The Toronto Railway Museum is located in the heart of the historic John Street Roundhouse. A National Historic Site, the John Street Roundhouse was built in 1929 by the Canadian Pacific Railway to house and repair its large fleet of passenger locomotives travelling through Union Station.
The Roundhouse was a very active industrial building; in use 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, steam locomotives were serviced in the 32 stalls around the clock. In its prime, the John Street locomotive facilities contained 43 structures and several miles of track and covered nearly 16 acres of property. Rail activity at the John Street Roundhouse began to dwindle in 1960s when diesel locomotives began to replace steam locomotives, and eventually closed in 1986.
The western portion of the park closest to the Roundhouse features the original, fully restored and operational 120-foot long locomotive turntable. Immediately north of this is a carefully chosen collection of full-sized railway equipment, which make up part of the Toronto Railway Museum’s collection. The museum tells the stories of Toronto’s railways through static and interactive exhibits inside of Stall 17, as well as by leading guided tours through the rolling stock and rail buildings in the collection.
