{"id":2566,"date":"2007-12-11T14:34:13","date_gmt":"2007-12-11T18:34:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spacingtoronto.ca\/?p=2566"},"modified":"2007-12-11T14:36:00","modified_gmt":"2007-12-11T18:36:00","slug":"the-death-and-life-of-great-queen-street","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2007\/12\/11\/the-death-and-life-of-great-queen-street\/","title":{"rendered":"The Death and Life of Great Queen Street"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>\n

Hot on the heels of the Fix the Queen Streetcar Forum<\/a>, where the corpse of the once great 501 line was kicked around<\/a> and administered the defibrillator paddles, National Geographic has released a new coffee table book called “Journeys of a Lifetime<\/a>: 500 of the World’s Greatest Trips” and it includes our Queen line. From CP<\/a>:<\/p>\n

The 501, boasting one of the longest streetcar routes in North America, is listed among the top 10 trolley rides on the planet. Others include Berlin’s Tram 68, Lisbon’s 28 Tram, Seattle’s George Benson Waterfront Streetcar, New Orleans’ St. Charles Streetcar Tour, Hong Kong’s trams and San Francisco’s Streetcar F.<\/em><\/p>\n

National Geographic lists trolleys as “the best way to see a city from an insider’s perspective.”<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

With the frustrating waits, short turns, packed cars and riders bailing out and seeking other ways to get around the bottom of Toronto, it’s easy to forget what a magnificent trip the 501 can be (when you’re not in a hurry). We once rode the entire length from Long Branch to Neville Park on a Sunday afternoon and it was quite something to see the character of the streetcar change as it passed through so many different neighbourhoods. For those needing an additional reminder of our Queen’s storied magnificence, read through the Queen Street — One Street \/ Many Stories<\/a> online archive written by Rick BeBout:<\/p>\n

Queen Street is one of Toronto’s oldest, longest, and most varied routes. It began in 1793 as a line on a map, running dead straight for ten miles, in modern measure some 16 kilometres. It is the spine, the high street, the main street of many distinct, and quite different, neighbourhoods.<\/em><\/p>\n

The street runs through the very heart of the city, bustling with traffic, bristling with towers, a downtown barely aware of the shoreline just south. From each end of Queen, far east and west, we can look out unimpeded over a vast Great Lake, an inland sea: Toronto’s very reason for being.<\/em><\/p>\n

It passes where people live (more than 100,000 within a few blocks north and south), work (100,000 more by day, even some at night, in downtown towers), and play — from one end to the other, each once leading to a lakeside amusement park. The street is address to public libraries, firehalls, police stations, churches and schools, even a former university; two City Halls, old and new; an asylum (three prisons nearby, two former); an Art Deco palace of water purification and, not far away, a high tech sewage treatment plant. There were once even public loos.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The good news is most of the bad news can be solved with some political will and smart planning, which will eventually come — what’s that about hitting the bottom before going back up? Queen Street can (and will) again live up to its deserved reputation as a great trip.<\/p>\n

Photo by rhygin<\/a>. <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Hot on the heels of the Fix the Queen Streetcar Forum, where the corpse of the once great 501 line was kicked around and administered the defibrillator paddles, National Geographic has released a new coffee table book called “Journeys of a Lifetime: 500 of the World’s Greatest Trips” and it includes our Queen line. FromContinue reading “The Death and Life of Great Queen Street”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4004,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[32,8],"tags":[532,7613,7614,6528,7610,7611,1125,7615,1154,3805,21,316,7612,576,430,19],"class_list":["post-2566","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-streetscape","category-transit","tag-berlin","tag-great-lake","tag-high-tech-sewage-treatment-plant","tag-lisbon","tag-national-geographic","tag-neville-park","tag-new-orleans","tag-new-orleans-st-charles-streetcar-tour","tag-north-america","tag-online-archive","tag-other-cities","tag-queen","tag-rick-bebout","tag-san-francisco","tag-seattle","tag-toronto"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nThe Death and Life of Great Queen Street - Spacing Toronto<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/toronto\/2007\/12\/11\/the-death-and-life-of-great-queen-street\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Death and Life of Great Queen Street - Spacing Toronto\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Hot on the heels of the Fix the Queen Streetcar Forum, where the corpse of the once great 501 line was kicked around and administered the defibrillator paddles, National Geographic has released a new coffee table book called “Journeys of a Lifetime: 500 of the World’s Greatest Trips” and it includes our Queen line. 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