Most people wouldn't associate Toronto with abandoned roads, but a few of them dot the city if you know where to look. One of the better examples is this surviving portion of old Don Mills Road as it climbs north out of the Don Valley. The current Don Mills Road is to the right in the picture above. The original road was realigned and widened in the 1950s to connect the new community of...

Ever marvel at the architecture of Casa Loma, Osgoode Hall and the Ontario Legislature in Queen's Park? Those lovely red-brick buildings, dear friends, are the legacy of Toronto's vernacular building material—sweet slabs formed from the banks of the Don herself. From 1889 to 1980, the Don Valley Brick Works made some of the highest quality brick in the land. Why, in 1893, the Don Valley brick was crowned Best Brick at the Chicago World's...

The next time you're walking along the wooded trails near the marsh in E.T. Seton Park, you may find a weathered sign overlooking a wet meadow. Still barely legible, it reads: Trees in this area were planted by the Outing Club of East York in honour of Charles Sauriol who was instrumental in the preservation of this valley August 1980 The Outing Club of East York's Diane Vieira told us that in its early...