CP Toronto Yard Part 2

August 2021

Belt pack switching and pulldown, MOW van and flat cars, Jordan Spreader, heritage SD70ACU, remains of the hump yard, and SOO 4410 on the dead track!

Toronto Yard in Agincourt was built by CP in the early 1960s, open in 1964. It's layout and design was based off a Great Northern yard in North Dakota and upon opening was the most modern and advanced rail marshalling facility in Canada. It allowed the move away from downtown yards, and added capacity over Lambton and West Toronto which already had heavy urban development around them. It was built near the split in the Havelock and Belleville Subdivisions allowing trains to flow in from the major Southern Ontario routes.

It's hump yard, both track and retarders were removed in the mid 2010s as a cost cutting measure. It's rumored a limited new hump facility may be planned for the site in the near future. These types of yards were closed at CN years before under the same management group, but have since been mostly reopened. At CP they were closed and the equipment removed to prevent this, including at CP's Alyth Yard in Calgary.

Toronto Yard is the point of origin and terminus for freight trains to and from Havelock.
The Havelock cars of Nepheline Syenite and roofing granules are shipped all over North America from here and loads of grains and fertilizer for the Peterboro area arrive via Toronto yard from across the network.



Along the route of the proposed VIA Rail VIA HFR project