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St. Clair Avenue
St. Clair Avenue is a major east-west street in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It was laid out in the late 18th century by the British as a concession road (the Third Concession), 2 kilometres (1.2 mi) north of Bloor Street and 4 kilometres (2.5 mi) north of Queen Street.
St. Clair Avenue has two sections. The western section extends from Moore Park in the east to Scarlett Road in the west, a distance of approximately 10 kilometres (6.2 mi). An eastern section picks up on the far side of the Don Valley at Taylor Creek Park, extending for 7 kilometres (4.3 mi) to Kingston Road. Like all streets in Toronto which cross Yonge Street, St. Clair is divided into separate East and West sections, each with its own street numbers beginning at Yonge Street. Unlike most other concession-road streets in Toronto, St. Clair does not extend west into Etobicoke, due to the northern arc of Dundas Street crossing the Humber River near its western terminus, forming a link to Burnhamthorpe Road, its approximate equivalent arterial.
St. Clair Avenue West has heavy automotive and public transit traffic. Over half the commuters in rush hour traffic travel by the 512 St. Clair streetcar line which connects with St. Clair subway station on Line 1 Yonge–University and St. Clair West station also on the Line 1 Yonge-University subway. The eastern section of St. Clair Avenue East is serviced by the 8 Broadview and 102 Markham Road bus routes.
St. Clair Avenue takes its name from Augustine St. Clare, a character from the novel Uncle Tom's Cabin. The Grainger family, who rented a farm near the present-day intersection of Avenue Road and St. Clair, had viewed a stage production of Uncle Tom's Cabin. Two members of the family, Albert and Edwin, adopted names of two characters as their middle names as each boy had no given middle name. Edwin added Norton to his name, and Albert chose St. Clare, although he used the incorrect spelling of St. Clair, as it was used in the theatre program. (Lake St. Clair and the St. Clair River use the same spelling, though they are named for the actual Saint Clare of Assisi, on whose feast day they were encountered by Sieur de La Salle.) As a joke, Edwin and Albert made street signs using their names and posted them at Yonge and St. Clair. The St. Clair sign survived for a while and the name became adopted as the name for the 3rd Concession Road. The first known printed use of the St. Clair name was in an 1878 publication, Illustrated Historical Atlas of the County of York.
In 1913, a Roman Catholic church was built in the Earlscourt District, and named after the actual Saint Clare. St. Clare's Church is at 1118 St. Clair Avenue West, on the north side of the street, east of Dufferin. The parish opened the St. Clare's Catholic School, an elementary school, next door in 1910.
The first settlement on St. Clair was at Yonge Street, where the Heath family bought land in 1837. A thriving neighbourhood, Deer Park, was established by the 1850s. The next settlement was about 5.5 km (3.4 mi) west, at Old Weston Road (then Weston Road), where settlement of Carlton Village began in the late 1840s. The western end of St. Clair experienced substantial development, with the municipalities of West Toronto, Earlscourt, Dovercourt, and Oakwood established there.
These municipalities were annexed by Toronto between 1908 and 1911, and the western section of St. Clair Avenue became entirely managed by the City of Toronto. To stimulate development along what was then largely a rural road, the city's Toronto Civic Railways built a streetcar line from Yonge Street to Caledonia Road by 1912. This included the construction of a bridge across Nordheimer Ravine (after an earth berm collapsed) as well as what was termed the Lauder Fill: the burying of the western branch of Garrison Creek, the final section to be routed into the city's stormwater system.
The growth of the inner suburbs of Leaside, Rosedale and Moore Park prompted the city of Toronto to approach the operators of Mount Pleasant Cemetery in 1912 with the goal of extending the short Mount Pleasant Road south through the cemetery to connect with St. Clair. Though the operators initially refused, they later accepted the city's offer of $100,000 ($2,095,000, adjusted for inflation) in 1915. The muddy road was opened to traffic in 1918. The construction of the Vale of Avoca through the first half of the 1920s prompted the new Toronto Transit Commission to extend the St. Clair streetcar line east to Mount Pleasant Road and then north to Eglinton Avenue.
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St. Clair Avenue
St. Clair Avenue is a major east-west street in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It was laid out in the late 18th century by the British as a concession road (the Third Concession), 2 kilometres (1.2 mi) north of Bloor Street and 4 kilometres (2.5 mi) north of Queen Street.
St. Clair Avenue has two sections. The western section extends from Moore Park in the east to Scarlett Road in the west, a distance of approximately 10 kilometres (6.2 mi). An eastern section picks up on the far side of the Don Valley at Taylor Creek Park, extending for 7 kilometres (4.3 mi) to Kingston Road. Like all streets in Toronto which cross Yonge Street, St. Clair is divided into separate East and West sections, each with its own street numbers beginning at Yonge Street. Unlike most other concession-road streets in Toronto, St. Clair does not extend west into Etobicoke, due to the northern arc of Dundas Street crossing the Humber River near its western terminus, forming a link to Burnhamthorpe Road, its approximate equivalent arterial.
St. Clair Avenue West has heavy automotive and public transit traffic. Over half the commuters in rush hour traffic travel by the 512 St. Clair streetcar line which connects with St. Clair subway station on Line 1 Yonge–University and St. Clair West station also on the Line 1 Yonge-University subway. The eastern section of St. Clair Avenue East is serviced by the 8 Broadview and 102 Markham Road bus routes.
St. Clair Avenue takes its name from Augustine St. Clare, a character from the novel Uncle Tom's Cabin. The Grainger family, who rented a farm near the present-day intersection of Avenue Road and St. Clair, had viewed a stage production of Uncle Tom's Cabin. Two members of the family, Albert and Edwin, adopted names of two characters as their middle names as each boy had no given middle name. Edwin added Norton to his name, and Albert chose St. Clare, although he used the incorrect spelling of St. Clair, as it was used in the theatre program. (Lake St. Clair and the St. Clair River use the same spelling, though they are named for the actual Saint Clare of Assisi, on whose feast day they were encountered by Sieur de La Salle.) As a joke, Edwin and Albert made street signs using their names and posted them at Yonge and St. Clair. The St. Clair sign survived for a while and the name became adopted as the name for the 3rd Concession Road. The first known printed use of the St. Clair name was in an 1878 publication, Illustrated Historical Atlas of the County of York.
In 1913, a Roman Catholic church was built in the Earlscourt District, and named after the actual Saint Clare. St. Clare's Church is at 1118 St. Clair Avenue West, on the north side of the street, east of Dufferin. The parish opened the St. Clare's Catholic School, an elementary school, next door in 1910.
The first settlement on St. Clair was at Yonge Street, where the Heath family bought land in 1837. A thriving neighbourhood, Deer Park, was established by the 1850s. The next settlement was about 5.5 km (3.4 mi) west, at Old Weston Road (then Weston Road), where settlement of Carlton Village began in the late 1840s. The western end of St. Clair experienced substantial development, with the municipalities of West Toronto, Earlscourt, Dovercourt, and Oakwood established there.
These municipalities were annexed by Toronto between 1908 and 1911, and the western section of St. Clair Avenue became entirely managed by the City of Toronto. To stimulate development along what was then largely a rural road, the city's Toronto Civic Railways built a streetcar line from Yonge Street to Caledonia Road by 1912. This included the construction of a bridge across Nordheimer Ravine (after an earth berm collapsed) as well as what was termed the Lauder Fill: the burying of the western branch of Garrison Creek, the final section to be routed into the city's stormwater system.
The growth of the inner suburbs of Leaside, Rosedale and Moore Park prompted the city of Toronto to approach the operators of Mount Pleasant Cemetery in 1912 with the goal of extending the short Mount Pleasant Road south through the cemetery to connect with St. Clair. Though the operators initially refused, they later accepted the city's offer of $100,000 ($2,095,000, adjusted for inflation) in 1915. The muddy road was opened to traffic in 1918. The construction of the Vale of Avoca through the first half of the 1920s prompted the new Toronto Transit Commission to extend the St. Clair streetcar line east to Mount Pleasant Road and then north to Eglinton Avenue.