Thinking about a Parliament Streetcar (draft)

Recently the topic of the 65 Parliament bus route and the old Parliament streetcar came up in conversation. Ever since the route was converted to bus operation in 1966, Toronto has had no north-south streetcar route on the east side, whereas it has now two on the west. The context of Parliament Street has shifted considerably in the decades since, with the area rapidly growing amidst a highly dynamic revitalisation along the route. A Parliament streetcar would make for a potentially effective way to improve transit service in Toronto's east, and with several changes to the city's rapid transit structure already underway, can potentially take a favourable route and make several valuable connections.

Why Add More Streetcars?

Streetcars are a vital component of Toronto's surface transportation network. Making up less than 6% of the Toronto Transit Commission (TTC)'s surface route network but carrying over 18% of its ridership as of 2025, streetcars support Toronto's busiest surface transit routes. 6 of 11 routes in service carry more than 20,000 riders a day, and the busiest, 504 King, over 60,000, even after ridership impacts from service degradation and the Covid-19 pandemic.

The TTC's streetcar fleet comprises 264 accessible low-floor streetcars of Bombardier's Flexity Outlook model, delivered between 2014 and 2026. Each streetcar can seat 70 passengers and carry 130 at normal capacity, as compared to 35 and 51 respectively on a 12-metre bus. The existing fleet is larger than what is needed to operate existing service. Current operating schedules are observed to require 172 vehicles in service at peak hour, with a reasonable spare ratio bringing operating requirements to slightly above 200. Even if all routes were operated at 6-minute frequencies, the fleet would not be entirely used up, even without considering potential reductions from speed-up initiatives currently under consideration and from bus replacement service during construction.

The fixed costs of streetcar operation are inevitably higher than that of bus operation as way and overhead must be maintained. However, there exist certain advantages to streetcar operations, which counterbalance this fixed cost. Notably,

• The capacity of streetcars is much higher than of busses, so on very high demand routes, fewer vehicles may be run while maintaining a useful headway, reducing variable costs.
• The riding experience is smoother, brighter, and quieter, presenting a stronger image.
• Rail surface transit is perceived as more permanent or more prestigious, potentially positively affecting land use and redevelopment.
• No fuel is consumed nor pollutants emitted by vehicles, providing a cleaner operation. This trait is shared with E-busses.

An estimation of the costs of new streetcar trackage can be reached by examining past projects. In 2023, 570 metres of trackage was built on Adelaide St to accommodate the closure of Queen St for construction of the Ontario Line subway. The total cost of this project was $39.55 million, of which $33 million related to relocation of THESL and Bell Canada utilities in 9 underground chambers and 500 metres of ducting, leaving about $6.5 million for track. A 2013 project that installed about 550 metres of track in a dedicated right-of-way on Cherry St was budgeted at around $5.7 million. In today's money this translates to about 15 million dollars per kilometre for surface work, although construction inflation is higher than CPI. More complex work carries higher cost. The construction of the Spadina LRT, the last new major streetcar line to be built, cost $20.5 million per kilometre in the 1990s, equal to about $40 million today, but included dedicated platforms and right-of-way as well as street reconstruction of a major avenue. Because Parliament cannot be rebuilt for such an arrangement and would necessarily involve simpler infrastructure, the unit cost of construction required would likely fall between that for a project like Adelaide/York or Cherry and that of Spadina.

The introduction of streetcars can significantly increase the attractiveness of transit service. When the 77 Spadina bus was replaced by the 510 Spadina streetcar, ridership grew from about 25,000 per day to 35,000 per day. In the case of that line, the change from curbside to right-of-way operation factors into the ridership growth, but it is thought to be motivated partly by the introduction of streetcar service on its own.

Concerns regarding operational drawbacks streetcars in Toronto exist. The average speed of streetcar routes tends to increase when bus service is substituted. However, this effect is not necessarily inherent to the mode, and in fact has to do with specific operational policies in Toronto such as slow orders at special work, stop-and-check procedures, restrictions on simultaneous intersection entry, permanent speed restrictions, and unconducive traffic and parking regulation along routes, all of which may be revised. As a result of political pressure, measures to improve the speed of streetcars are being investigated and will be reported for implementation as of 2026.

65 Parliament

The 65 Parliament route is one of two north-south transit routes in downtown Toronto east of Yonge St. In its present form, it runs between Castle Frank subway station and the waterfront. Departing Castle Frank's bus loop, it proceeds along Bloor St on the Prince Edward Viaduct for about 250 metres before turning onto Parliament St, the core of the route. It continues past Lakefront Blvd, where Parliament St turns and merges into Queens Quay, proceeding for about 650 metres and looping on-street via Richardson St, and Dockside Dr. This routing was set in 2022 to accommodate new development south of King St. 

The service level on the bus varies from an 8 minute headway at peak to a 15 minute headway at off-peak weekend hours. In 2019 daily ridership was 4,961 passengers per weekday but it by 2024 it had grown to 7,988 per weekday. This represents a doubling of ridership since 2014. Ridership is much lower than on 510 Spadina and 511 Bathurst, both of which exceed 20,000, but is higher than 509 Harbourfront at 6,713. 

The Parliament Context

The areas along Parliament are undergoing rapid transformation. Beginning at the bayfront in the south, substantial change is visible since the 2000s. Beginning at the bayfront, the pier west of Parliament, dubbed the East Bayfront, has gone from a disused shipping facility to a development led by Waterfront Toronto of some 6,000 residential units. At the southern end of Parliament, the Quayside site, also led by Waterfront Toronto, is planned to accommodate about 5,000 more. The area west of Parliament and south of Lakeshore Blvd is the Keating Precinct, planned for some 5,000 units. The West Don Lands and the Distillery District to the west of Parliament contain another 8,000 units in delivery between them. 

Altogether, the areas near Parliament St south of Front St are seeing some 25,000 or more new residential units in Waterfront Toronto developed areas alone. Tens of thousands of residents will move into the area, which will only have 1 residential parking space per 3 units or fewer. High-quality transit will be vital to these new precincts.

George Brown Polytechnic's Waterfront Campus, which opened in 2012 in the East Bayfront and around which the 65 Parliament loops, counts some 10,000 students and is a major demand driver at the south end of the Parliament line. 

Proceeding northwards, the Corktown station on the Ontario Line subway is under construction on the west side of Parliament St between Front and King streets. The Ontario Line, fully automated and planned for extremely high frequencies, will offer a fast connection to downtown and the west side while also bringing in riders from the east side of Toronto. A transit connection to the station would allow for rapid access to downtown employment and amenities, letting residents along Parliament bypass slow east-west streetcars and the crowded Yonge subway. It will also stimulate development in the Old Town on the west and Corktown on the east side of Parliament St, growing population and creating demand for local transit. The station site itself is to accommodate a Transit-Oriented Community of some 2,500 units. 

Further north, Parliament is flanked by Moss Park and Regent Park, mixed-income communities with a large proportion of public housing. Regent Park is in the midst of a high-profile redevelopment, the public housing authority replacing aging structures with newer, larger ones, increasing the area's population and mixing market-rate housing with social housing. Moss Park is experiencing less change, but the Ontario Line station on its west end may bring shifts in development patterns.

North of these communities is Cabbagetown, a lower-density area of brick Victorians and small apartments. This area is the most stable and slowest to grow of the neighbourhoods along the street: whereas lakefront areas and Regent Park grew their populations by 50% or even 100% population between 2016 and 2021, Cabbagetown tracts barely grew or lost population between censuses. The area also has higher incomes. In contrast, at the northern end of Parliament St lies St James Town, Canada's densest neighbourhood. The apartment towers there house nearly 20,000 people, a large proportion of whom are transit commuters.

"515 Parliament" Concept

The basic routing of the conceptual Parliament streetcar is a line between Union Station and Castle Frank station via Parliament St, with the Union connection on Queens Quay. The basic reasons for such a routing are:

• A turning loop can be located at Castle Frank station, the terminus of the 65 Parliament, but not at Sherbourne station.
• A Union Station terminus allows for single-seat access to regional transit and brings riders close to prominent downtown destinations.
• Streetcar infrastructure on Queens Quay East and an expanded Union loop is already part of the Waterfront East LRT project, which a Parliament line could take advantage of.
• Parliament St already has trackage between Carlton and King streets.

Consequently the required work to instate a Parliament car is reduced. The major aspects are:

• A junction with the future WELRT at the extended Queens Quay. 
• Work at the underpasses of the railway Joint Corridor and Gardiner Expressway.
• New track and overhead from Queens Quay to King St. 
• New track and overhead from Carlton St. to Bloor St. The original poles for OCS are still present but may need rehabilitation.
• A turn onto, and a short section on, Bloor St.
• Modification of the Castle Frank bus loop.

The design of way is intended to be median-running, allowing use of the existing Parliament tracks. Although the TTC intends to construct new streetcar trackage as right-of-way only, Parliament is narrow at 20m wide and is highly constrained, making dedicated rights of way impractical if general traffic is maintained. The operational performance of a line could be improved with priority measures such as those applied to the 511 Bathurst route as part of the RapidTO initiative, but centre running with curb stops means that customers would have to cross a traffic lane to board and alight as with most existing streetcar routes. Reserved centre lanes would also require the removal of curbside parking along the route.

The most challenging traffic interaction on the route is the segment from Parliament/Bloor to Castle Frank station. Streetcars must access the loop on the north side from Parliament on the south and so all movements conflict with Bloor traffic. The Prince Edward Viaduct which carries Bloor in the area is wide, however, and can accomodate streetcar tracks as well as traffic lanes of a number matching with the design of the street in the eastern and western contexts. 

more to come...

Some of the streetcar surplus is intended to eventually service the under-development but currently unfunded Waterfront East LRT. Mirroring the 509 Harbourfront and 510 Spadina streetcar routes, originally built as the Harbourfront and Spadina LRTs in the 1990s, the Waterfront East LRT is to comprise a streetcar route on a dedicated right-of-way reaching into Toronto's East Waterfront along Queens Quay East. The LRT includes a capacity expansion of the existing underground streetcar terminus at Union Station as well as the route along Queens Quay and in the Port Lands.