Planning The Gardiner Expressway was one of the first projects undertaken by the newly formed government of
Metro Toronto. The route of the Expressway necessitated the paving over of parkland, demolition of residences and a
popular amusement park, and a long elevated section to get through the downtown area. Planning was done stage-by-stage, from the Humber River east through downtown. The Humber Bay section was built according to initial plans. The route in the Exhibition Place area changed over time from one along the lake shore into downtown, to one aligned along the railway north of Exhibition Place. The initial route east of Exhibition Place would have necessitated the moving or removal of Old Fort York, but was moved to a more southerly alignment after protest. The elevated section through downtown was then aligned over the existing Lake Shore Boulevard in the area. East of downtown, the initial plans were for a ground-level route east to Woodbine, but this was changed in conjunction with the planning of the interchange of the Don Valley Parkway into downtown from the north to an elevated section east to Leslie Street. Various routes to the east were proposed, but never progressed beyond planning studies due to public protest. Plans for the highway, first named the Lakeshore Expressway, were first developed prior to the formation of Metro Toronto. In the post-war period, the population of greater Toronto was growing at a rate of 50,000 persons per year, the ownership of private automobiles was growing, and the traffic between downtown Toronto and the western suburbs was regularly stuck in 'traffic jams.' (The Sunnyside stretch of the Lake Shore Boulevard and Queen and King Streets in the Parkdale and High Park areas were apparently notorious for this.) Another reason for the proposal to build the lake shore highway was the expected opening of the
Saint Lawrence Seaway and the need for adequate roadways to serve the expanded port facilities. In May 1947, the Toronto City Planning Board proposed building a four-lane "Waterfront Highway" from the Humber to the Don River. In November 1947, the City's works committee approved a four-lane highway, following a path beside the rail lines along the north of the
Canadian National Exhibition (CNE) grounds, ending at Fleet Street to the East at a cost of , to be approved by a plebiscite. The
Toronto Board of Control approved the plan, but City Council voted against the plan after 11 hours of deliberation, sending it back to the Board of Control. In December 1947, the Board of Control abandoned the plan, on advice that the bridges for the highway would not be built due to a shortage of steel. By 1952, the lake shore highway plan cost had escalated to an estimated $30 million. Toronto's Mayor
Allan A. Lamport objected to the cost being borne solely by the City of Toronto. Lamport suggested that the road could be built either as a toll road or built by private interests. A toll road was opposed by the Ontario Deputy Minister of Highways J. D. Millar, who suggested that "cars would be waiting for miles" to pay a three-cent tax. Millar stated that "the Ontario driver was taxed and taxed heavily and expected his roads will be paid for." Toronto Board of Control abandoned the project in July 1952, stating that it would need additional funds not forthcoming from the Ontario government. In July 1953, prior to the formation of Metro Toronto, the Metropolitan Executive Committee, chaired by Fred Gardiner, ordered the planning of the Lakeshore Expressway as a four-lane or six-lane expressway from the Humber in the west to Woodbine Avenue in the east. The cost was estimated at . Route planning was given to the engineering firm Margison Babcock and Associates, with the proviso that an American firm expert in expressway building would be involved. Margison's plan was delivered in April 1954. The roadway was to be constructed in the Sunnyside area and CNE grounds to the south of the present Lake Shore Boulevard. South of the CNE grounds, the route would be on lands created from infilling of the shoreline to the breakwaters and an interchange was proposed in front of the Prince's Gate. East of the CNE grounds, the highway would be an elevated roadway above the existing Fleet Street, to just west of the Don River. The highway proceeded at grade from that point eastward, ending at Coxwell Avenue and
Queen Street East. Interchanges were proposed for
Jameson Avenue, Strachan Avenue, Spadina Avenue, York Street, Jarvis Street, Don Roadway, Carlaw Avenue, Keating Avenue (the present Lake Shore Boulevard East) and Coxwell Avenue. The cost was then estimated at $50 million. The plan also proposed extending Queen Street westwards through High Park to west of the Humber River to connect with
the Queensway and extending Keating Avenue east to Woodbine Avenue. The shoreline route was opposed by the City of Toronto and the
Toronto Harbour Commission, and Margison was tasked with plotting a route north of the CNE grounds. This plan was delivered in July 1954. The change to an inland route north of the CNE grounds was estimated to cost another $11 million as the homes to the west of the CNE grounds would have to be purchased and demolished. This change moved the route from the Humber to the Ontario Hydro right-of-way next to the railway tracks, saving of waterfront. The expressway was moved to the north of Lake Shore Boulevard in the Sunnyside segment and the Jameson Avenue area. The inland route, while not opposed in the Sunnyside and Jameson areas, faced opposition in its proposed route in the CNE to downtown segment. Alternative route proposals emerged in 1954 from the Toronto Harbour Commission, which wanted the route moved further north, and planner Edwin Kay, who proposed a tunnel through downtown. The decision was then made to proceed with the non-contentious parts of the original Margison plan, to build a new Humber bridge to connect with the QEW, the Queen Street extension, and the Humber River to Dowling section, demolishing Sunnyside Park and South Parkdale. Metro also approved the eastern section of the expressway from
Sherbourne Street to the east, but the central, elevated section was left for further deliberation. Metro approved $33 million for the eastern and western sections in its 1955 budget, but omitted the Humber River bridge. The route to the north of the CNE grounds followed a Hydro-electric right-of-way beside the railway tracks to the north of the Exhibition, using approximately of CNE land, and requiring the removal of the original Dufferin Gate and the demolition of two other CNE buildings. To make up for the loss of lands, Metro infilled into Lake Ontario to the breakwater. East of the CNE grounds, the inland route proposed to fly over
Fort York with a westbound on-ramp from Bathurst Street directly over the fort. Opposition from historical societies and the City of Toronto came to a head when the city refused to transfer the land to Metro Toronto. Gardiner himself and George O. Grant, the Metro Roads Commissioner, at first opposed the re-routing of the highway around the fort as it would mean a "greater than six-degree curve" in the highway, necessitating drivers to slow down. Gardiner rescinded his opposition to the change in March 1958 after visiting the site with a delegation from the City and historical societies. In 1959, Fort York was again under threat. A proposal was published to link
Highway 400 to the Gardiner to meet in the vicinity of the fort. Gardiner proposed that Metro Toronto and the City share the costs of relocating the fort to the waterfront. In the end, the fort was not moved, the westbound on-ramp from Bathurst Street was cancelled, no interchange was built in the area and the Highway 400 extension was never approved.
Construction bridge, looking west toward the Jameson Avenue/Dunn Avenue exit |alt=an 8-lane roadway from an overhead bridge with three parallel train tracks on the right Construction on the expressway began in 1955 with the building of The Queensway and the Keating Avenue (now Lake Shore Boulevard East) extension to the foot of Woodbine Avenue. The Gardiner was built in segments, with the final section being completed in 1966. The cost was approximately million ($ in dollars). Construction of the first part of the actual Expressway started in 1956 with the Humber River bridge, followed by the Humber to Jameson segment. Max Tanenbaum's York Steel supplied the iron girder sections that supported the road deck on the elevated sections. ;Humber River to Jameson Avenue The route of the expressway around Humber Bay necessitated the demolition of the Sunnyside Amusement Park on the lakeshore, which had existed since 1925. Some amusements were moved to the CNE, others sold off or just destroyed. The carousel was moved to the newly built
Disneyland. The Amusement Park lands were subsumed by the Lake Shore Boulevard expansion to six lanes. Only the
Palais Royale hall,
Sunnyside Bathing Pavilion and Sunnyside Pool were not demolished. A pedestrian bridge crossing was built from the foot of Roncesvalles Avenue to the Palais Royale site. To the east of Sunnyside, the 1800s-era 'South Parkdale' residential neighbourhood at the foot of Jameson Avenue was demolished in 1957. The expressway, like the railway just to the north, was cut through the area at lake shore level. An interchange was built at Jameson with on and off ramps to Lake Shore Boulevard, and Lake Shore Boulevard was expanded to six lanes in the area. This created a pedestrian barrier to the lake shore for Parkdale neighbourhood residents to the north. Efforts made by community groups over the next 20 years to restore access to the lake shore, including plans to cover the section of the Expressway and railway line, did not come to fruition. A pedestrian bridge over Lake Shore Boulevard at the foot of Jameson Avenue was eventually built. Jameson Avenue, which had previously been a street of mansions, saw intense apartment building development after the building of the Expressway. The section between Humber River and Jameson Avenue was completed in 1958. The expressway, by then named the Gardiner Expressway, was officially opened by Gardiner himself and Ontario Premier
Leslie Frost on August 8, 1958. When this section opened, it opened without guard-rails on the median dividing the different directions. Steel guard-rails and a 'glare shield' were approved for this section in 1965 at a cost of . The road bridge of Dowling Avenue over the Gardiner was demolished in the 2000s, replaced by a pedestrian bridge. ;Jameson Avenue to York Street The section between Jameson Avenue and Spadina Avenue was completed and opened on August 1, 1962 and the westbound lanes from York Street were opened on December 3, 1962. The eastbound lanes from Spadina to York opened in 1963. The elevated section starts from the north-east corner of the CNE. The route to the east of the CNE was modified to avoid passing over historic Old Fort York. The Gardiner passes over some of the fort's property, and it is extra high to allow for possible multiple interchanges. East of Fort York, the Gardiner was built entirely as an elevated route, through a predominantly industrial area, to the south of railway lands to reach downtown. The roadway was built directly overhead of Fleet Street (Fleet is now Lake Shore Boulevard West east of Bathurst but Fleet exists as parallel roadway on the north side from Bathurst to Strachan Avenue) through much of this section. The expressway off-ramp to York/Bay/Yonge Streets was developed as a two-lane eastbound 'finger' flying over Harbour Street, south of the main roadway, descending to Harbour Street with a circular off-ramp to York Street northbound, and it was nicknamed the "Hot Wheels Ramp". ;York Street to the Don Valley Parkway This segment was completed in 1964. In the original proposal, the elevated segment would descend to ground level and meet the Don Valley Parkway at a clover-leaf interchange. It was instead constructed as an elevated section overhead of Lake Shore Boulevard and at its eastern end forks into a flyover of the Don River mouth and a separate connector to the east. The section between the Parkway and Yonge Street was built eight lanes wide. ;Don Valley Parkway to Leslie Street Known as "Gardiner East", this segment was elevated directly overhead of Lake Shore Boulevard, and opened in July 1966 without ceremony. This section had no access to the Don Valley Parkway, as westbound motorists had to continue underneath on Lake Shore Boulevard which met the Parkway on-ramp at a signalized intersection. Gardiner East ended just east of Leslie Street where eastbound traffic was forced to exit at an offramp descending to Lake Shore Boulevard (renamed from Keating Street) or a circular ramp to Leslie Street, while for westbound traffic entering the expressway there was a single lane onramp. The design left the eastern end open for a future connection with the proposed but never-built Scarborough Expressway, leaving this segment a
spur route. This then-terminus of the Gardiner was also where the provincial Highway 2 routing shifted back to Lake Shore Boulevard, until Highway 2 was decommissioned in 1998. ; Highway 427 to the Humber River This segment, built as part of the Queen Elizabeth Way by the Province of Ontario, was transferred to the City of Toronto in 1997, and designated as part of the Gardiner. The original QEW highway was built in the 1930s and connected to the Gardiner in the 1950s. This section of the QEW between the recently expanded Highway 27 (which would be renumbered as Highway 427 on December 4, 1971) and Lake Shore Boulevard was reconstructed in the late 1960s to 8-10 lanes which included a short collector-express system between Kipling Avenue and Royal York Road. Metro Council approved the renaming in August 1957:
From completion to the present By 1963, the first rooftop billboards along the Expressway were built, targeting the daily 40,000 to 60,000 motorists. Companies paid up to $3,000 per month to locate their billboard. Today, there are dozens of neon signs, billboards and video boards in the proximity of the Expressway, mostly in the sections between Roncesvalles Avenue to Spadina Avenue and east of Jarvis Street. In 1965, 62 yellow 'call boxes', containing phones for emergency assistance, installed by the Ontario Motor League, were fixed to poles on the shoulders. These remained in operation until the 1990s. In 1994, the Road Emergency Services Communications Unit traffic management system began operation on the Gardiner and Lake Shore Boulevard and stranded motorists became quickly detected by the CCTV cameras and operators quickly dispatch assistance. By 1966, rush hour traffic and collisions in the Jameson area meant that the Jameson westbound on-ramp was closed permanently during rush hours. That same year, after criticism of the safety of the expressway by Toronto coroner
Morton Shulman, Metro started installing guardrails on the full length of the Gardiner and Don Valley expressways. In 1968, the speed limit was proposed to be raised from to (today it is . Journalists openly questioned whether anyone could reach that top speed with the "horrendous volume of traffic" during peak rush times. In the late 1980s, Metro Toronto proposed to widen the Gardiner to eight lanes from Strachan Avenue to the Humber, and extend Front Street from Bathurst Street west to connect with the highway. The widening proposal was never implemented as it depended on provincial funding which never materialized. Metro had planned the Front Street extension as part of allowing the Bay-Adelaide office complex and other development downtown to proceed. The Province did approve the Front Street extension, but the then-City of Toronto Council voted against it. The Front Street extension proposal was later resurrected as part of proposals to redevelop or dismantle the central section of the Gardiner. The old Gardiner and Lake Shore Boulevard bridges over the Humber River, which had been in service since the 1950s, were removed and replaced by new structures from 1998-1999, at a cost of million. The old bridge pillars, which were resting on soil, not on bedrock, had sunk by a metre, giving the eastbound Gardiner a roller-coaster ride or "Humber hump". Fatal collisions had occurred at the location, including an August 13, 1995, incident where a speeding automobile going eastbound became airborne and collided with a vehicle in the westbound lanes, killing three people. West of the Humber River, there was also a
weaving problem on the westbound Gardiner due to an on-ramp from Lake Shore Boulevard followed by an off-ramp to Lake Shore Boulevard just before the CN rail underpass. As part of the Humber bridges replacement, the off-ramp (originally built in the 1960s as part of the QEW's widening) was extended and placed upon its own alignment with the exit shifted to before the Humber River, separating traffic from the on-ramp's entry point. The steel guard rail dividing opposing traffic from The East Mall underpass and the Grand Avenue overpass was replaced by an
Ontario "tall-wall" concrete barrier in early 2007, although steel guard rail still remains between the collector and express lanes. The city also replaced the province's late 1960s-era truss light poles with shaded high mast lighting (similar to the lighting on the Don Valley Parkway) west of Kipling Avenue and east of Royal York Road, while a rehabilitation project for the railway underpass east of Park Lawn Avenue took place from 2014-15. The elevated section between the Don River and Leslie Street known as "Gardiner East", intended for connection to the cancelled
Scarborough Expressway, was eventually demolished in 2001. Demolition was first proposed in 1990 by the Crombie Commission and the Lake Shore-Gardiner Task Force. The segment was in need of expensive repairs and a 1996 environmental assessment determined that it would cost $48 million to refurbish the Gardiner from the Don Valley Parkway to Leslie St., but only $34 million to tear it down. The final cost of the demolition was $39 million. In the wake of the demolition of Gardiner East, Lake Shore Boulevard has been revealed from the cover of the highway. Green boulevards have been implemented along the wide thoroughfare. Several supportive concrete pillars of the demolished elevated expressway remain standing as public art. Paved bicycle paths extend eastward for approximately two kilometres from the
Martin Goodman Trail at Cherry Street to Coxwell Avenue. In 2002, a dual on-and-off ramp structure known as the Logan Avenue Ramp was completed just west of Carlaw Avenue, allowing Gardiner eastbound traffic to descend and merge with Lake Shore Boulevard as well as the opposite movement.
Elevated section maintenance The elevated section built with concrete girders was not built to withstand the use of
road salt in the winter. The salt created corrosion of the steel within the concrete bents (vertical columns and horizontal caps), which expanded and weakened the steel and caused pieces of concrete to fall off. Remedial work had to be applied starting in the 1990s at a cost of per year. The remedial work included sealing expansion joints to force the salty water into the drains and extensive patching of the concrete columns. Exposed steel was sand-blasted and repainted. The annual maintenance costs for the Gardiner Expressway were estimated in 2011 at million per year. According to the City of Toronto, the City monitors the pillars on an ongoing basis and "re-coats" the pillars with new coatings of concrete, giving each new pillar an estimated 30 years of extended usage. A section of concrete fell down onto Lake Shore Boulevard in June 2011. In May 2012, pieces fell from the elevated section near Jarvis, and a piece fell from the overpass over
Parkside Drive. In June 2012, concrete fell from the elevated section at Yonge St. and Lake Shore Blvd. which struck a driver's vehicle causing minor damages. One eastbound lane was closed near Cherry Street due to deterioration. The concrete parapet wall could no longer support the light standard in that location. The light standard was instead relocated into the rightmost lane, and the lane was closed. Two locations, at Fort York Boulevard and near Cherry Street were reinforced to prevent "punch-throughs" (holes) from happening on the road surface, potentially knocking a large piece of concrete to the ground below and causing a dangerous incident for the vehicles above.
York/Bay/Yonge Streets ramps rebuild The original York/Bay/Yonge Streets off-ramp was nicknamed the "Hot Wheels ramp" among city staff, due to its looping around to York Street. In 2009, the City of Toronto commenced a study of the York/Bay/Yonge off-ramps and the Bay Street on-ramps "to support and enhance the pedestrian and park spaces in the immediate area while maintaining acceptable traffic capacity and operations". The preferred option identified in the study would be to reconfigure the off-ramp to connect at Simcoe Street, and close the on-ramp from northbound Bay Street to the eastbound Gardiner. The change to the ramps was approved in August 2010 by City Council. An Environmental Assessment was completed in 2013. In 2016, the City of Toronto began construction work on the project. In phase one, the new off-ramp at Lower Simcoe Street was built to feed into a widened Harbour Street. The York/Bay/Yonge off-ramp started demolition in April 2017. This was followed by the widening of Harbour Street from three to four lanes. York Street Park was opened where the York Street off-ramp previously looped, although many of the support pillars were not removed. The York Street Park was built in 2022–23 according to the "Love Park" design chosen in 2018. The new off-ramp opened to traffic on January 28, 2018. The newly-christened
Love Park opened in June 2023.
Gardiner Expressway Strategic Rehabilitation Plan , June 2025 Starting in 2018, the City of Toronto has been rehabilitating the Gardiner from the 427 highway to the Don Valley Parkway. The project is known as the "Gardiner Expressway Strategic Rehabilitation Plan". The work is being done in stages and is already in progress: •
Jarvis Street to Cherry Street - Replacement of the elevated portion. (complete) •
Strachan Avenue to Dufferin Street (in progress) - Replacement of the elevated portion. (2024–2026) This will progress in three stages, replacing two lanes at a time. This was initially contracted to cost CA$260 million, in 2023 and take three years. Additional changes to the project to speed up completion by one year will add CA$73 million, to be paid by Ontario provincial government. The target is for completion before the
2026 FIFA World Cup in July 2026. •
Highway 427 to the Humber River - Reconstruction of roadway and rehabilitation of several bridges. (2026–2029) •
Grand Magazine Street to York Street - Replacement of the elevated portion. (2026–2028) •
Cherry Street to the Don Valley Parkway (DVP) - Replacement of the elevated portion and the interchange with the DVP. (2026–2030) This includes the already completed demolition of the off-ramps to Logan Avenue. •
Humber River to Dufferin Street - Undetermined rehabilitation. (2029–2030)
Transfer to province In November 2016, the City of Toronto and mayor
John Tory considered imposing a toll to use the Gardiner and the Don Valley Parkway, to cover the maintenance costs of the highway and support public transit construction. However, the plan was rejected by the Ontario government. In November 2023, the municipal and provincial governments announced a tentative deal which will see responsibility for the Gardiner Expressway and Don Valley Parkway transferred to the province, with them to be maintained as provincial highways. Construction work on the expressway would be finished 18 months ahead of schedule, opening in late 2025. ==Future==