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Roads: Front Street East finally getting repaved

hawc

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Driving home last night and noticed from Cherry Street heading west along Front they've finally started to rip up and repave the bumpiest street in Toronto. I'm not sure where automakers will go now to test their suspension components. Perhaps Dufferin south of Dundas? Well at least they're finally smoothing out Front. Which means in 6 months Enbridge will rip it all up again. :cool:
 
Long way to go still ... they start digging up Sherbourne to Jarvis soon for watermains, or sewers, or something. Got a notice about it the other day. Can't imagine that piece will be paved for a few years yet.

Personally, I don't know why we just don't stick dedicated LRT down the middle of it from Bathurst all the way to West Donlands, and then use the old Front Street Extension alignment to get it to the Queensway.
 
As nfitz says, the City is about to continue the new watermain work further east than last year's project and will start working on the Sherbourne to Jarvis section of Front (and Sherborne north of Front) any day now. This is apparently the extent of the work on this section of watermain/sewer; the sewer and watermain work on Lower Sherbourne will occur in 2012/13.

The contract to 'rehabilitate' Front from Eastern to Parliament (and Eastern from Cherry to Front) was awarded last fall and is now underway,

The City has a 'promenade plan' for Front Street from Parliament to Jarvis and planning for this has been ongoing for about 3 years. It is supposed to be starting this summer (as soon as the watermain is finished) and the end-result will see buried wires, pedestrian scale lighting, better sidewalks and bump-outs at many of the cross-streets and a median from Jarvis to George (a continuation of the median west of Jarvis). Council has approved the changes at Berkeley, Princess, Frederick, George and Jarvis.) Funds for this are coming from the City, the local BIA and Section 37 funds but the wrinkle is that Hydro have not been playing ball. Though they were slow to respond to requests for information on possibilities for burying wires or installing new lights before they were refused the recent rate increase they have, apparently, been even worse since. The promenade plan is supposed to be finished by the Pan-Am Games and will link to the 'promenades" on Lower Sherbourne (to be done in 2013), Lower Jarvis (to be done when Market Wharf is finished?) and Yonge - done in 2010.
 
So they're redoing the section from Jarvis eastward ? I alway thought the section up to Jarvis i.e. Yonge to Jarvis was decent, from the pedestrian realm point of view anyway.

Wasn't there work on the esplande as well, did that finish and did they redo all the paving ?
 
Front East from Yonge to Jarvis was "done" several years ago - the current project is bringing this work east to Parliament.

The work on The Esplanade is for a sewer installation and it is 'almost' finished but, at last word, the restoration from Scott to Church will not start until September to allow the patios to be open all summer. The section from Church to Jarvis should be restored this year too, probably earlier than the western stretch as it has no patios. More wiring will be buried and more trees planted.
 
are there any city documents pertaining to what the promenades will look like? I searched but couldn't find anything.
 
Speaking of Front, I noticed some old streetcar tracks popping through on Sherbourne just south at Front (just south of the south pedestrian crossing). Sherbourne streetcar service ended in 1947, however I don't know how long before that they stopped using the spur south of Front ... the only map I could see it on was from the early 1920s ... though I found a photo in the archives showing a Lake Simcoe line car being stored there in 1928:
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. I suspect that piece of Sherbourne hasn't been fully rebuilt then since the 1920s ... wouldn't be surprised if Front is similar. Not surprised it's bumpy! I suspect they won't just be repaving then, but will be reconstructing.
 
Speaking of Front, I noticed some old streetcar tracks popping through on Sherbourne just south at Front (just south of the south pedestrian crossing). Sherbourne streetcar service ended in 1947, however I don't know how long before that they stopped using the spur south of Front ... the only map I could see it on was from the early 1920s ... though I found a photo in the archives showing a Lake Simcoe line car being stored there in 1928:
I suspect that piece of Sherbourne hasn't been fully rebuilt then since the 1920s ... wouldn't be surprised if Front is similar. Not surprised it's bumpy! I suspect they won't just be repaving then, but will be reconstructing.
No, Front Street is being resurfaced NOT reconstructed - though much of it will get a new concrete base as there are so many utility cuts. (Much like what is happening now east of Parliament Street.)

This fall the City will be laying a new sewer on Lower Sherbourne from Front to the rail bridge (or Queen's Quay) and when this is done the section of Lower Sherbourne from Front to the rail bridge WILL be completely rebuilt and the old streeetcar tracks will finally go. They were the south end of the Sherbourne streetcar route that, as you say, ended in the 1940s! (See:http://transit.toronto.on.ca/streetcar/4123.shtml ). These tracks also led to the streetcar barn that was on west side of Lower Sherbourne (between there and Frederick Street) There is a also a small piece of streetcar rail on Frederick Street just north of Front, it too will probably vanish when Front is fixed as there will be a 'bump-out' in this part of the street. (There was a photo of it in, I think, the Then and Now thread a year or so ago.)
 
Ah, a barn eh. That explains the spur south of Front. I thought there was one somewhere, but couldn't find anything that showed it.

Perhaps Front isn't as old ... I didn't see any streecar tracks poking through there during the recent work ... though I think the tracks were only from Sherbourne to Bathurst, and most of the digging so far has been west of Sherbourne.

Sometimes I wonder if we'd be better off if the Bathurst streetcar still went down Front to Sherbourne ... and we then extended that all the way to Bayview ... probably would provide better transit to West Donlands than the cockamamie scheme they've got that doesn't put anything east of Cherry, and then takes you northeast all the way to King to go west.
 
Speaking of Front street, what's with it west of Spadina. Last weekend I walked past it, and it looks purely suburban. On either side of Spadina, it is like two different worlds.
 

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