Union Station’s subway platforms opened on February 28, 1954, but the site has long served as Toronto’s central transportation hub—connecting local and regional transit under one evolving structure. Beneath the heritage façade of the main rail terminal, the TTC’s compact subway level pushes thousands of riders through tight spaces, linking them to GO trains, VIA Rail, the UP Express to Pearson Airport, and a steady flow of streetcars and buses along Front Street. The scale of movement here is unmatched anywhere else in the system.
The station sits at the heart of downtown, surrounded by landmarks like the CN Tower, Scotiabank Arena, and the waterfront. And yet, much of its experience happens below grade, in a complex network of corridors, platforms, and transfer points that feel both monumental and constrained. Union is where Toronto’s layered infrastructure reveals itself most clearly—a dense tangle of old and new, national and local, formal architecture and improvisational expansion. It’s not just a station—it’s a threshold between systems, districts, and speeds of life.
Station Photos
