Streetcar to Toronto

In 1899 the rails of an electric street railway system – today we’d call it a streetcar line – pushed up Yonge St. and reached Newmarket. The tracks came into town in the area of today’s Cane Parkway, and then went up Main St. First terminal was the Railroad Hotel (now King George Hotel), Timothy and Main Sts., but later the tracks were moved west of Main St. and a station was built on Botsford St. across from the Old Town Hall. The tracks eventually continued north to Sutton West.

The “radial” brought tourists flocking to town. They came for the Saturday farmers’s market, which was famous throughout the area, and special trains were run from Toronto for the North York Agricultural Fair held each September in Newmarket. The street railway also carried freight, including locally-produced farm produce, to Toronto markets.

Better highways and cheaper cars and trucks eventually put the line out of business. It was discontinued north of Richmond Hill in the early 1930s, and in 1947 the tracks between North Toronto and Richmond Hill were torn up.

- Terry Carter