By Isabeaux Graham & Jeff Allen
Running east to west through Toronto, the new Line 5 Eglinton (also known as the Eglinton Crosstown LRT) will pass through a wide range of neighbourhoods that reflect nearly a century of urban development.
To better understand this corridor, we put together a series of maps that layer the route alignment relative to surrounding land-use patterns and demographics. Together, these maps show how the new transit line relates to building footprints; space devoted to cars, bikes, and pedestrians; zoning; green space; population density; household income; and senior populations.
Layers for these maps come from a variety of open data sources, including the City of Toronto, Statistics Canada, and OpenStreetMap. These maps were partly inspired by a series of similar maps for Finch West that we made when it opened in December 2025, as well as linear print maps of Yonge Street and Eglinton Avenue by Tom Weatherburn for Spacing Magazine.
Click on the maps below to view at a higher resolution.
The next graphic looks more closely at population change along the corridor, comparing census data from 1996 and 2021 within 800m of the line. Overall, population levels along Eglinton have remained relatively stable over this 25-year period, but there are notable pockets of change. Growth is concentrated primarily between Chaplin and the Golden Mile, with especially significant increases around Eglinton and Mount Pleasant. In contrast, there is a small population decline toward the eastern end of the line around Golden Mile and Birchmount, a largely employment/industrial area.
These data and chart come from a set of interactive charts that track 25 years of change across transit lines in Toronto. The Canadian Urban Institute is also creating similar interactive charts looking at a range of data for transit lines across Canada.
