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 ...

’s first Union Station was a passenger rail station located west of York Street at Station Street, south of Front Street in downtown Toronto. It was built by the

Grand Trunk Railway The Grand Trunk Railway (; french: Grand Tronc) was a railway system that operated in the Canadian provinces of Quebec and Ontario and in the American states of Connecticut, Maine, Michigan, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Vermont. The rai ...

(GTR) and opened in 1858. Toronto-union-station-1867

History

Railways arrived in Toronto in 1853, when the first passenger train left Toronto from a wooden depot located near Bay and Front Streets. This was the line of the Ontario, Simcoe & Huron Railway. This was followed in 1855 by Great Western Railways (GWR), which connected Toronto to the west along the waterfront, from a station at the Queen's Wharf. The Grand Trunk Railway completed its Montreal–Toronto mainline one year later. The three railways now converged at the Toronto waterfront, a narrow strip of land south of Front Street. They were forced to share the limited real estate available. As a consequence, the Grand Trunk Railway (GTR) built the first

union station A union station (also known as a union terminal, a joint station in Europe, and a joint-use station in Japan) is a railway station at which the tracks and facilities are shared by two or more separate railway companies, allowing passengers to ...

in Toronto in 1858 at a location just west of the present Union Station train shed. The location was landfill, south-west of Front and York Streets, then the intersection of York Street and The Esplanade along the water. The station consisted of three wooden structures and was initially shared with the Northern Railway of Canada (as the Ontario, Simcoe & Huron was renamed) and the Great Western Railway, although both railways had already built their own stations along the

Toronto waterfront The Toronto waterfront is the lakeshore of Lake Ontario in the city of Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It spans 46 kilometres between the mouth of Etobicoke Creek in the west and the Rouge River in the east. History Lake Ontario is a recent lake. A ...

. It was Canada's first union station. It opened on June 21, 1858, known simply as the "New Station". Three GTR trains departed daily to the east (to Montreal and Kingston) and two to the west (through Guelph, Berlin and Stratford). In 1864, delegates from the

Charlottetown Charlottetown is the capital and largest city of the Canadian province of Prince Edward Island, and the county seat of Queens County. Named after Queen Charlotte, Charlottetown was an unincorporated town until it was incorporated as a city in ...

and Quebec City conferences on the

Canadian Confederation Canadian Confederation (french: Confédération canadienne, link=no) was the process by which three British North American provinces, the Province of Canada, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick, were united into one federation called the Canada, Dom ...

were welcomed at this station by a huge crowd which then escorted the delegates to the Queen's Hotel on Front Street. In 1866, the Great Western opened its own station at Yonge Street. It was the first station in Toronto to provide a covered train shed. In 1867, the Northern opened its City Hall station at Jarvis Street. By the 1870s, the 1858 station was inadequate. The station was demolished in 1871 and a temporary station was used while the Grand Trunk built a much larger, second Union Station at the same location, opening in 1873. The other railways continued to use their own stations but stopped at the Union Station as a courtesy to passengers. The location of the railway station is now buried under the -high railway viaduct on the western approach to the current Union Station.

References

* {{coord, 43, 38, 41, N, 79, 23, 1, W, display=title, type:railwaystation_region:CA Union Station (1858) Railway stations closed in 1871 1858 establishments in Canada Union stations in Canada