Caption: A warm spring evening finds freshly painted CP FP7 4069 leading RS10 8568 northbound on Train #11, the Toronto-Sudbury portion of "The Canadian" as they cross over the busy Highway 7 bridge and head north into the town of Woodbridge. #11's previous stop was at West Toronto around 5:30pm, but since Woodbridge's station closed in May 1968 the train won't be stopping for passengers again until Alliston. CP's 4066-4075-series dual service freight/passenger FP7 units and steam generator-equipped RS10's were regular power on the Toronto-Sudbury consists at this time. Behind them are two old lightweight steel baggage cars still sporting older maroon letterbands, while the rest of the train are stainless steel Budd cars in modern action red "CP Rail" paint (CP repainted all of its Budd equipment relatively quickly in 1969, but older steel cars often sported maroon letterbands many years after). Note the typical "Skyline" and "Park" dome cars in consist. CP's premier transcontinental passenger train continued to use this routing until VIA took over in 1978 and switched it to running on CN's lines out of Toronto.

One can make out CN's Halton Sub in the background (note their high bridge over the Humber River, and the second bridge where the CP MacTier Sub ducked under the line). The train is running on CP's MacTier Subdivision, which was originally the Toronto Grey and Bruce Railway line between Toronto and Bolton (constructed in 1869-1870 as a narrow-gauge line), later coming under control of the Grand Trunk Railway (who standard-gauged the line in 1881) and soon after coming under Canadian Pacific Railway control (via CP's Ontario & Quebec Railway). This part of the line however wasn't original to the TG&B.

Time for some local Woodbridge history: the original TG&B alignment through Woodbridge ran through town to the west (branching off to the right where the signal is in the background), but was shifted eastward to this present alignment in 1907 under CP (this involved constructing a new high bridge over the Humber River to the south, and changing the alignment through town including a bridge over Pine Street (today's Woodbridge Ave.)). The old TG&B alignment became a short spur branching south from the station, which lasted into at least the 1980's to serve local industries (there's a segment of rail visible in the parking lot behind Nino D'Aversa Bakery downtown).

However, automobiles and horse-drawn carriages continued to cross the CP line here at Highway 7 (then known as MacKenzie Avenue) at-grade, after climbing a winding hill ("Horner's Hill") to the southeast that looped up from the south end of present-day Wallace Avenue to cross the tracks (I believe the old level crossing would have been where the first or second baggage car is today) and continued on what is the present-day stub road MacKenzie Avenue. A large grade separation project undertaken in 1929-1931 saw a new roadway excavated down to run underneath the rail line and the present bridge built, eliminating the jog in the road, the hill and the level crossing. Highway 7 was widened here in 1961, but the old circa 1930 bridge constrains busy Highway 7 to only four lanes of traffic between Kipling and Islington.

Charles "Chuck" O. Begg photo, Dan Dell'Unto collection slide.