IMO the most elegant solution is to copy Quebec and start naming things after people.

A few good candidates for what's now to be Chinatown station:

- Sam Factor, one of Canada's first Jewish MPs, who represented the area in the House of Commons and served with distinction in both World Wars.
- Al Waxman, the Order of Canada-winning star of King of Kensington, among others.
- Jean Lumb, restaurateur and civil rights activist, who worked for decades to preserve Chinatown and to fight racism in the Canadian immigration system, and also made numerous important contributions to community organizations.
 
McGillicuddy said:
IMO the most elegant solution is to copy Quebec and start naming things after people.

A few good candidates for what's now to be Chinatown station:

- Sam Factor, one of Canada's first Jewish MPs, who represented the area in the House of Commons and served with distinction in both World Wars.
- Al Waxman, the Order of Canada-winning star of King of Kensington, among others.
- Jean Lumb, restaurateur and civil rights activist, who worked for decades to preserve Chinatown and to fight racism in the Canadian immigration system, and also made numerous important contributions to community organizations.
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While the sentiment is nice, the problem with naming things for people is that it tells a visitor to (or new resident of) Toronto absolutely nothing about where the station is located, which should be the point of a transit station name. Neighbourhoods, local attractions, and most obviously intersections (even if I personally hate naming stations after intersections because I think it's clinical and dull) are much clearer reference points for station names than people ever will be.

Like yes Queen/Spadina is barely Chinatown, but it will be the closest station to Chinatown for the forseeable future. And if they do build one actually in Chinatown, we could just rename the OL station to something else, who knows if the area would have it's own identity by then. Tons of transit systems rename stations far more than the TTC does (at least we aren't the US and renaming stations every time a sports stadium changes it's sponsor).

Alternately, we could name it after the infamous McDonalds at the corner since that is essentially a local attraction.
 
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McGillicuddy said:
IMO the most elegant solution is to copy Quebec and start naming things after people.

A few good candidates for what's now to be Chinatown station:

- Sam Factor, one of Canada's first Jewish MPs, who represented the area in the House of Commons and served with distinction in both World Wars.
- Al Waxman, the Order of Canada-winning star of King of Kensington, among others.
- Jean Lumb, restaurateur and civil rights activist, who worked for decades to preserve Chinatown and to fight racism in the Canadian immigration system, and also made numerous important contributions to community organizations.
Click to expand...
Tom from Tom’s Place Station
 
I don't know that it matters if we follow one nomenclature rule or another. People get around Tokyo just fine and the names of the stations there can be based on historical districts, random local landmarks, geographical features, etc., many of which may no longer exist. Nor do they hesitate to add cardinal directions or other descriptors like "new" that never get dropped regardless of how much time has gone by.

Examples:
  • Akihabara (秋葉原): "Field of Autumn Leaves".
  • Shinjuku (新宿): "New Inn/Post Station".
  • Ochanomizu (御茶ノ水): "Tea Water".
  • Ueno (上野): "Upper Field".
  • Ginza (銀座): "Silver Mint" (and Higashi-Ginza = East Silver Mint)
  • Toranomon (虎ノ門): "Tiger Gate".
  • Yuurakuchou (有楽町): "Have Fun Town".
  • Shimbashi (新橋): "New Bridge".
  • Kudanshita (九段下): "Below the nine steps"
 

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McGillicuddy said:
IMO the most elegant solution is to copy Quebec and start naming things after people.

A few good candidates for what's now to be Chinatown station:

- Sam Factor, one of Canada's first Jewish MPs, who represented the area in the House of Commons and served with distinction in both World Wars.
- Al Waxman, the Order of Canada-winning star of King of Kensington, among others.
- Jean Lumb, restaurateur and civil rights activist, who worked for decades to preserve Chinatown and to fight racism in the Canadian immigration system, and also made numerous important contributions to community organizations.
Click to expand...
Naming stations after people provides zero wayfinding ability. Also, not to mention the historical reparations that need to happen when said person is found to be a terrible person.
 
McGillicuddy said:
IMO the most elegant solution is to copy Quebec and start naming things after people.
Click to expand...
Nothing should ever be named after a person, IMO. It leads to sticky situations where they eventually need to be renamed, along with the other issue being pointed out which is that they don't provide wayfinding.

Outside of that, it lets governments-of-the-day name and memorialize people they specifically like. Hope you enjoy using John Tory Station - I won't be telling you where it is. ;)
 
Hopefully that map was not final for some of the stations. By way of further thinking:
- the stop at King/Bathurst should be called Fort York or something more unique than King West
- the stop at Spadina/Queen should be called Queen West because that's the name of the neighbourhood
- East Harbour needs a better name, and the best I've got so far in terms of recent local history is Sunshine Park
 
StreetcarRider said:
- the stop at King/Bathurst should be called Fort York or something more unique than King West
- the stop at Spadina/Queen should be called Queen West because that's the name of the neighbourhood
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Isn't this a bit of a contradiction?

Every station should be called for the intersection in the style of King-Bathurst. It's far more clear to call out the intersection than a neighbourhood name, which is not a fixed thing. Jingoistic folk and real estate developers are coming up with new neighbourhoods all the time, so using neighbourhoods as the identifier will cause far more confusion than benefit. 4 different neigbourhoods can lay claim to this area. No matter what you call it, someone is going to feel snubbed.

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Price tag for the name change:
- Corktown: $200,000
- Queen Spadina + King Bathurst: $170,000
- Riverside-Leslieville: unknown
- Other stations (indirect impact): $60,000
Please don't ask why the numbers don't add up. They are from each station designer's quotation.
MTO reviewed the information and on December 11, 2025, MTO shared with Metrolinx the direction to proceed with the following station names: • Riverside-Leslieville to be named Leslieville• Corktown to be named Distillery District• Queen-Spadina to be named Chinatown• King-Bathurst to be named King West. MTO has directed Metrolinx to proceed, however we have been instructed to keep these names confidential pending MTO announcement of names. We ask that communication for the Change Order reflect the confidentiality requested from the Province.
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17_Bean_17 said:
Corktown should have been First Parliament.
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Reminds me of my favourite Shanghai metro station name: Site of the First CPC National Congress (Xintiandi Road) Station - not to be confused with Site of the First CPC National Congress (South Huangpi Road) Station 😁

The more stations we have the less these little quibbles over station names will really matter. Larger metro systems have tons of strange names that don't reflect direct, exact neighbourhoods or specific intersections. Our rinky dink system now has more than one museum on its lines, and so maybe it's time to rename Museum Station to Royal Ontario Museum Station, so people don't get it confused with Aga Khan Park & Museum Station. You know, so we're more exact.
 
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