West Hill is a neighbourhood 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 anch ...

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, Canada. It is located in the eastern end of the city, in the suburb of Scarborough. It is roughly bounded by Scarborough Golf Club Road and a branch of Highland Creek on the west, the CNR railway tracks and

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on the south, and Highland Creek on the north-east. The name comes from its elevated position on the west side of Highland Creek, a deep

glacial A glacial period (alternatively glacial or glaciation) is an interval of time (thousands of years) within an ice age that is marked by colder temperatures and glacier advances. Interglacials, on the other hand, are periods of warmer climate betwe ...

ravine A ravine is a landform that is narrower than a canyon and is often the product of streambank erosion. In the mid 19th century, what is now West Hill was part of the larger Highland Creek community, which extended from today's Galloway Rd over to the Pickering border. In 1862, Eli Shackleton took over as postmaster in Highland Creek and moved the post office from the east side of the Highland Creek valley to the west. Following Shackleton's tenure as postmaster, the post office was relocated back to the east side of the valley. In 1879, John Richardson opened a new post office on the west side of the valley officially known as "West Hill".Schofield, Richard, "Post offices sparked early rivalry", The Toronto Star (Scarborough Edition), October 6, 1980 From 1906 until the closing of the line in 1936, West Hill was the eastern terminus of the Toronto and Scarborough Electric Railway, a street-car line. West Hill Public School is one of the oldest in Toronto, a school having been built on the present site in the 1880s, although the original building was replaced by a modern facility in 1994.

West Hill Collegiate Institute West Hill Collegiate Institute (also called West Hill CI, WHCI or West Hill) is a public high school in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, located in eastern Scarborough in the neighbourhood of West Hill. It is under the jurisdiction of the Toronto Distri ...

is also an older high school in Scarborough, having been opened in 1955. Until after World War II, West Hill was largely rural, although the stretch of Kingston Road (including what is now Old Kingston Road) running through it had some commercial development, some even dating back to the late 19th century. The neighbourhood's oldest remaining buildings tend to be along this stretch. In the 1950s the neighbourhood was still difficult to reach by road, except for access to the south-west towards the city because even at this point Kingston Road was a four-lane highway. However, access to the direct east and west had to navigate Highland Creek and required a steep descent and ascent. There was no access across the creek across Morningside. However, the main bus commuter bus route from downtown Toronto to Oshawa ran directly along Kingston Road as well. As such, early development in the neighbourhood clustered around Kingston Road starting in the 1950s. The first subdivisions stretched along the straight north–south roads running off Kingston Road, primarily those existing road allowances which were close together and allowed for back-to-back lots with minimum frontage and depth. Larger plots of land that were developed in the late 1950s through the 1970s tended to be laid out with curved roads, short connecting roads and dead end streets that made for quieter neighbourhoods but resulted in irregular lot sizes.

Development (1960–present)

Before the completion of Highway 401 in the 1960s, West Hill was one of the major shopping areas in the region. In the 1950s, it served communities as far away as Oshawa. However, as development spread east and north along the new highway, major commercial developments became less viable. A major regional shopping centre, Morningside Mall, built in the late 1970s, was left without a major tenant when

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, and Shoppers Drug Mart abandoned the mall. Morningside Mall was completely demolished as of late 2007, and has been replaced by Morningside Crossing, a plaza. Another change occasioned by the building of Highway 401 was a drop in business for the large number of

motel A motel, also known as a motor hotel, motor inn or motor lodge, is a hotel designed for motorists, usually having each room entered directly from the parking area for motor vehicles rather than through a central lobby. Entering dictionarie ...

s lining Kingston Road. Most of the motel sites have been redeveloped as commercial sites, and many of the remaining motels serve as temporary housing for Toronto's homeless. The neighbourhood grew quickly and by the mid-1960s there were several new public schools to serve the new residents, who were generally young families drawn to the lower home prices in the area. The area's K-6 and K-8 public schools, Galloway Road, Eastview, Peter Secor, William G. Miller, and Heron Park, were all built in this period, as was the separate school, St. Martin de Porres. By the 1970s, two technical high schools, Sir Robert Borden and Maplewood, had joined West Hill C.I., as did Joseph Brant, a senior public school that accepted grades 7-8 from three feeder schools. At the times of the earliest developments, sanitary sewer service had not been extended this far east. House lots generally had to be large to accommodate septic tanks. Development was largely limited to single family homes and low rise apartment blocks. Guildwood GO Station main tracks

Road and traffic access to the neighbourhood quickly improved. During the 1960s, new bridges were built spanning the deep sections of Highland Creek on Lawrence, Morningside and Kingston. This allowed direct access to the new Highway 401 to the east and west. The introduction of the GO Train at

Guildwood Station Guildwood GO Station is a GO Transit train station in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is located on Kingston Road in the Guildwood neighbourhood of the district of Scarborough. The station is situated on the CN Kingston Subdivision. It is a stop ...

allowed direct commuter connections into the city. The completion of the Bloor-Danforth subway line to

Warden Station Warden is a station on the Bloor–Danforth line in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is located at the southeast corner of St. Clair Avenue East and Warden Avenue. The station is located perpendicular to St. Clair Avenue, and is the only Line 2 st ...

allowed more frequent TTC bus service into the neighbourhood. Service improved again when the subway was extended to

Kennedy Station Kennedy is both a terminal and interchange station on Line 2 Bloor–Danforth and Line 3 Scarborough of the Toronto subway system. Opened in 1980, it is located east of the Kennedy Road and Eglinton Avenue intersection. With the adjacent Ken ...

Commercial development centered around the triangle where Kingston, Lawrence and Morningside met, and spread out along Kingston Road and parts of Morningside Avenue. In the south-eastern part of the neighbourhood, there was industrial development along Coronation Drive, mostly catering to the chemical industry. City services continued to improve and in the 1970s high rise apartment buildings were introduced. Most homes in the neighbourhood were upgraded to have both storm and sanitary sewers. This allowed redevelopment of many larger lots to allow more homes in existing space. By the late 1970s, almost all the land in the neighbourhood had been developed. Development peaked in the late 1970s with the building of Morningside Mall, an enclosed mall built on the site of a strip plaza, anchored by Woolco and Dominion. Kingston and Morningside Apartments West Hill Scarborough

Kingston and Morningside Apartments West Hill Scarborough

However, although the development of the neighbourhood continued into the 1980s, its character started to change as many of the original residents started to age and residential patterns in Scarborough started to change. Commercial development in the Morningside and Malvern neighbourhoods improved, and residents who used to come to West Hill to shop now no longer had to do so. It was clear that Toronto was overbuilt with shopping centers and Morningside Mall started only to draw from the immediate neighbourhood as larger nearby malls such as

Cedarbrae Mall Cedarbrae Mall is a shopping mall 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 popul ...

and

Scarborough Town Centre Scarborough Town Centre (STC) is a shopping mall in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Central to the Scarborough City Centre in the former city of Scarborough, it is adjacent to Scarborough Centre station, the Scarborough Centre Bus Terminal and the C ...

had better road access. As such, recent re-development in the neighbourhood has been centred along the commercial areas surrounding Kingston Road. Disused commercial properties are often redeveloped as high density residential townhouses. Home prices in the neighbourhood generally remain below average for the City of Toronto as a whole despite the average size of homes (predominately two-bedroom bungalows) and larger lot sizes. In addition, the neighbourhood's population is slowly shrinking as the resident per home average continues to drop. Newcomers to the neighbourhood tend to be younger families looking for inexpensive housing in the city with convenient commuting connections.

Education

Three

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school board A board of education, school committee or school board is the board of directors or board of trustees of a school, local school district or an equivalent institution. The elected council determines the educational policy in a small regional are ...

s operate in West Hill, the

Conseil scolaire Viamonde The Conseil scolaire Viamonde (CSV) is a public-secular French first language school board, and manages elementary and secondary schools in the Ontario Peninsula and the Greater Golden Horseshoe. The school board operates 41 elementary schools an ...

(CSV), the

Toronto Catholic District School Board The Toronto Catholic District School Board (TCDSB, known as English-language Separate District School Board No. 40 prior to 1999) is an English-language public-separate school board for Toronto, Ontario, Canada, headquartered in North York. I ...

(TCDSB), and the

Toronto District School Board The Toronto District School Board (TDSB), formerly known as English-language Public District School Board No. 12 prior to 1999, is the English-language public-secular school board for Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The minority public-secular franc ...

(TDSB). TCDSB are separate public school boards, whereas CSV, and TDSB are

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public school boards, with the former being French

first language A first language, native tongue, native language, mother tongue or L1 is the first language or dialect that a person has been exposed to from birth or within the critical period. In some countries, the term ''native language'' or ''mother tongu ...

school board, and the latter being English first language school board. TDSB operates two active secondary school in the neighbourhood,

. It was constructed in 1954 and opened to 376 students on September 6, 1955. Schools in West Hill that are operated by public school boards include: *Académie Alexandre-Dumas (CSV) *Eastview Public School *Galloway Public School *Jack Miner Senior Public School *Poplar Road Junior Public school *St. Malachy Catholic School *St. Martin de Porres Catholic School *William G. Miller Public School (TDSB) *Joseph Brant Public School was opened in 1969 as a

senior school A secondary school describes an institution that provides secondary education and also usually includes the building where this takes place. Some secondary schools provide both '' lower secondary education'' (ages 11 to 14) and ''upper seconda ...

named after Joseph Brant the Mohawk leader. Since 2012, the school operates from Junior Kindergarten to Grade 8 after the closure of two feeder schools: the adjacent Heron Park Junior Public School and Peter Secor Junior Public School. * Maplewood High School is a junior vocational secondary school opened in 1967 modeled after Tabor Park Vocational School. It is a specialized school providing students with special needs. *

Sir Robert L. Borden Business and Technical Institute Sir Robert L. Borden Business and Technical Institute is a dormant high school facility Toronto, Ontario, Canada that formerly served as a Vocational school, technical public high school. Located in the former suburb of located in the Scarborough ...

was built in 1965 and opened in 1966. This school, like Bendale, offered many business-oriented and technical courses in addition to academic programs. After the school closed in 2016, the TDSB retained ownership of the building pending its sale.

Recreation

West Hill is bordered on three sides by the Highland Creek, the community is surrounded by a system of parks. Morningside Park, and Colonel Danforth Park are located along the creek, while East Point Park is located along Lake Ontario at the eastern end of the

Scarborough Bluffs The Scarborough Bluffs, also known as The Bluffs, is an escarpment in the Scarborough district of Toronto, Ontario, Canada. There are nine parks along the bluffs, with Bluffers Park being the only one with a beach. Forming much of the eastern ...

. Parks in West Hill are managed by the

Toronto Parks, Forestry and Recreation Division Toronto Parks, Forestry & Recreation (PFR) is the division of Toronto's municipal government responsible for maintaining the municipal park system and natural spaces, regulation of and provision of urban forestry services, and the delivery of rec ...

. The area has numerous sports facilities, including an indoor arena and a baseball diamond at Heron Park, and two swimming pools, one of which is indoor. There are tennis facilities at nearby University of Toronto Scarborough Campus. Other public amenities includes the Morningside branch of the

Toronto Public Library Toronto Public Library (TPL) (french: Bibliothèque publique de Toronto) is a public library system in Toronto, Ontario. It is the largest public library system in Canada, and in 2008 had averaged a higher circulation per capita than any other pub ...

, built further east of the former site at Morningside Mall, roughly at the geographical centre of the neighbourhood, on Lawrence Avenue, just west of Manse Road. West Hill has a good mix of commercial establishments far more typical of an older neighbourhood than a new suburb. Fast food establishments do not dominate and there are many sit-down restaurants featuring a variety of cuisines including, Canadian Chinese, Caribbean and Middle Eastern, echoing the ethnic diversity of the neighbourhood. There are two supermarkets and numerous smaller food outlets. The area is well served by physicians, dentists and lawyers and features three pharmacies, including both major chains.

Transportation

The main routes through West Hill are Kingston Road (part of the former Highway 2),

Morningside Avenue Morningside Avenue is a suburban arterial road in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is entirely within Scarborough, running north by north-west from the Scarborough Bluffs overlooking Lake Ontario to the eastern terminus of McNicoll Avenue near the ...

and Lawrence Avenue East. The

Toronto Transit Commission The Toronto Transit Commission (TTC) is the public transport agency that operates bus, subway, streetcar, and paratransit services in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, some of which run into the Peel Region and York Region. It is the oldest and larges ...

's (TTC) bus service provides

public transportation Public transport (also known as public transportation, public transit, mass transit, or simply transit) is a system of transport for passengers by group travel systems available for use by the general public unlike private transport, typical ...

through the neighbourhood, operating on all the major streets in the area, allowing access to TTC's Line 2 Bloor-Danforth subway at

Kennedy station Kennedy is both a terminal and interchange station on Line 2 Bloor–Danforth and Line 3 Scarborough of the Toronto subway system. Opened in 1980, it is located east of the Kennedy Road and Eglinton Avenue intersection. With the adjacent Ken ...

and the

Line 3 Scarborough Line 3 Scarborough (originally known as the Scarborough RT or SRT) is a light rapid transit line that is part of the Toronto subway system in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The line runs entirely within the suburban district of Scarborough, encompas ...

at Lawrence East station. Located along the boundary of Guildwood and West Hill is Guildwood GO Station. The station provides access to GO Transit's commuter

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and bus services, as well as

Via Rail Via Rail Canada Inc. (), operating as Via Rail or Via, is a Canadian Crown corporation that is mandated to operate intercity passenger rail service in Canada. It receives an annual subsidy from Transport Canada to offset the cost of operating ...

's intercity rail routes.

References

External links

City of Toronto - West Hill Neighbourhood Profile
{{authority control Black Canadian culture in Toronto Black Canadian settlements Neighbourhoods in Toronto Scarborough, Toronto