Dufferin Street
Dufferin Street is a major north-south street in Toronto and King Ontario, Canada. It is a concession road, two concessions west of Yonge Street; the street starts at the foot of Lake Ontario, continues north to Toronto's northern boundary at Steeles Avenue with some discontinuities and continues into Vaughan, where it becomes York Regional Road 53. The street is named for Frederick Hamilton-Temple-Blackwood, 1st Marquess of Dufferin and Ava, who served as Governor General of Canada from 1872 to 1878. In 2003 and 2007, it was voted as one of "Ontario's Worst 20 Roads" in the Ontario's Worst Roads poll organized by the Canadian Automobile Association; the southern end of Dufferin is within the Exhibition Place at Dufferin Gates. The two Dufferin Street bridges connect the Exhibition Place with the rest of Dufferin Street to the north; the bridge span over the railway north of the CNE grounds was determined to be unsafe for vehicular traffic in 2013. The span, dating from 1911, is closed to vehicles until a replacement bridge is ready in early 2014.
The bridge is scheduled for replacement starting in 2016. The City of Toronto plans to build a temporary bridge to restore vehicular traffic in advance of the replacement construction. North of the CNE grounds, the east side is dominated by industrial or transitional industrial to residential and commercial buildings of Liberty Village, with several old factories being converted to loft-style condominiums; the west side is single-family homes with one apartment building south of King Street. The neighbourhood to the west is named Parkdale, developed before 1900. North of Queen Street West, Dufferin is residential on both sides, with the large Dufferin Mall on the west side of Dufferin, south of Bloor Street; this was the former site of the Dufferin Park Racetrack. Across the street from the mall is the Dufferin Grove city park. From Queen Street north to College Street, the neighbourhood is known as Little Portugal. North of College, west of Dufferin is the former village of Brockton and on the east is the Dufferin Grove neighbourhood, named after the park on the east side of Dufferin.
Dufferin station is located at Dufferin and Bloor Street on Line 2 Bloor–Danforth of the Toronto subway system. From Bloor Street to Davenport, Dufferin is lined with homes built from the 1920s to post-World War II; the Galleria Shopping Centre is located on the west side of Dufferin and on the south side of Dupont Street. The neighbourhood west of Dufferin in this area is known as Wallace Emerson, while on the east it is known as Dovercourt Park. North of Davenport, Dufferin ascends the former Lake Iroquois shoreline escarpment. North of the escarpment, the street continues to be residential on both sides north to Eglinton Avenue West. Between Rogers Road and Eglinton Avenue West, Dufferin crosses two steep ravines. North of Eglinton Avenue, it becomes a six-lane arterial road through industrial and low-density commercial lands of the former North York; the regional shopping centre of Yorkdale Shopping Centre is located at Dufferin and Highway 401. The sections from Eglinton into York Region was Vaughan Road.
North of Wilson Avenue, Dufferin is interrupted by Downsview Airport and Allen Road, the latter of which feeds Dufferin north of Kennard Avenue, north of Sheppard Avenue. A broken section of Dufferin Street runs parallel with Allen Road, one block east, south of the continuation from Allen Rd. from Sheppard Ave. to Kennard Ave. This section ends in a cul-de-sac just south of Kennard. North of Wilson, Dufferin Street runs 210 metres to Katherine Street and continues on as Beffort Road/Hanover Road. Dufferin Street continues north of Steeles Avenue into the city of Vaughan; the section north to Highway 7 and Langstaff Road is a six-lane arterial road, designated as York Regional Road 53. North of that, it narrows to four lanes narrows again two blocks north of Major Mackenzie Drive to two lanes. North of Lloydtown/Aurora Road / 18th Sideroad, it is maintained by King Township and terminates just north of Graham Sideroad in the Holland Marsh, after jogging at Davis Drive, the former Highway 9; the intersection of Dufferin Street and Queen Street West intersects with the main railway line from downtown to the northwest of Toronto from Union Station.
The location was the site of the Parkdale Train Station and it was a level crossing. In the 1890s, an underpass was built for Queen Street to accommodate growing east-west traffic. At the time, the area north of the railway line was industrial and factories backed onto the tracks. North-south traffic was not expected or planned for and the two sections of Dufferin were not connected; as automobiles arrived in Toronto around 1903, for the next 107 years, vehicles looking to travel along Dufferin detoured around the closed section to Peel and Gladstone, which became de facto sections of Dufferin. The detour was known locally as the Dufferin Jog; the jog was eliminated in 2010 with the construction of a four-lane underpass beneath the railroad track, including public art and an amphitheatre-styled park with tiered gardens at the southwest corner of the underpass. This project was approved by city council in 2007, work on extending the roadway began on July 2009; the underpass was opened on November 18, 2010.
A further widening of the north side of the bridge was completed in 2016-2017 to support expanded GO Transit train service. The section of the east side of the bridge along Queen Street was built in
Arcadia Publishing
Arcadia Publishing is an American publisher of neighborhood and regional history of the United States in pictorial form. Arcadia Publishing runs the History Press, which publishes text-driven books on American history and folklore, it was founded in Dover, New Hampshire, in 1993 by United Kingdom-based Tempus Publishing, but became independent after being acquired by its CEO in 2004. The corporate office is in South Carolina, it has a catalog of more than 12,000 titles, it—along with its subsidiary, The History Press—publishes 900 new titles every year. Its formula for regional publishing is to use local writers or historians to write about their community using 180 to 240 black-and-white photographs with captions and introductory paragraphs in a 128 page book; the Images of America series is the company's largest product line. Other series include Images of Rail, Images of Sports, Images of Baseball, Black America, Postcard History, Campus History, Corporate History, Legendary Locals, Images of Modern America, Then & Now.
In 2010, Arcadia became the first major publisher to print all of their books on Forest Stewardship Council paper. All of the publishers books are printed and manufactured in South Carolina on American-made paper. In May 2017, Arcadia acquired Palmetto Publishing Group, a Charleston-based self-publishing service, in business since 2015. In 2018, Arcadia was acquired by a new company owned by Lili and Michael Lynton. In March 2019, Walter Isaacson became the editor-at-large and senior adviser for Arcadia Publishing, where he will be promoting books for the comany as well as editing, new strategy development, partnerships; the History Press is a subsidiary publishing house, owned by Arcadia. Its books deal with "narratives of local heroes, tragic losses, collections of homegrown recipes, historic mysteries, everything in between." Some of their series include: American Legends, Forgotten Tales, Haunted America. The History Press was a US subsidiary of the UK-based publisher of the same name. In 2014, the US-based portion of The History Press was sold to Arcadia Publishing.
The books are printed in the United States. It handles its own sales and distribution with the following each accounting for one-third of the company's sales: Bookstore chains Independent bookstores and museums Nontraditional outlets Alan Sutton Official website Arcadia Publishing: Expands Distribution to Reach More Readers Alexander Street and Arcadia Publishing Launch Local History Collection Containing Hundreds of Thousands of Images and Texts
Cycling infrastructure
Cycling infrastructure refers to all infrastructure which may be used by cyclists. This includes the same network of roads and streets used by motorists, except those roads from which cyclists have been banned, plus additional bikeways that are not available to motor vehicles, such as bike paths, bike lanes, cycle tracks and, where permitted, plus amenities like bike racks for parking and specialized traffic signs and signals. Cycling modal share is associated with the size of local cycling infrastructure; the manner in which the public road network is designed and managed can have a significant effect on the utility and safety of cycling. The cycling network may be able to provide the users with direct, convenient routes minimizing unnecessary delay and effort in reaching their destinations. Settlements with a dense road network of interconnected streets tend to be viable utility cycling environments; the history of cycling infrastructure starts from shortly after the bike boom of the 1880s when the first short stretches of dedicated bicycle infrastructure were built, through to the rise of the automobile from the mid-20th century onwards and the concomitant decline of cycling as a means of transport, to cycling's comeback from the 1970s onwards.
A bikeway is a lane, way or path which in some manner is designed and /or designated for bicycle travel. Bike lanes demarcated by a painted marking are quite common in many cities. Cycle tracks demarcated by barriers, bollards or boulevards are quite common in some European countries such as the Netherlands and Germany, they are increasingly common in other major cities such as New York City, Ottawa and San Francisco. Montreal and Davis, which have had segregated cycling facilities with barriers for several decades, are among the earliest examples in North American cities. Various guides exist to define the different types of bikeway infrastructure, including UK Department for Transport manual The Geometric Design of Pedestrian and Equestrian Routes, Sustrans Design Manual, UK Department of Transport Local Transport Note 2/08: Cycle infrastructure design the Danish Road Authority guide Registration and classification of paths, the Dutch CROW, the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials Guide to Bikeway Facilities, the Federal Highway Administration Manual on Uniform Traffic Control Devices, the US National Association of City Transportation Officials Urban Bikeway Design Guide.
In the Netherlands, most one way cycle paths are at least 2.5 metres wide. The Netherlands has protected intersection to cyclists crossing roads; some bikeways are separated from motor traffic by physical constraints —bicycle trail, cycle track—but others are separated only by painted markings—bike lane, buffered bike lane, contraflow bike lane. Some share the roadway with motor vehicles—bicycle boulevard, advisory bike lane—or shared with pedestrians—greenway, shared use path; the term bikeway is used in North America to describe all routes that have been designed or updated to encourage more cycling or make cycling safer. In some jurisdictions such as the United Kingdom, segregated cycling facility is sometimes preferred to describe cycling infrastructure which has varying degrees of separation from motorized traffic, or which has excluded pedestrian traffic in the case of exclusive bike paths. There is no single usage of segregation. Thus, it includes bike lanes with solid painted lines but not lanes with dotted lines and advisory bike lanes where motor vehicles are allowed to encroach on the lane.
It includes cycle tracks as physically distinct from the sidewalk. And it includes bike paths in their own right of way exclusive to cycling. Paths which are shared with pedestrians and other non-motorized traffic are not considered segregated and are called shared use path, multi-use path in North America and shared-use footway in the UK. There have been a lot of studies on the safety of all types of bikeways. Proponents say that segregation of cyclists from fast or frequent motorized traffic is necessary to provide a safe and welcoming cycling environment. Opponents point out the increased risk from various types of infrastructure including shared use paths. Different countries have different ways to define and enforce bikeways; some detractors argue that one must be careful in interpreting the operation of dedicated or segregated bikeways/cycle facilities across different designs and contexts. Proponents point out that cycling infrastructure including dedicated bike lanes has been implemented in many cities.
Jurisdictions have guidelines around the selection of the right bikeway treatments in order make routes more comfortable and safer for cycling. Bikeways can fall into these main categories: separated in-roadway bikeways such as bike lanes and buffered bike lanes; the exact categorization changes depending on the jurisdiction and organization, while many just list the types by their used names Bike lanes, or cycle lanes, are on-road lanes
Royal York Road
Royal York Road known as Church Street or New Church Street, is a north-south arterial road in Toronto, Canada. It is a concession road, 5 concessions west of Yonge Street, runs through many residential neighbourhoods, most notably Mimico and the Kingsway, it is classified as a "minor arterial" road by the city of Toronto. The road begins in the south near the shoreline of Lake Ontario, just south of Lake Shore Blvd, it travels through the neighbourhoods of Mimico, the Queensway, the Kingsway, Humber Valley Village. It serves as the boundary for two neighbourhoods north of Eglinton Avenue; the road crosses three creeks. Royal York Road ends at Dixon Road, but its alignment continues further north as St. Phillips Road, which ends at Weston Road. Weston Road continues north on the same concession as Royal York into Vaughan. Royal York Road started out as a local street in Mimico called Church Street when the village was settled in the late 19th century. During this time, it was a dirt road north of there.
This changed in the 1920s when The Kingsway was developed, in the 1930s with the development of Humber Valley Village. At this point, the paved section extended up to Eglinton Avenue; the entire road would be paved by the 1950s when the remaining areas were developed. Royal York Road has undergone several reconstruction projects; the 1.25 metre wide bike lanes that were approved and painted during this process on the stretch between Mimico Creek and Usher Avenue have been criticized for being too narrow, a violation of Transportation Association of Canada standards, for not conforming to the 1.5 metre minimum. The Toronto Transit Commission provides bus services along Royal York Road. Royal York subway station on the Bloor-Danforth line is the major transit terminal that these services feed into. North of Bloor, the main route is 73 Royal York, which goes along Albion Road in the Rexdale area, south of Bloor, the primary route is 76 Royal York South, which carries commuters from Mimico. There are two additional routes that serve parts of Royal York because they use it to feed into the subway.
These routes are. The Mimico GO Station on the Lakeshore West line provides commuter rail service to downtown, other areas in the Greater Toronto Area, such as Hamilton, Oakville. Local landmarks along Royal York Road: Sanctuary Park Cemetery Riverside Cemetery Royal York Plaza All Saints Catholic elementary school Scarlett Heights Entrepreneurial Academy Lambton Mills Cemetery Humbertown Shopping Centre Royal York subway station École Sainte-Marguerite d'Youville Catholic elementary school Bishop Allen Academy Etobicoke School of the Arts Mimico GO Station Mimico Linear Park Major streets in Toronto which intersect with Royal York: Dixon Road Lawrence Avenue Eglinton Avenue Dundas Street West Bloor Street The Queensway Lake Shore Boulevard
Toronto Transit Commission
The Toronto Transit Commission is a public transport agency that operates bus, subway and paratransit services in Toronto, Canada. It is the oldest and largest of the urban transit service providers in the Greater Toronto Area, with numerous connections to systems serving its surrounding municipalities. Established as the Toronto Transportation Commission in 1921, the TTC owns and operates four rapid transit lines with 75 stations, over 149 bus routes, 11 streetcar lines. On an average weekday in 2019, 1.69 million passengers made 2.76 million unlinked trips on the TTC, with the number of trips about evenly divided between the subways and buses and streetcars. The TTC operates door-to-door paratransit service for the elderly and disabled, known as Wheel-Trans; the TTC is the most used urban mass transit system in all of Canada, the third largest in North America, after the New York City Transit Authority and Mexico City Metro. Public transit in Toronto started in 1849 with a operated transit service.
In years, the city operated some routes, but in 1921 assumed control over all routes and formed the Toronto Transportation Commission to operate them. During this period, streetcars provided the bulk of the service. In 1954, the TTC adopted its present name, opened the first subway line, expanded its service area to cover the newly formed municipality of Metropolitan Toronto; the system has evolved to feature a wide network of surface routes with the subway lines as the backbone. On February 17, 2008, the TTC made many service improvements, reversing more than a decade of service reductions and only minor improvements. In addition to buses and subways, the TTC operated the Toronto Island ferry service from 1927 to 1962, when it was transferred to the Metro Parks and Culture department; the TTC operated a suburban and regional intercity bus operator, Gray Coach Lines, from 1927 to 1990. Gray Coach used interurban coaches to link Toronto to points throughout southern Ontario. In addition, Gray Coach operated tour buses in association with Gray Line Tours.
The main terminal was the Metropolitan Toronto Bus Terminal on Elizabeth Street north of Dundas Street, downtown. In 1954, Gray Coach expanded further when it acquired suburban routes from independent bus operators not merged with the TTC as it expanded to cover Metro Toronto. By the 1980s, Gray Coach faced fierce competition in the interurban service in the GTA; the TTC sold Gray Coach Lines in 1990 to Stagecoach Holdings, which split the operation between Greyhound Canada and the government of Ontario three years later. The Gloucester subway cars, the first version of TTC subway cars, known as "red rockets" because of their bright red exterior, have been retired; the name lives on as the TTC uses the phrase to advertise the service, such as "Ride the Rocket" in advertising material, "Rocket" in the names of some express buses, the new "Toronto Rocket" subway cars, which began revenue operation on July 21, 2011. Another common slogan is "The Better Way"; the TTC has recovered about 70% of its operating costs from the fare box in recent years.
From its creation in 1921 until 1971, the TTC was self-supporting both for capital and operations. Through the Great Depression and World War II, it accumulated reserves that allowed it to expand after the war, both with subways and major steady growth of its bus services into the suburbs, it was not until 1971 that the Metro government and the province started to provide operational subsidies, required due to rising costs of delivering transit to low-density suburbs in Metro Toronto and large wage increases. Deficits and subsidies soared throughout the 1970s and 1980s, followed by service cuts and a period of ridership decline in the 1990s attributable to recession; when the Harris Progressive Conservatives ended the provincial subsidies, the TTC cut back service with a significant curtailment put into effect on February 18, 1996, an increased financial burden was placed on the municipal government. Since the TTC has been in financial difficulties. Service cuts were averted in 2007, when Toronto City Council voted to introduce new taxes to help pay for city services, including the TTC.
As a result, the TTC became the largest transit operator in Anglo-America not to receive provincial/state subsidies. The TTC has received federal funding for capital projects from as early as 2009; the TTC is considered one of the costliest transit systems per fare price in North America. For the 2011 operating year, the TTC had a projected operating budget of $1.45 billion. Revenue from fares covered 70% of the budget, whereas the remaining 30% originated from the city. In 2009 through 2011, provincial and federal subsidies amounted to 0% of the budget. In contrast to this, STM Montreal receives 10% of its operating budget from the provincial government, Ottawa Transpo receives 9% of its funding from the province; the fairness of preferentially subsidizing transit in specific Canadian cities has been questioned by citizens. Buses are a large part of TTC operations today. Before about 1960 however, they played a minor role compared to streetcars. Buses began to operate in the city in 1921, became necessary for areas without streetcar service.
After an earlier experiment in the 1920s, trolley buses were used on a number of routes starting in 1947, but all trolley bus routes were converted to bus operation between 1991 and 1993. The TTC always used the term "trolley coach" to refer to its trackless electric vehicles. Hundreds of old buses have been replaced with the low-floor Orion V
Don River (Ontario)
The Don River is a watercourse in southern Ontario, that empties into Lake Ontario, at Toronto Harbour. Its mouth was just east of the street grid of the town of York, Upper Canada, the municipality that evolved into Toronto, Ontario. Of the various watercourses that drained Toronto, the Don, the Humber River, the Rouge River have headwaters in the Oak Ridges Moraine; the Don is formed from two rivers, the East and West Branches, that meet about 7 kilometres north of Lake Ontario while flowing southward into the lake. The area below the confluence is known as the lower Don, the areas above as the upper Don; the Don is joined at the confluence by a third major branch, Taylor-Massey Creek. The Toronto and Region Conservation Authority is responsible for managing the river and its surrounding watershed. Humans first arrived in the Don River area 12,500 years BP, most as nomadic hunters. While there is little archaeological evidence in the Don valley itself, regional finds in the Great Lakes St. Lawrence area have revealed that permanent settlements started to occur about 6000 BP.
The most significant recorded find is known as the Withrow Site. It was discovered in 1886 during road building just east of Riverdale Park, it contained human remains and other artifacts dating back to about 5000 years BP. It is unclear. In 1788, Alexander Aitkin, an English surveyor who worked in southern Ontario, referred to the Don River as Ne cheng qua kekonk. Elizabeth Simcoe, wife of Lieutenant Governor John Graves Simcoe, reported in her diary that another name used was Wonscotanach; this is an Anishnaabe phrase meaning the river coming from the back burnt grounds which could refer to an earlier forest fire in the poplar plains to the north. The name Don River was given by Lt. Gov. Simcoe because the wide valley reminded him of the River Don in Yorkshire, England. After the founding of York in 1793, several mills were constructed along the lower Don. One of the first was at Todmorden Mills; these mills turned out lumber and paper products. By the 1850s, there were more than 50 mills along its tributaries.
The Lower Don was becoming an industrial setting. Petroleum storage facilities and pork processing plants were constructed along the banks of the Don. In 1879, the Don Valley Brick Works opened. Polluted effluent from these factories and the growing city nearby was turning the Don and its marshy mouth into a polluted hazard. There were two prominent hills that were found north of Bloor, Tumper's Hill near Don Mills Road and Sugar Loaf Hill at Bloor Street; the latter was flatten in the 1960s during the construction of the Don Valley Parkway and the latter Conical hill removed during the construction of the Prince Edward Viaduct. In the 1880s, the lower part of the Don south of the former Winchester St. bridge was straightened and placed in a channel to create additional harbour space and industrial dock space for boats. Known as The Don Improvement Project, the straightened river was supposed to divert the polluted waters into the Ashbridges Bay marsh; this proved unsuccessful so the mouth was turned 90 degrees west where it empties into the inner harbour.
This short extension of the harbour is known as the Keating Channel. The channel north of Lake Shore Blvd. East ceased being navigable when the Gardiner Expressway was constructed in the 1950s. Boats may still enter the Keating Channel by going underneath a lift bridge at Cherry St. During the early part of the 20th century the river and the valley continued to be neglected. 31 separate sewage treatment facilities were built along the river. Over 20 places in the valley and adjacent ravines were used as landfills for garbage and industrial refuse. In 1917, the Don Destructor was built beside the Don just north of Dundas Ave. East, it was used as a garbage incinerator for 52 years burning about 50,000 tonnes per year. After World War II, rapid urban expansion occurred in the northern reaches of the watershed. At the same time, interest in conservation of watersheds across Ontario led to the formation of conservation authorities for watershed management. Conservation authorities were established across Ontario to manage river valleys, the Don Valley Conservation Authority was established in 1947.
The authority had limited authority, funded by local municipalities. Land purchases had to be paid for by local municipalities. For example, a 1950 plan to build a large conservation area on the East Don River at Lawrence Avenue never came to pass over the cost of developing it. In 1946, a plan by the Shirriff company to demolish pioneer dwellings in the area of Todmorden Mills led outraged citizens to form the Don Valley Conservation Association volunteer organization; the Association's opposition was successful in causing Shirriff to abandon the project in 1947. The Association continued its activities, planting tree seedlings, stopped the picking of wild flowers trilliums and preventing the vandalism of trees; the Association held educational events to educate the public about the Don Valley, including special trains through the valley, a recreation of Lt. Governor Simcoe's journey up the Don by canoe; the Association advocated for the building of trunk sewers to stop the run-off of pollution into the Don.
In 1954, Hurricane Hazel struck the Toronto area. Most of the damage occurred in the Humber River area. While there was some flooding less rain fell over the Don Watershed resulting in no loss of life. However, the impact of the hurricane led to changes for the conservation authorities in the Toronto region. In 1957, the DVCA, along with other Toronto-area conservation authorities, was reformed into the Metro Toronto and Region Conservation
Broad-gauge railway
A broad-gauge railway is a railway with a track gauge broader than the 1,435 mm standard-gauge railways. Broad gauge was first used in Great Britain in Scotland for two short, isolated lines, the Dundee and Arbroath Railway and the Arbroath and Forfar Railway. Both the lines were built in 5 ft 6 in. Both the lines were subsequently converted to standard gauge and connected to the emerging Scottish rail network; the Great Western Railway, was designed by Isambard Kingdom Brunel, in 1838, with a gauge of 7 ft 1⁄4 in, retained this gauge until 1892. Some harbours used railways of this gauge for construction and maintenance; these included Portland Harbour and Holyhead Breakwater, which used a locomotive for working sidings. As it was not connected to the national network, this broad-gauge operation continued until the locomotive wore out in 1913; the gauge proposed by Brunel was 7 ft but this was soon increased by 1⁄4 in to 7 ft 1⁄4 in to accommodate clearance problems identified during early testing.
While the parliament of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland was prepared to authorise lines built to the broad gauge of 7 ft, it was rejected by the Gauge Commission in favour of all new railways in England and Scotland being built to standard gauge of 4 ft 8 1⁄2 in, this being the gauge with the greatest mileage. Railways which had received their enabling Act would continue at the 7 ft gauge. Ireland, using the same criteria, was allocated a different standard gauge, the Irish gauge, of 5 ft 3 in, used in the Australian states of South Australia and Victoria. Broad-gauge lines in Britain were converted to dual gauge or standard gauge from 1864, the last of Brunel's broad gauge was converted over a single weekend in 1892. In 1839 the Netherlands started its railway system with two broad-gauge railways; the chosen gauge of 1,945 mm was applied between 1839 and 1866 by the Hollandsche IJzeren Spoorweg-Maatschappij for its Amsterdam–The Hague–Rotterdam line and between 1842 and 1855, firstly by the Dutch state, but soon by the Nederlandsche Rhijnspoorweg-Maatschappij, for its Amsterdam–Utrecht–Arnhem line.
But the neighbouring countries Prussia and Belgium used standard gauge, so the two companies had to regauge their first lines. In 1855, NRS regauged its line and shortly afterwards connected to the Prussian railways; the HSM followed in 1866. There are replicas of one broad-gauge 2-2-2 locomotive and three carriages in the Dutch Railway Museum in Utrecht; these replicas were built for the 100th anniversary of the Dutch Railways in 1938–39. Ireland and some states in Australia and Brazil have a gauge of 5 ft 3 in, but Luas, the Dublin light rail system, is built to standard gauge. Russia and the other former Soviet Republics use a 1,520 mm gauge while Finland continues to use the 5 ft gauge inherited from Imperial Russia. Portugal and the Spanish Renfe system use a gauge of 1,668 mm called Ancho Ibérico in Spanish or Bitola Ibérica in Portuguese. In Toronto, the gauge for TTC subways and streetcars was chosen in 1861. Toronto adopted a unique gauge of 4 ft 10 7⁄8 in, an "overgauge" stated to "allow horse-drawn wagons to use the rails", but with the practical effect of precluding the use of standard-gauge equipment in the street.
The Toronto Transit Commission still operates the Toronto streetcar system and three subway lines on its own unique gauge of 4 ft 10 7⁄8 in. The Scarborough RT, uses standard gauge, as will the future light rail lines of the Transit City plan. In 1851 the 5 ft 6 in broad gauge was adopted as the standard gauge for the Province of Canada, becoming known as the Provincial gauge, government subsidies were unavailable for railways that chose other gauges; this caused problems in interchanging freight cars with northern United States railroads, most of which were built to standard gauge or a gauge similar to it. In the 1870s between 1872 and 1874, Canadian broad-gauge lines were changed to standard gauge to facilitate interchange and the exchange of rolling stock with American railroads. Today, all Canadian railways are standard-gauge. In the early days of rail transport in the US, railways tended to be built out from coastal cities into the hinterland, systems did not connect; each builder was free to choose its own gauge, although the availability of British-built locomotives encouraged some railways to be built to standard gauge.
As a general rule, southern railways were built to one or another broad gauge 5 ft, while northern railroads that were not standard gauge tended to be narrow gauge. Most of the original track in Ohio was built in 4 ft 10 in Ohio gauge, special "compromise cars" were able to run on both this track and standard gauge track. In 1848, Ohio passed a law stating "The width of the track or gauge of all roads under this act, shall be four feet ten inches between the rails." When American railroads' track extended to the point that they began to interconnect, it became clear that a single nationwide gauge was desirable. Six-foot-gauge railroads had developed a large regional following in New York State in the first part of the 19th century, due to the influence of the New York and Erie, one of the early pioneering railroads in
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