504 King


504 King is an east–west streetcar route in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It serves King Street in Downtown Toronto as well as Broadview Avenue on the east end and Roncesvalles Avenue on the west end of the line. The route consists of two overlapping branches: 504A between Line 2 Bloor–Danforth's Dundas West station and Distillery Loop, and 504B between Broadview stationalso on Line 2and Dufferin Gate Loop. The two branches overlap on King Street between Dufferin and Sumach streets, both passing St. Andrew station and King station on subway Line 1 Yonge–University.
The 504 King is the busiest line in the Toronto streetcar system., the combined daily ridership of routes 504 King and 514 Cherry was 72,000 trips, which was significantly higher than two of the TTC's rapid transit lines, Line 3 Scarborough and Line 4 Sheppard. The 514 route was merged into the 504 route on October 7, 2018.

History

On July 1, 1923, as part of a reorganization of streetcar routes, the King streetcar route acquired its current U-shape. The west end of the line was at the Vincent Loop, located near the northeast corner of Dundas Street West and Bloor Street West, across the street from today's Dundas West station. The east end of the line was at the Erindale Loop, located at the northeast corner of Broadview Avenue and Erindale Avenue, on the north side of today's Broadview station.
On February 25, 1966, the Bloor–Danforth subway opened, and Dundas West station replaced the Vincent Loop, and Broadview station replaced the Erindale Loop. Both new subway stations had, and still have, a streetcar loop within the fare-paid zone. Otherwise, the King streetcar route had changed little since 1923.
In 2006, the TTC briefly considered adding couplers to streetcars to enable operation of streetcars in two or three units, a common practice until the opening of the Bloor–Danforth subway; the expectation was that this would keep them from bunching and becoming stuck in traffic. This plan was rejected in favour of ordering brand-new, longer Flexity Outlook vehicles.
Starting June 19, 2016, a new route – 514 Cherry – was created to supplement 504 King service on King Street between Dufferin and Sumach streets. The 514 route increased capacity along the King Street corridor to address the growing downtown ridership. It also addressed accessibility concerns through its use of the low-floor Flexity Outlook streetcars.
From December 2, 2017, the TTC assigned a minimum of two low-floor accessible Flexity Outlook streetcars on 504 King to handle weekday overcrowding, as the [|King Street Pilot Project] improved service performance and made the service more popular.
On October 7, 2018, 504 King was divided into two overlapping branches with two new termini replacing the 514 Cherry route, which was permanently cancelled on the same date. The 304 King Blue Night service remained unchanged.
By January 6, 2019, the 504 King route was fully served by Flexity Outlook streetcars. Thus, the TTC designated the route as accessible except along Roncesvalles Avenue where the platform height still needed to be adjusted to allow deployment of the Flexity ramp.

Blue Night service

From 1987 to 1992, the Blue Night Network included the 304 King route, which provided overnight service along the length of the 504 King daytime route. The 304 route was eliminated in February 1992, with the Broadview and Roncesvalles segments replaced by portions of other Blue Night bus routes; however, King Street remained unserviced directly until September 6, 2015, when the 304 King was restored as part of a $95million investment from Toronto City Council. Currently, overnight service operate every 30 minutes between Broadview and Dundas West stations via Broadview Avenue, King Street, and Roncesvalles Avenue.

Roncesvalles Avenue

On December 19, 2010, 504 streetcar service returned to Roncesvalles Avenue after service was suspended for track replacement work. As part of the construction work, the street was rebuilt to a new design, including bike lanes and a widened sidewalk "bumpout" at stops to allow riders to board streetcars directly from the curb. In these sections, the bike lane gently rises from the main road to run on top of the ; when a streetcar is stopped at a bumpout, cyclists are required to stop and allow riders to board or alight from the vehicle.
Since January 2, 2018, accessible low-floor Flexity Outlook streetcars on the 504 King route have regularly served Roncesvalles Avenue. However, stops along Roncesvalles Avenue between Queen Street and Dundas West station are not yet accessible due to platform height issues preventing the loading ramp on the Flexity streetcars from being deployed. The TTC expects this problem to be corrected.

Route

The 504 King route operates as two overlapping branches:
In the west, routes 504A King and 505 Dundas start at Dundas West station on Line 2 Bloor–Danforth. From there, both routes go a short distance south of Bloor Street along Dundas Street West to Roncesvalles Avenue, where route 505 Dundas route splits off to continue eastbound on Dundas Street. Route 504A King continues further south on Roncesvalles Avenue, crossing Howard Park Avenue and route 506 Carlton. 504A King passes the Roncesvalles Carhouse as it approaches Queen Street West and the Queensway, where it crosses route 501 Queen.
South of Queen Street West and the Queensway, the route turns east along King Street. At Dufferin Street, 504B streetcars from Dufferin Gate Loop merge with 504A streetcars to provide a combined service along King Street to Sumach Street. Continuing further east to Bathurst Street, and after crossing the 511 Bathurst route, the 504 enters a transit mall where automobiles have restrictions so as not to impede streetcar service. Continuing eastward past Spadina Avenue, crossing route 510 Spadina, the 504 route passes St. Andrew station at University Avenue and King station at Yonge Street, both on Line 1 Yonge–University. At York Street, rush-hour route 503 Kingston Rd merges eastwards with route 504. At Jarvis Street, the transit mall ends and routes 503, 504A and 504B continue to Sumach Street, where route 504A turns south on Cherry Street to proceed to Distillery Loop. Routes 503 and 504B continue on King Street, as the street bends northeast to merge with Queen Street East, route 501 Queen and workday route 502 Downtowner. Routes 501, 502, 503 and 504B all cross the Queen Street Viaduct and the Don River to arrive at Broadview Avenue.
While routes 501, 502 and 503 continue further east on Queen Street, route 504B turns north on Broadview Avenue. At Dundas Street East, route 505 Dundas merges with route 504B to continue north. At Gerrard Street East, routes 504B and 505 cross the 506 Carlton route. Continuing on Broadview Avenue, routes 504B and 505 eventually cross Danforth Avenue arriving at Broadview station on Line 2 Bloor–Danforth.

Operation

The branch routes 504A and 504B operate at the same frequency during the day and evening. This provides extra frequency to the downtown area between Sumach and Dufferin streets where the two branches overlap. Route 304 King runs overnight between Dundas West station and Broadview station, replacing 504A and 504B service, but does not serve the two branches to Dufferin Gate Loop and Distillery Loop. Route 304 is part of the TTC's Blue Night Network operating from approximately 1am to 5am.

King Street Transit Priority Corridor

Route 504 King passes through the King Street Transit Priority Corridor, a transit mall located between Bathurst Street and Jarvis Street. Within the mall, there are restrictions on road traffic to prevent the obstruction of transit vehicles. Trucks and cars may enter the traffic mall, but must leave after a few blocks by turning right; left turns within the transit mall are not allowed.

Sites along the line (from east to west)