What's happening behind the scenes at the Ontario Line's Queen Station

It seems Metrolinx has learned from the 13.5-year-long construction fiasco of the Eglinton Crosstown LRT, as its latest mega project, the Ontario Line subway, is shaping up rapidly.

While residents patiently wait for the former line to finally launch this fall — five years later than initially planned after numerous setbacks and cost overruns — key intersections across the city are being transformed for new stations on the latter route, and looking different every day.

Gigantic caverns are being excavated below King-Bathurst and Queen-Spadina in preparation for the tunnel boring machines that will carve out the underground parts of the 15.6-kilometre-long line, which will stretch across 15 stops total, including downtown hubs at the aforementioned intersections and the nearby corner of Queen and Yonge streets.

Queen-Yonge station will be one of the more complicated builds, as it already services the Line 1 Yonge-University subway, and attaches to the Eaton Centre and PATH network. It has also necessitated an inconvenient multi-year full closure of the key junction.

But a new update promises that great progress is indeed being made to justify all the transit and traffic headaches taking place as a result.

2025 declared 'the year of digging' for $27 billion Ontario Linehttps://t.co/2Ws4VZoCeI

— blogTO (@blogTO) January 29, 2025

At the future Queen Station East site, the first phase of the capping beams — which will support the forthcoming station structure — has been completed as of May, with additional capping beam work ongoing. Excavation has also kicked off, with the first struts now in place to support the walls as crews dig.

Overhead views also show the beginnings of the noise-dampening acoustic shelter that will soon surround and isolate the site (the same as the large white tent passersby can see at work sites like King-Bathurst).

A crane has also made its arrival in recent days, to be installed inside of the shelter, once it's complete.

Ontario Line construction, from above Queen Street
byu/FunMathematician170 intoronto

A ton of headway has also been made on the west side of the future station ("Future Queen Station West Site"), including all micropiling works, and some piling deeper into the ground. Temporary watermains have also been installed, capping beams are in progress, and the elevated structure that will hold machinery during the excavation is taking form in anticipation of the delivery of said machinery this month.

Deeper cavern excavation like that we've seen at King-Bathurst will commence over winter 2025-2026, following preliminary soil and rock removal this summer and fall.

The monumental line is expected to open to the public in 2031, a decade after construction began. Hopefully, at this rate of work, Metrolinx will be able to actually stick to this timeline.