Counting down: 30 days until Spadina subway rolls into Vaughan

Long-awaited 8.6-kilometre extension will carry subway outside Toronto's borders for 1st time

Yorkregion.com
Nov. 17, 2017
By Adam Martin-Robbins

The countdown is on.

It's now just 30-days until the first subway train rolls into Vaughan on Dec. 17.

Municipal politicians from Vaughan, Toronto and the Region of York were joined by Vaughan-Woodbridge MP Francesco Sorbara, King-Vaughan MP Deb Schulte and Transportation Minister Steven Del Duca, MPP for Vaughan, at a news conference Nov. 17 to mark the milestone.

The long-awaited 8.6-kilometre extension of TTC's Line 1 from Downsview Park Station to the Vaughan Metropolitan Centre, at Hwy. 7 and Jane Street, brings the subway beyond Toronto's borders for the first time.

The extended subway line boasts six eye-catching new stations, three commuter parking lots, plus TTC, York Region Transit and GO bus terminals along the route.

Expected to carry at least 100,000 passengers per year to and from the VMC station, the extension has been plagued by delays and ballooning costs.

Originally, it was slated to open in 2015, but late in 2012, the TTC announced the deadline was being pushed back to the fall of 2016.

Then, in 2015, the opening date was once again delayed to December 2017.

Along with the delays, the project's cost soared to $3.2 billion from the original forecast of $2.6 billion.