Toronto Ontario Line: Chinatown Station | 7m | 1s | Metrolinx | HDR

[UtakataNoAnnex]

Glad to see that Doug Ford reads my posts here on Urban Toronto

I do hope the McDonalds doesn't survive at that intersection. It's constantly crowded with food couriers and unhoused people sleeping at the door. McDonalds should consider opening a central mobile delivery order restaurant. That tiny McDonalds has long been outgrown.

There should be a residential/retail tower on every corner of Queen and Spadina. The two station entrances kitty corner to one another suggests that the position of the line would enable the other two corners to also become station entrances.

I would hope they will be housed there instead, but I got a feeling Doug hasn’t thought that far ahead with this… /sigh

 

[GenerationLee]

Yesterday

 

[kotsy]

New CLC docs are out

Highlights:

 

[YongeBloor]

EOY Update: @kotsy, any update here? Very hard to shoot either side as there's no real angle to see what is going on.

a

 

[kotsy]

EOY Update: @kotsy, any update here? Very hard to shoot either side as there's no real angle to see what is going on.
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There's a good update in the latest CLC documents.

Here are slides with construction updates:

 

[nightstreak]

With excavation nearly complete, permanent station construction will begin in March.

The timeline given is 3 years with the station expected to be built by early 2029.

https://assets.metrolinx.com/image/upload/v1769619787/Images/Metrolinx/Ontario%20Line/Ontario_Line-_Queen-Spadina_-_Notice_of_Permanent_Works.pdf

 

[fanoftoronto]

Couple of pics from today:

 

[UrbanFervour]

Metrolinx has decided to call this Chinatown Station?

Someone in the bureaucracy decided to have a station that isn't actually in Chinatown named for Chinatown because objective reality doesn't matter.

 

[milkycontent]

Should've been called Nirvanna The Band The Show The Subway Station

 

[nightstreak]

Metrolinx has decided to call this Chinatown Station?

Someone in the bureaucracy decided to have a station that isn't actually in Chinatown named for Chinatown because objective reality doesn't matter.

Technically it is:

...at least the North-East corner. Chinatown has been expanding E-W along Dundas more than southbound but I can see that happening if a new station bearing the name begins to act like a sort of self-fulfilling prophecy with Chinatown-like businesses being attracted to it. Queen St. west of Spadina has a lot of empty storefronts that could serve the type of mom and pop shops that make up Chinatown on Dundas.

 

[reinventingthewheel]

Technically it is:

...at least the North-East corner. Chinatown has been expanding E-W along Dundas more than southbound but I can see that happening if a new station bearing the name begins to act like a sort of self-fulfilling prophecy with Chinatown-like businesses being attracted to it. Queen St. west of Spadina has a lot of empty storefronts that could serve the type of mom and pop shops that make up Chinatown on Dundas.

Moreover there’s no chance of a future subway station any closer, and more deserving of the Chinatown station moniker.

 

[Natika33]

I've typically brought visitors to Toronto along Queen West & upon reaching Spadina told them "we're heading to Chinatown now" as I led them north, so I guess in a way, it's always been a kind of entrance in my mind. Wish we could have a super swanky giant gate across Spadina there... but modern to differentiate us from Montréal.

 

[Milaisacat]

Technically it is:

...at least the North-East corner. Chinatown has been expanding E-W along Dundas more than southbound but I can see that happening if a new station bearing the name begins to act like a sort of self-fulfilling prophecy with Chinatown-like businesses being attracted to it. Queen St. west of Spadina has a lot of empty storefronts that could serve the type of mom and pop shops that make up Chinatown on Dundas.

Teeeeeechnically, only the north station house is in Chinatown, while the platform and south station house are outside its boundaries.

My two cents would be to have called it Queen-Spadina/Chinatown. It would roll off the tongue like the Main Street-Science World SkyTrain station and have the benefit of providing a street-based location name and a nearby landmark/destination.

 

[AnnetteMeetsJane]

My vote is to return to Queen/Spadina - that not only conveys accurate geographic location, it also conveys information about the TTC routes that passengers can transfer to.

When the design for the NE station building was first available, I asked at a public meeting whether it would be possible to have an entrance facing Spadina as well as Queen W. At the time Metrolinx wanted a Queen W. facing station despite the narrowness of the sidewalk there. Now they want a Spadina-facing name.

 

[AnnetteMeetsJane]

Technically it is:

...at least the North-East corner. Chinatown has been expanding E-W along Dundas more than southbound but I can see that happening if a new station bearing the name begins to act like a sort of self-fulfilling prophecy with Chinatown-like businesses being attracted to it. Queen St. west of Spadina has a lot of empty storefronts that could serve the type of mom and pop shops that make up Chinatown on Dundas.

That map is wishful thinking for a preservation exercise. It doesn't bear much relationship to real life. I don't think that there is a single Chinese-related business south of Sullivan and the whole area is shrinking towards Spadina/Dundas as the Chinese population ages out or moves to Markham.
Even the Chinatown BIA put their placemarkers on Huron N. of Dundas, not on Spadina near Queen.

The Chinatown Land Trust surveyed the area and reported at the time of the Chinatown public consultation that most of the underutilised land had already been bought up by developers. The area around Q-S will be hotels and maybe some tech offices, not mom and pop stores.