toronto Transit Commission's Luttrell Loop was the eastern terminus of the Bloor streetcar line. The loop was closed in 1968 after completion of an extension of the Bloor–Danforth subway line.
In 1913, the Toronto Civic Railways, owned b ...
, which had been the previous terminus of the Carlton streetcar since 1923. Between April 25 and June 13, 1966, the 1955 loop was closed to build a new streetcar loop for Main Street subway station. During construction, Carlton streetcars temporarily returned to Luttrell Loop. Carlton streetcars started using the new station loop in 1966, before the subway platforms at the station were open to the public in 1968.
Unlike most TTC stations, its name includes the word "Street" in order to avoid the possible misreading that it is the subway's "main" station. It is named after Main Street, which was the main street of the suburban town of
East Toronto
East Toronto was an incorporated community, currently part of Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It covered much of the present day neighbourhood of the Upper Beaches, stretching up to Danforth Avenue in the north, part of it stretching to Lake Ontario in ...
, which was amalgamated into Toronto in 1908.
The station was initially built with its turnstiles and collector booths on the concourse level between the bus and streetcar terminal and the subway platforms, because until 1973, some of the buses serving the station crossed the fare zone boundary between Toronto and the then-city of Scarborough. When the fare zone system was abolished in 1973, the fare gates were moved upstairs to street level, to bring the bus bays and streetcar platform into the fare-paid area. Because of this, Main Street station has a larger concourse compared to many other subway stations on Line 2, particularly those directly to the east which were built as part of the original section of Line 2 opened in 1966.
Main–Danforth has been identified by
Metrolinx
Metrolinx is a Crown agency of the Government of Ontario that manages and integrates road and public transport in the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area (GTHA), which comprises much of Ontario's Golden Horseshoe region. Headquartered at Union Sta ...
as a transportation
mobility hub as it is located at the interchange of two or more current or planned regional rapid transit lines. As a result, Main Street was the first subway station to be outfitted with new accessible paddle-style Presto fare gates, which replaced the existing tripod turnstiles system-wide and are used with
Presto card
The Presto card (stylized as PRESTO) is a contactless smart card automated fare collection system used on participating public transit systems in the province of Ontario, Canada, specifically in Greater Toronto, Hamilton, and Ottawa. Presto car ...
s
across the subway system.
Danforth GO Station
Danforth GO Station is a railway station on GO Transit's Lakeshore East line in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The station is situated in the east end of Old Toronto, south west of the intersection of Main Street and Danforth Avenue. The station is a ...
is a station on the
Lakeshore East Line
Lakeshore East is one of the seven commuter rail lines of GO Transit in the Greater Toronto Area, Ontario, Canada. It extends from Union Station in Toronto to in Durham Region. Buses from Oshawa connect to communities further east in Newcastle, B ...
, located approximately south of the station along Main Street. The station has also sporadically served trains on the
Stouffville Line
The Stouffville line is one of the seven train lines of the GO Transit system in the Greater Toronto Area, Ontario, Canada. Its southern terminus is Union Station in Toronto, and its northern terminus is (formerly "Lincolnville") in Whitchurch ...
. The 2 stations are within walking distance of each other and an accessible ramp exists at Danforth GO, but the path follows Main Street on the sidewalk for most of its distance and is exposed to the elements.
Subway infrastructure in the vicinity
East of the station the tracks angle north away from Danforth Avenue and emerge to run on the surface at the ''Tyra Portal'' in Dentonia Park, just west of Victoria Park station. To the west the subway tunnel was mostly constructed by
cut-and-cover
A tunnel is an underground passageway, dug through surrounding soil, earth or rock, and enclosed except for the entrance and exit, commonly at each end. A pipeline is not a tunnel, though some recent tunnels have used immersed tube constr ...
along Harris Avenue from Woodbine station.
Surface connections
TTC routes serving the station include:
References
External links
*
{{TTC lines and stations
Line 2 Bloor–Danforth stations
Toronto streetcar loops
Railway stations in Canada opened in 1968
Toronto Transit Commission stations located underground