Toronto 400 Front Street | 195.75m | 60s | State Building Group | Kirkor

CP express sat where Roy Thompson is now, right? I consider myself to be a bit of a history buff and I didn't even know that building existed. I knew about the old rail yard it was connected to, but I thought it was just a yard.
 
ProjectEnd said:
The CP Express Freight Building was enormous and was the kind of thing the city would never allow to be taken down today. That said, there are surprisingly few pictures of it still existing:

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You can see that building and how the tracks filter down over the 400 Front site to Front and Spadina in this image:

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Excellent pics, some hard-to-finds in there!
 
innsertnamehere said:
CP express sat where Roy Thompson is now, right? I consider myself to be a bit of a history buff and I didn't even know that building existed. I knew about the old rail yard it was connected to, but I thought it was just a yard.
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Correct, yes. It was demo'd to make way for that project. The yard itself occupied the space where Metro Hall and Roy Thompson Square sit now (constructed in 1992 - about 10 years after RTH and before the mid-90s collapse of office space in Toronto).
 
ProjectEnd said:
Correct, yes. It was demo'd to make way for that project. The yard itself occupied the space where Metro Hall and Roy Thompson Square sit now (constructed in 1992 - about 10 years after RTH and before the mid-90s collapse of office space in Toronto).
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Do you know in which year the building was demolished? I'm trying to dig deep into the memory files...
 
I believe it was 1978-1979. Does that sound about right @AHK? By 1980 they're already constructing RTH and they would have needed to have the site prepped in advance of that.
 
ProjectEnd said:
I believe it was 1978-1979. Does that sound about right @AHK? By 1980 they're already constructing RTH and they would have needed to have the site prepped in advance of that.
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When we arrived in Toronto in July, 1979 I was working from 55 University - I do not recall seeing the CP Express Freight building either in place, or being demolished. I have always walked around during my lunch breaks, looking at what was happening - I definitely do not remember either the building, or seeing it being demolished - even though it would have been a short block away.

On a side note - there was a very similar and comparable railway express freight forwarding building right in downtown Montreal, on the west side of Rue Peel, between Rue St Jacques and Rue Notre Dame. From what I recall, it was still in place when we left Montreal in 1979 - it however is also long gone as well.
 
Northern Light said:
** Now can we dig up any photos of the CN facility, which @UtakataNoAnnex was mentioning. (south of Wellington)
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Keep in mind though my first presence in TO was 1980 to 81...so what was there before then is completely clueless to me. Hence, my initial double take when I saw there where complicated rail lines above Front W. To which I had always presumed the main rail corridor below that had always been there since Confederation and nothing else.

...but either way, thanks for looking into this. /bows
 
Northern Light said:
From here: https://www.trha.ca/trha/collections/structures/watchmans-shanty/


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That suggests it was shuttered in about '77, puts your timeline pretty much on the money.

** Now can we dig up any photos of the CN facility, which @UtakataNoAnnex was mentioning. (south of Wellington)
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AHK said:
When we arrived in Toronto in July, 1979 I was working from 55 University - I do not recall seeing the CP Express Freight building either in place, or being demolished. I have always walked around during my lunch breaks, looking at what was happening - I definitely do not remember either the building, or seeing it being demolished - even though it would have been a short block away.

On a side note - there was a very similar and comparable railway express freight forwarding building right in downtown Montreal, on the west side of Rue Peel, between Rue St Jacques and Rue Notre Dame. From what I recall, it was still in place when we left Montreal in 1979 - it however is also long gone as well.
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Still appears to be there in 77 but you can see it's really only the street-facing building. They're already demoing the back (west) side.

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