The Labour Day weekend sees the TTC return to fall schedules on several routes, the end of some construction diversions, and the beginning of another.

Subway Service

There is no change in subway service

Streetcar Services

A plan to improve streetcar service to a six minute standard daytime headway begins with 512 St. Clair, and is expected to continue with 511 Bathurst and 505 Dundas at dates yet to be announced.

The construction work at King & Church finished recently. With the new schedules, streetcar service returns to King through downtown, but the west end of the line will divert around reconstruction of King & Dufferin until Thanksgiving weekend.

The 503 Kingston Road car will become a bus with the route shortened to Joe Shuster Way east of Dufferin. The 303 night service will be suspended. On Kingston Road the 322 Coxwell night bus will remain.

The eastern terminus of 508 Lake Shore will be shortened from Broadview Station to Distillery Loop.

Bus Services

Lawrence Station will reopen to bus service allowing restoration of regular bus services. The 52/952 Lawrence service will no longer operate via Avenue Road to Eglinton Station. Routes 124 Sunnybrook and 162 Lawrence-Donway will terminate at Lawrence Station rather than running west to Roe Loop on Avenue Road.

The south end of 325 Don Mills night bus will be extended east from Carlaw via Commissioners to Lake Shore Garage. The east end of 385 Sheppard East night bus will extended from Meadowvale Road to Rouge Hill GO Station.

Some of the seasonal services will end on Labour Day including:

• The weekend service to Biidaasige Park on 72D Pape will end, and buses will return to the 72C terminus at Commissioners and Saulter Streets.
• Weekday service on 200 Toronto Zoo and 201 Bluffer’s Park will end. Weekend service continues.
• Service on 203 High Park will end.

Many routes see restoration of services reduced for the summer lull in riding, although there are a few cuts scattered around the system. A large number of school trippers are also back, but these are not listed here.

The remainder of this article details various aspects of the changes and includes a link to a spreadsheet with the operating plans for all modified routes.

Construction Projects

The table below is the TTC’s list of construction projects affecting service together with their projected end dates.

325 Don Mills & 385 Sheppard East Night Bus Route Extensions

325 Don Mills will be extended south and east to Lakeshore Garage to provide operators with a relief location.

385 Sheppard East will be extended east and south to Rouge Hill GO.

Lawrence Station Reopens to Bus Traffic

Construction at Lawrence Station allows bus traffic to resume standard routes.

• 52/952 Lawrence services will terminate at Lawrence Station rather than running south via Avenue Road to Eglinton Station.
• 124 Sunnybrook and 162 Lawrence-Donway will terminate at Lawrence Station rather than at Roe Loop on Avenue Road.

(Note that proposed changes to services at Sunnybrook Hospital are still under discussion as part of the 2026 Network Plan and they will be implemented at a later date if they are approved.)

Platform allocations at Lawrence and Eglinton Stations are shown below. Routes 51 Leslie and 56 Leaside which had used a platform remote from the station entrance will shift north to use the slot previously occupied by 52 Lawrence.

Note that the Eglinton Station map incorrectly shows a route “56 Avenue Road” in the legend when it should be route 13 (it is correct on Bay 10).

King/Dufferin Project

This project and its effects are discussed in a separate article about streetcar diversions generally. The original start date was to be early after Labour Day, but this has been deferred to mid-September at a date to be announced. One advantage of this change is that the Tiff diversions will be over and done with before the King/Dufferin diversions start. This delay likely means that the diversions will continue into the October schedule period which starts on Thanksgiving weekend.

Although the schedules are drawn up assuming King/Dufferin will be closed, routes will operate normally until this occurs rather than diverting around the intersection.

The route configuration is shown below:

• 29 Dufferin and 329 Dufferin Night Bus will divert via Queen, Shaw and King to loop east of Dufferin. The stop at Joe Shuster will be the last/first stop on their routes.
• 929 Dufferin Express will loop at Queen via Gladstone and Peel.
• 504A King, 304 King Night Car and 508 Lake Shore will divert both ways via Queen east from Roncesvalles and south via Shaw to King. The 504B King car which usually goes to Dufferin Loop will instead loop north on Bathurst to Wolseley Loop.
• 503 Kingston Road will operate with buses and will use the same loop as 29 Dufferin.

Streetcar Maps

The maps below show the daytime and overnight configurations of the streetcar network for the September schedules. Note that only 501 Queen remains operating via the Richmond/Adelaide detour. The night service map does not show the 322 Coxwell service to Bingham, but this does appear in the GTFS version of the schedules which are already available on Toronto’s Open Data page.

Fleet Summaries

The peak vehicles in use for September sits at 1,596 buses and 152 streetcars on weekdays. On Saturdays, the streetcar peak hits 158 vehicles. Allowing for 20% spares, this implies a requirement of 190 streetcars out of a fleet that will soon number 263, and 1,915 buses out of a total of 2,044. There is headroom for additional service if only the TTC had the budget and staff to operate it.

Carhouse Allocation

The Six Minute Streetcar Network

TTC hopes to provide service every six minutes on its streetcar network with a gradual buildup over the next few years. 512 St. Clair is the first route to see this improvement.

One very troubling aspect, however, is that St. Clair has extremely long recovery time relative to the length of the route, far more than one would expect especially considering that it has an almost totally exclusive right-of-way.

Recovery times of up to 16 minutes appear in the weekday schedules, about 25% of the round trip time. This amount of recovery time is more commonly seen on longer mixed-traffic routes like 504A King (Distillery to Dundas West). The St. Clair car definitely needs a review of its actual operating conditions.

RAD Bus Allocation

The TTC operates a pool of Run As Directed (“RAD”) buses primarily in the PM peak and evening. The allocation of these vehicles by garage is shown below. This is possible because there are both surplus buses and operators.

Budget Hours

This table shows the number of vehicle hours planned in the budget and scheduled. In recent months, the actual scheduled service has exceeded the budgeted level. Considering that ridership is running about 1% below budget, it is not clear what the effect of extra service and lower revenue will be by year-end.

EBus Compatibility

The table below shows the number of scheduled blocks (periods one vehicle stays in service continuously) by mileage as a measure of whether they can be operated with eBuses given their limited range. This problem is particularly acute on weekends when there is no mid-day lull in service requirement between two peaks, and many buses remain in service all day.

As more eBuses enter service, the TTC is adjusting schedules to create more short blocks at Arrow and McNicoll Divisions. The extra garage mileage and hours this requires is an overhead cost of eBuses compared to hybrids.

Temporary Service Improvements

Because the TTC has extra buses and operators, they will provide added, unscheduled service on routes with crowding or resiliency problems. The affected routes are:

Service Change Details

Planned service changes will occur on the routes and at times listed below. For complete information on the existing and new operating plans, please see the spreadsheet linked at the end of the article.

Not listed here are the large number of school trips on many bus routes that were suspended for the Summer but are now restored with the Fall schedules.

Several routes, noted in the spreadsheet, will have early morning and late night schedule adjustments to better align with connecting routes such as the subway and the night services.

Streetcars

• 503 Kingston Road: Bus replacement service will operate on the same headways as the streetcar service except for peak periods when it will change from a streetcar every 8′ to a bus every 7′. Running times are reduced to reflect the end of the King/Church diversions.
• 303 Kingston Road Night: Service suspended. The30′ service on 322 Coxwell Night remains on Kingston Road.
• 504 King: Streetcars will generally operate on the same headway as the current mixed streetcar/bus service except in peak periods and weekend afternoons when streetcar service will be slightly less frequent. Running times are reduced to reflect the end of the King/Church diversions.
• 304 King: Service will improve from every 20′ to every 10′ to reflect the suspension of the 303 Kingston Road Night Car.
• 508 Lake Shore: Service resumes, but will now terminate at Distillery Loop rather than at Broadview Station.
• 510 Spadina cars will run to/from Leslie Barns via King Street now that King/Church has reopened.
• 511 Bathurst cars will run to/from Roncesvalles Carhouse via Queen and Shaw streets during the King/Dufferin project.
• 512 St. Clair will see service improved to every 6′ during the daytime on all days. One car will be added late evenings weekdays to provide additional running time.

Buses

• 307 Bathurst Night Bus: One vehicle added on all days to provide additional running time. No change in service levels.
• 11 Bayview: Seasonal service increase weekday peak periods, midday and late evening.
• 15 Evans: Seasonal service increase weekday PM peak.
• 924 Victoria Park Express: PM peak service will begin at 2:00pm rather than 3:00pm.
• 325 Don Mills Night Bus: Extended to Lakeshore Garage.
• 29/929/329 Dufferin Services: Diverted for King/Dufferin project. No change in service levels.
• 34 Eglinton East: Seasonal service increase weekday peak periods.
• 36 Finch West: Additional peak period extra trips restored. No change in scheduled service.
• 38/938 Highland Creek: Seasonal service increase weekdays except late evenings with the restoration of the express service to UTSC.
• 39 Finch East: Midday and evening service weekdays reduced. Peak period running times adjusted with no change in service levels.
• 40/340 Junction: Seasonal service increase weekday peaks and midday, Saturday late morning, Sunday late morning, afternoon and early evening. Sunday service reduced slightly late evening. Sunday early morning service replaced by 340 Junction Night Bus.
• 41 Keele: Seasonal increase in all weekday periods except late evenings.
• 50 Burnhamthorpe: Seasonal increase in weekday peak periods, and on weekends.
• 52 Lawrence: Service restored to Lawrence Station with headways unchanged in most periods except AM Peak and late evening weekdays (service reduced). Running times adjusted for the shorter route.
• 54 Lawrence East: Seasonal improvement in weekday peak and midday service.
• 60/960 Steeles West: Seasonal improvement to AM peak, midday and early evening weekday service.
• 61 Avenue Road North: Seasonal improvement to weekday peak and midday service, Saturday morning and afternoons, Sunday afternoons. Service reduction weekend evenings to provide added running time.
• 62 Mortimer: Seasonal service improvement in all weekday periods.
• 66 Prince Edward: Seasonal service improvement in 66B Lake Shore service in peak periods.
• 72 Pape: Seasonal weekend extension to Biidaasige Park discontinued.
• 75 Sherbourne: Seasonal service increase during weekday peak and midday periods.
• 76 Royal York South: Seasonal restoration of 76C Queensway peak service. PM peak headways widened to provide added running time. Late evening 76B service to Grand Avenue cut on weekdays.
• 83 Jones: Seasonal improvement in peak service.
• 84/984 Sheppard: Seasonal improvement in weekday peak, midday and early evening service.
• 385 Sheppard East Night Bus: Extended to Rouge Hill GO.
• 989 Weston: Seasonal improvement in peak service.
• 90 Vaughan: Sunday afternoon service improvement.
• 92 Woodbine South: Seasonal decreases in service during many periods.
• 96/996 Wilson: Weekday midday express service improvement. Weekend local serviceimprovements during mornings, afternoons and early evenings.
• 98 Willowdale-Senlac: Weekday headways widened during most periods to provide added running time. Weekend service improved and running time extended late mornings, afternoons and early evenings.
• 100 Flemingdon Park: Peak service slightly reduced. Weekday running times increased.
• 102/902: Markham Road: 102A service and extra 902 express trip at 7:47am to Centennial College restored. Early morning trip times on 102D Major Mackenzie service adjusted to align with YRT service at 7th and 16th Avenues. PM Peak 102C Steeles via Dynamic service restored.
• 105 Dufferin North: Headways widened in most periods for additional running time, reduced in a few to trim excess. Details in the spreadsheet.
• 107 York University Heights: Seasonal service improvement in weekday peaks and midday.
• 108 Driftwood: Seasonal service improvement in weekday peaks and midday. Headways widened weekday early evenings and Sunday afternoons for added running time.
• 112 West Mall: Seasonal service improvement weekdays except early evenings when service is reduced.
• 114 Queen’s Quay East: Seasonal service increase in all weekday periods.
• 121 Esplanade-River: Destination sign changed to “Hennick Bridgepoint Hospital” for consistency with other routes serving that site.
• 124 Sunnybrook: Service restored to Lawrence Station. Service improved in some periods, reduced in others. See spreadsheet for details.
• 133 Neilson: Service increase weekday peaks, midday and early evening, weekend afternoons and early evenings.
• 134 Progress: Seasonal service improvement weekdays except late evenings.
• 161 Rogers Road: Seasonal service improvement weekdays except midday, Sundays except afternoons.
• 162 Lawrence-Donway: Service restored to Lawrence Station. Service level unchanged.
• 165 Weston Road North: Seasonal service restoration PM peak, weekends late morning, afternoon and early evening.
• 185 Sheppard Central: Headways and running times adjusted for reliability. See spreadsheet for details.
• 200 Toronto Zoo: Weekday service discontinued.
• 201 Bluffer’s Park: Weekday service discontinued.
• 203 High Park: Service discontinued.
• 900 Airport Express: Seasonal increase in Sunday afternoon and early evening service.
• 903 Kennedy-Scarborough Express: Seasonal service improvement to Centennial College.
• 905 Eglinton East Express: Seasonal service improvement weekday during all periods.
• 927 Highway 27 Express: Additional midday trips to Humber College restored. This route will continue to operate with standard sized buses due to a shortage of articulated vehicles.

Operating Plan Details

The spreadsheet linked here shows detailed operating plans for the September scheduled compared with those in use for August.

• 20250831_Service_Changes (Version 2)