Toronto's Waterways

Toronto – Many Rivers Run Through It.

The Royal Ontario Museum’s newest exhibition titled WATER, opens March 5th. This is an appropriate exhibit for Toronto, a city that owes much of its early growth to the many rivers that traverse the city and spill out into Lake Ontario on the shoreline of this urban metropolis.
Toronto’s six waterways include: the Humber, Rouge and Don Rivers, as well as Etobicoke, Mimico and Highland Creek. Toronto’s waterways allowed early settlers to operate saw and grist mills and brickyards. These rivers would prove to be the catalyst for the growth of many of Toronto’s neighbourhoods.
The name Toronto is thought to originate from the Mohawk word Tkaronto which translates to “where there are trees standing in water”. Toronto’s early government viewed Toronto’s protected harbour as the ideal place to defend Upper Canada during the War of 1812 and Fort York was born.
In the 1850s the railway came of age and a network of railway lines began to traverse the Toronto harbourfront. The railway provided safe passage of goods brought into the harbour by steamship from the St. Lawrence Seaway.
Toronto’s growth would likely not have happened, had it not been positioned on the shores of Lake Ontario where it could draw all the water it needed to service its steadily growing population. Today the city’s daily water demand is 1.3 billion litres, enough to fill the Rogers Centre.
The ROM’s WATER exhibit includes multimedia displays live animals and hands-on activities for kids. There will also be a series of lectures and programs on the topic of water and what it means to our ever changing and expanding world population. This series will run from March through June. Visit www.rom.on.ca for more details.