Caption: Toronto Transit Commission ICTS cars 3006 and 3007 are seen outside Kennedy Station during the two-month Scarborough Rapid Transit (SRT) line's free ride period for the public (over a small portion of the line), still a few months away from full completion and opening for revenue service in March 1985. The joint Kennedy subway/SRT station featured the SRT platforms on the upper level, the bus terminal concourse at ground level, and the subway platforms for the easternmost end of the Bloor-Danforth line below. A school of the TTC's classic GMC "fishbowl" buses populate the bus terminal. In the foreground is the CN's Uxbridge Sub that runs alongside part of the SRT line.
Reminiscent of an 80's zoo monorail, the Scarborough RT was the result of 1970's Scarborough wanting a link to the rest of Toronto's subway network. A lack of density along the route (lots of low-density residential and industrial lands) didn't warrant a costly full subway line extension, so the TTC was initially building it as a grade-separated LRT to use the new CLRV streetcars (operating alone or in multiple/MU) to service it. Due to political pressure by the Ontario government of the day, they ended up changing plans and building the line to run the government's expermental Intermediate Capacity Transit System (ICTS) instead, essentially a halfway transit solution between a streetcar and a subway.
Much to the government's disappointment, their ICTS system never caught on outside of a few transit agencies (notably Vancouver and Detroit) and decades later, the TTC's Scarborough RT system is an orphan on the system that has reached the end of its lifespan. The equipment is old and obsolete, and can't be easily replaced by new off-the-shelf design cars due to restrictions on the line, nor can the line easily be upgraded to handle modern equipment or even a subway itself.
The SRT had been green-lit in the 2000's to be replaced with a fully funded LRT system, until the election of Rob Ford - who cancelled the LRT in favour of his promise of building Scarborough a subway extension of their own instead. Years of political squabbles followed over the costs involved of replacing it with an LRT or subway, subsequent councils changing their minds a few times, and later how much of the proposed subway extension should (or could) be built. In the meantime, the TTC has manged to kept the SRT running, and the residents of Scarborough keep waiting for their "someday, someway" subway promise.
Original photographer unknown, Dan Dell'Unto collection slide.
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