Summary

The Credit Valley Railway built Streetsville Station in 1879 whilst construction of its lines from Toronto to Orangeville and St. Thomas were underway. It was located where the two lines split apart about 1.5 kilometres north of the village of Streetsville, which was inconvenient for local residents and was primarily intended to facilitate connections with other trains. The first train arrived at Streetsville on September 1st, 1879 when regular service between Toronto and Campbellville commenced. Service over the Orangeville line began a few months later on December 2nd. The station, which originally appeared as “Streetsville Junction” on timetables, was a single-storey wood frame structure with a hipped roof and an ornate turret at its northwest corner. The “front” of the station faced the line to St. Thomas, which was expected to be the busier of the two. A small passenger shelter, simply called “Streetsville” on timetables, was built at the west end of Old Station Road shortly thereafter to make travel more convenient for the local population. In 1881 the Campbellville line was extended to St. Thomas, where the Credit Valley Railway interchanged with the Canada Southern Railway – providing an important connection with several major American cities. Rail traffic increased as a result, and by October 1883 a total of nine trains stopped at Streetsville Junction per day.

The Canadian Pacific Railway gained control of the Credit Valley through one of its proxies, the Ontario & Quebec Railway, in November 1883. Service to Streetsville would increase exponentially to seventeen trains per day by 1899, only four of which made use of the Orangeville line. In late 1913 work was underway on laying a second track along the former Credit Valley line between Islington and Guelph Junction to ease congestion and allow for a higher volume of trains. As part of this work a new Streetsville Station was built just north of Ontario Street, about mid way between the original station and the passenger shelter further south. The original station was saved from demolition by Ephraim Evans and moved to the corner of Ontario and William Street where it was converted into a private residence, just metres away from its replacement. It remains in that location to this day. Passenger service to Streetsville had increased even further to 21 trains per day by 1921. The passenger shelter at Old Station Road remained on timetables into the 1930’s, though by that point it saw only two trains per day. It was likely closed as a result of the Great Depression and dismantled soon afterward.

Service to the new Streetsville Station also suffered during the depression, decreasing to twelve trains per day by 1940. There would be a brief rebound during the postwar era but it was cut short by the popularization of automobiles and air travel. Ridership would decrease further with the completion of Highway 401 just north of Streetsville between 1959 and 1961, which generally ran parallel to the Toronto-St. Thomas line and served many of the same communities along the way. Service to Streetsville was reduced further to six trains per day in 1963, then only four in 1966. The introduction of self-propelled Budd Rail Diesel Cars as an economical alternative to conventional passenger trains helped to briefly increase service to nine trains by 1968, the vast majority of which were on the Orangeville line. Streetsville Station was closed to passengers in 1970 when service on both the Orangeville and St. Thomas lines ended in 1970. However, the station remained in use by Canadian Pacific as a train order office until it was finally abandoned and torn down on October 22nd, 1982.

After an 11-year hiatus, passenger service returned to Streetsville with the opening of the Streetsville GO Station on October 27th, 1981. Rather than make use of the earlier station building an entirely new one was built at Old Station Road where more space for parking was available.

Condensed Station Info:

Location:	Served By:	Current State:	Date Built:	Date Demolished:
North of Brittania Road	Credit Valley (1879 – 1883) Canadian Pacific (1883 – 1970)	Preserved (First) Demolished (Second)	1879 (First) 1914 (Second)	N/A (First) 1982 (Second)