Sherbourne Street (Toronto)

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A blockhouse built at the north end of Sherbourne was one of seven blockhouses built to defend Toronto after the 1837 Rebellion.
This view, down Sherbourne, on 2003-08-15, the night a massive blackout hit Ontario and the US eastern seaboard, shows Sherbourne remained active, in spite of the blackout.

Sherbourne Street is an important roadway in downtown Toronto, Ontario.[1] It is one of the original streets in the original city of York, Upper Canada.

In 1838, following the Upper Canada Rebellion, seven blockhouses were built, guarding the approaches to Toronto, including the Sherbourne Blockhouse, built at the current intersection of Sherbourne and Bloor.

In the 19th Century Sherbourne was lined with the stately homes of many of Toronto's most prominent families, but by the 20th Century remaining stately houses, like 230 Sherbourne Street had been converted to rooming houses.[2]

A streetcar ran down Sherbourne from 1874-1942.[3]

In the early 2000s City Council chose Sherbourne as one of the first streets in Toronto to be retrofitted with dedicated bike lanes. In 2012 Sherbourne's bike lanes were improved, changing them from lanes separated from cars and trucks solely by painted lines to lanes with a pavement change that would warn motorists when they had strayed out of their lanes.[4][5]

References

  1. Mary Ormsby. Sherbourne: Toronto's 'city in one street', Toronto Star, 2009-11-29. “From its origins two centuries ago, Sherbourne reflected what the city of York would become – a duelling ground where privilege, poverty and politics would battle to shape the metropolis. Those duels aren't over.”
  2. Lesley McCave (2005). Time Out Toronto. Time Out Guides. ISBN 9781904978329. Retrieved on 2013-03-11. “Sherbourne Street houses many excellent 19th-century buildings, but the most interesting is probably the Clarion Selby Hotel & Suites at No. 592. At different times it has house everything and everyone from Ernest Hemingway to a gay backroom bar. The original macho man stayed here in September 1923, when the building was the Selby Hotel and Hemingway was a reporter for the Toronto Star.” 
  3. James Bow, Pete Coulman. Remembering the Sherbourne Streetcar (1874-1942), Transit Toronto, 2013-01-03. “Sherbourne Street was, after Yonge Street, the first major north-south street in Toronto to reach north towards Bloor. As streetcar service grew and developed in the young city, it wasn’t long before streetcar tracks followed.”
  4. Don Peat. Sherbourne bike lanes get ready to roll as Jarvis fight looms, TOronto Sun, 2012-09-25. “The stretch of separated lanes are expected to be completed next month and will be the first on-road separated bike lanes in the city.”
  5. James Armstrong. North American cyclists up to 30 times more likely to be injured than European cyclists, Global Toronto, 2013-02-20. “The study found that separated bike lanes, found on the length of Sherbourne Street from King Street to Bloor Street, significantly decrease the risk of injury among cyclists.”

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