Scarborough Expressway

The cancelled expressways in Toronto were a planned series of expressways in Toronto, Ontario, Canada that were only partially built or cancelled due to public opposition. The system of expressways was intended to spur or handle growth in the suburbs of Toronto, but were opposed by citizens within the city of Toronto proper, citing the demolition of homes and park lands, air pollution, noise and the high cost of construction. The Spadina Expressway, planned since the 1940s, was cancelled in 1971 after being only partially constructed. After the Spadina cancellation, other expressway plans, intended to create a 'ring' around the central core, were abandoned.

By the 1940s, urban development extended past the city of Toronto's borders. It was recognized within the planning department of the city that population growth would take place and that the farmlands outside of the city's border would be developed. In 1943, the City of Toronto Planning Board developed a plan for the area within a nine-mile radius of Yonge Street and Queen Street. It included a network of superhighways:

Source: Sewell( 2009)

With the creation of Metropolitan Toronto (Metro) in 1953, a new level of government was created with the authority to build what was necessary to facilitate the growth expected within the Metro area. Metro would build the infrastructure, such as sewers, sewage treatment plants, public transit, highways and arterial roads, leaving local roads and land use planning to the individual governments. Based on the 1940s plans, Metro planned to build an extensive network of highways that crisscrossed the city. While Metro would pay 100% of the cost of most infrastructure, Ontario paid 50% of the cost of road projects.

While the provincial government would plan and build highways crossing Metro and highways to connect to municipalities outside of Metro, Metro would focus on roads serving the downtown core and connecting the downtown core to the growing suburbs. The plan was centred on a number of major routes, notably the "Muskoka Highway" (Ontario Highway 400) on the north-west of Toronto, and the Queen Elizabeth Way on the southwest side. The province was already deep in the planning process for what would become Highway 400 along the northern reaches of the city, in what was then farmland far from the city core. To connect these highways, which ended at the city limits for the most part, with the downtown core, Metro would be responsible for continuing construction into the city.

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