Toronto's Ontario Line! Future Subway Route Ebike Ride

The Ontario Line is a new subway project in Toronto that Metrolinx broke ground on in March of 2022. For this ebike ride I start at the future Science Centre Station in East York and make my way down to the Exhibition Station riding past each of the future stations on the line along the way.
0:01 - Science Centre Station
3:20 - Flemingdon Park Station
9:50 - Thorncliffe Park Station
17:45 - Cosburn Station
23:00 - Pape Station
29:10 - Gerrard Station
34:00 - Riverside/Leslieville Station
38:51 - East Harbour Station
46:15 - Corktown Station
50:00 - Moss Park Station
53:13 - Queen Station
56:15 - Osgoode Station
59:45 - Queen/Spadina Station
1:04:50- King/Bathurst Station
1:12:00 - Exhibition (Ontario Place)
Recorded in 4K at 60 FPS with a DJI Pocket 2 on Monday, April 4, 2022.
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[@PlanetLinuxChannel]

Metrolinx really seems to be changing the game when it comes to transit development. We finally seem to be (mostly) getting past neighbourhoods / municipalities never forming a plan or getting it off the ground. It’s not always perfect, but it seems like Metrolinx has the experts to plan good projects, they gat provincial approval / funding, then they build it. Nice to see more and more transit around the GTA getting built.

[@lemonade4181]

They’re planning to build some offices at east harbour, and it’ll be close to the portlands area.

[@gabygaedecke2411]

Okay, this was VERY informative, Johny - thanks so much for your research prepwork (i.e. the renderings) integrated with the ride - most helpful! You mentioned the mess created by the Eglinton Crosstown: it might be instructional to combine an ebike ride in the western end of the Eglinton Crosstown with a walking tour of the Eglinton-Yonge neighbourhood with its horrible transformation for that project.

[@moho472]

Hello Johnny, thanks to your videos, I ditched my car for my new ebike in Toronto. Thanks for the inspiration!

[@JohnnyStrides]

Awesome!

[@FranHutchison]

Thanks for taking us along on the Ride Johnny. Great Ride and you have a cool bike. Wish Toronto had more Bike Lanes like Sherbourne.

[@alexjohnson8209]

Thank you johnny for showing us the length an where the stations going to be of the Ontario line love this video👍.

[@JohnnyStrides]

No problem 👍

[@leonardjoseph3268]

Congratulations for all the info in such a large amount of space. Leonard 👍

[@jimmytraveller2970]

Thankyou Johnny for a Great Production showing Us the Route & the Architects Renderings . It will be another Decade of Disruption , I can see it ending as an LRT like the Eglington Line if not Blocked by future MP's . Toronto needs a Mass Subway Network as population & traffic in creases .

[@n.b.3521]

Such a great idea for a video and so informative! Thank you for matching up the locations to the concept drawings!

[@transittown7891]

Wooo 🥳 that Ontario line will be so wonderful. I think Carlaw and Gerard will be a new station on the Ontario Line called Gerard station

[@franklynmars3207]

👋 Helloo Johnny Strides...woww it's been an awful wile as u kow my crazie workaholic schedule lol! soo good to catch you again as usual and I hope your weeknd going quite goldenexciting awesume. This was definitely a very informative livestream u shared of the Ontario future subway line and was quite contended and pleased that Metrolinx for sure is trying their best to rapidly get it done wich should take about 10 yrs or less wich wouldn't be easy and will bring lots of traffic delays, more scaffolding and detours along that routes to intersections but hey at least it's worth it, shoulda done that decades ago! oooh I love that future Corktown stn rendition and Liberty village 1 too...anyways thanks 😊 a bunch

[@T.O.basics]

East Harbour will in fact the busiest station. Also will have a Smart GO station and a Briadview sreetcar car station

[@FBG_Cory]

i came to comment just because you went live to read them so everyone watching hit that like Butten!!

[@kallelepik373]

We love your video's,and the nerative. You have and extensive vocabulary and you use it well! So nice to see my home town showcased for all. Toronto is a great city, and Canada is a great country. Thanks Johnny! 🎼🇨🇦

[@JohnnyStrides]

Glad you enjoyed the video!

[@C-mac_in_the_6ix]

Alright Johnny, put it in your calendar right now. April 2030 you'll do this exact route and we can do a comparison.

[@canman5060]

Finally after 25 years another new subway line.

[@goldenretriever6261]

I grew up in the 70s in that building at 3:14, long before the demographic change.. Don Mills was only a 4 lane road back then.

[@oquefizhoje]

Pedal assist is the great innovation for bicycles. The mid drive motors can give you the torque that you need for longest uphill bike tracks. I do have a mountain ebike that i run for leisure. I have 400m hills topography that are very hard to come by without a motor pedal assist. I prefer the mid drive systems over the rear wheel assist, cause mid drive are very precise motors and do not have throttle, ie, you have to pedal if you want that ebike moves forward. Hugs.

[@demonmucker4734]

The crossing at Pape ave was closed to traffic in 79 due to many people getting hit by trains. It use to have 4 sets of tracks back in the day. I grew up on Riverdale ave at Pape and seen a few people getting taken away. sad times.

[@iranchoori]

Thank you very much. Have nice day. 😊

[@T.O.basics]

West bound stree cars will turn south on Church then west on Richmond then north on York. East bound will turn south on York, east on Adelaide then north in Church

[@Dharamdevsinh]

And peaceful roads...❤️❤️❤️

[@scotiawillow]

Very informative! Thank you!

[@JohnnyStrides]

Glad it was helpful!

[@gregderise9969]

I lived in Toronto in the mid 70s riding the original street cars and some of the Gloucester trains on the Yonge Street line, Line 1 now. I haven’t been back in 45 years and I still miss Toronto sometimes. I’m glad to see all the transit projects happening. I rode every mode every day. I wonder what is going to be needed on Line 1 because the population is growing faster than capacity. The only solution I see for that line, which would be horrendous to do, is to lengthen trains which means excavation to lengthen every subway station. Alternatively, more north south subway parallel a short distance over. OR put a cap on downtown development like the moratorium of the early mid 70s and focus on a new area o of development. A future generation is going to have to deal with it and thinking should probably start as the Ontario Line is being completed. The upgrades announced for GO Transit are going to be crucial to move people faster from farther out. It looks like catching up will take a massive continuous capital investment. Toronto was so smart to keep street car lines going. Even though it’s got a very good transit system expanding rapidly toward a really great one, the growth of population means incredible expenditure will have to be continuous or the situation on Line 1 will never get comfortable like when I was there. I lived in Leaside briefly, Yonge and Lawrence for awhile, and Browning Ave just across the Don Valley above Bloor. Trains at Eglinton were never overcrowded. Only all the way downtown during rush hour did I have to wait for a second train, briefly, sometimes. It never was a bother because while I could see the taillights of the reason I couldn’t get I I turned and saw the headlights of the train approaching I was going to be able to board. No worry back then. Metro Toronto was 2.1 million people. The subway was totally adequate. The Spadina Line was under construction. The Eaton Center was a plastic model. Things were different. Not nearly the forest of office towers as now. I was there when the first ever subway crime on a train happened. The culprit got tackled by passengers. I was there when the last train at night was lit on fire by a pyromaniac and partially melted, closing down a stretch of Line 2 while station repairs were made and lots of buses covered the gap between stations. I see there’s so much more security features what happened then, a mostly empty train traveling through the tunnel becoming a blow torch, would not happen today. Thankfully the TTC responded. Back to the Ontario Line. I’m fascinated with that project, where it’s running and can be extended from after it’s open, and the technology of the trains allowing a lot of capacity by automation. I hope that the Ontario Line is extended as soon as it opens because Toronto will need it. The Crosstown LRT has been fascinations me too. There was talk of light rail along Eglinton four and a half decades ago. Not actual proposal but certainly discussion. I didn’t know what that meant then. It is so needed. I hope it’s enough for a long time to come because there will be demands put on it by the end of the decade when the Ontario Line is operating, if not before because of planned development. It will get a lot of use. If it were up to me the Ontario Line would keep getting extended until maybe it looped around and met itself in a big circle. There’s a lot of great expansion projects happening but really, they all need to have been completed yesterday. Electrifying GO lines and ramping up to 15 min service all day long may have the most impact the soonest.

[@lvalledor3440]

For a second there I thought you were actually gonna go along the GO Transit Corridor since parts of the Ontario Line will also run alongside the GO Transit Corridor similar to Line 2 from Kipling Station to the Bloor St. Bridge & Portal

[@Dharamdevsinh]

Very nice atmosphere 👍

[@Nouvellecosse]

I noticed you were planning on doing a comments stream so i figured I better hurry up and get a comment in if I'm going to have any chance of being featured!

[@C-mac_in_the_6ix]

@ the 29:40 mark, that's the nicest station on the new line IMO.

[@patrick97764]

35:50 why would it be the least busy ? as the station is being built the whole area going to be redeveloped and there will also be connections to streetcars and GO.

[@jayvonnoelsmith8445]

Hello Johnny you look nice videos how about Ontario line and Eglinton Crosstown

[@GregBoswell428]

I really enjoy your videos. I have a Pocket 2 camera, likewise. Do you use the MAX AUTO ISO settings? If so, what do you set it on?

[@JohnnyStrides]

Pretty much everything is on auto (too many varying conditions when I record). Cheers

[@GregBoswell428]

@@JohnnyStrides Thank you

[@driveincanada9713]

🌹🌹🌹

[@Christina24life]

Johnny will you pretty please go to Rogers Centre for the Blue Jays opening day? This Friday

[@JohnnyStrides]

I'm planning on going AROUND it but not in.. also it's the SkyDome ;)

[@meltingtomato]

A few notes: 1. Part of the issue people have with the sound barriers is the Ministry of the Environment standard is 60dBA. The noise along parts of the rail corridor is already above 60dBA (due to outside factors), so Metrolinx is putting up barriers to basically not exceed it where it is below that threshold, whilst residents in Riverside are worried about the increase in frequency of noise (because of substantially more trains) as well as how that noise will project upwards (with more condos going into former single story houses). 2. East Harbour is actually planned to be one of the busiest stations on the line (very similar design to Exhibition - 4 GO tracks + 2 OL tracks). There's a massive amount of development planned for the area (practically a second downtown east of the current core). The streetcar tracks along Queens Quay/Cherry, Broadview, and Leslie/Commissioners are all planned to be extended to the area. The whole Portlands area is planned to be developed as the mouth of the Don River returns to a more natural state (rather than concrete). 3. Metrolinx is paying to rebuild the tracks along both Richmond and Adelaide from (IIRC) Victoria to York (might be further than that though). The Queen streetcar will run along that stretch for ~4 years, then run normally west of York. Overall, while Metrolinx has done some poor communication (arguably deliberately) with the community in Thorncliffe Park and Riverside, there's a lot to like about the project, and I'm glad to see it getting built. Great video!

[@JohnnyStrides]

Great points! Thanks for sharing (I learned some things). Cheers!

[@SullySyed]

Great video, was fun to preview the line! Any chance you'll do the Eglinton Crosstown route? I'm hoping to cycle it this summer but wonder if it's well marked or even just friendly to bikes right now.

[@JohnnyStrides]

I rode along Eglinton East in a video last year and will be doing the new bikelanes on Eglinton West later this year, cheers!

[@SullySyed]

@@JohnnyStrides I'll go queue that video up now; thanks, this'll be great for all of us looking for new routes to ride!

[@funvideofan1625]

I think “Queen/Spadina” should be “Spadina South” And “King/Bathurst” Should be “King West”

[@AkashSharma-oe9no]

But how to save ourselves from someone shooting at us?

[@WilliamChan]

That's an awesome ebike, but I'd be paranoid that it'd be stolen every time I took it out

[@JohnnyStrides]

I've never left it outside unattended.. and I don't think I would lol

[@allanallan4791]

So sad to see Toronto so dirty and depressing. The 90s in Toronto were the best times.

[@warmflash]

I don't imagine this line will ever be made. Doug Ford will lose the next election and that will be the end of that.

[@filipmisic9936]

Exactly. And when liberals win del duca in charge your can only expect more debt and spending and nothing being built. Glad I’m selling my place and moving out of this city. Will never be world class.

[@warmflash]

@@filipmisic9936 Despite what Boomers think, Toronto (and urban Canada’s) time is gone. Good on you for selling and moving out. It’s a dirty horrible place with horrible people. The Ontario Line will never be made. Toronto is a slum.

[@lemonade4181]

Lose to who? Steven del Duca? I’m not stating my political affiliation, but Doug doesn’t really have great competition.

[@meltingtomato]

Tbh, regardless of politics, this line is getting built. Hell, it would have been built by the TTC a decade ago if Queen's Park and Ottawa had decided to fund it.

[@warmflash]

The Federal government will never move forward with this. Everyone hates Toronto including the Feds so.