St James Town at Night

On July 24, 2025 by admin With 2 Comments - Photography, Toronto

***your phone will crush and distort these pictures. If you can, try to see this on a bigger screen like a laptop***

A Very Short History of St James Town

St James Town was once a working-class Victorian neighbourhood, housing the poorest of Toronto residents in ratty decaying homes. In the 50s and 60s, city planners and developers decided to rezone and bulldoze most of the neighbourhood. Over the next decade or so, they built nineteen highrise buildings including 4 city owned public housing towers. At the time, developers assumed that fresh young middle-class office workers would quickly move in. Instead, that demographic chose to move to the suburbs of North York and Scarborough and the neighbourhood filled up again with Toronto’s lowest income families. Over the last couple of decades, the demographics have shifted more towards new immigrants to Canada and St James Town remains one of the last affordable neighbourhoods in the downtown area.

For a more detailed account of St James Town history and development have a look at this excellent article at Blog TO.

Bad Reputation?

In the late 90’s, when I first moved to Toronto, St James Town had been in steady decline for 30 years. The buildings were crumbling, the public spaces were trampled and neglected and the residents were some of the poorest in the downtown area.

One day, shortly after moving to this city, I went to visit a friend downtown and missed my subway stop. As a result, I accidentally came above ground at the tiny run-down Glen Road exit of the Sherbourne subway station. Glen Road consists of a single block of some of the last surviving Victorian homes in the area but, at the time, the houses were all boarded up and abandoned. It was like coming up into a ghost town of haunted houses. I was so surprised that I took a bunch of film photos but, unfortunately, I can’t seem to find them now. If you want to see some images from this time, this site has some good ones.

A little later I met my friend and told him about getting lost in St James Town. His advice was to stay away from the neighbourhood, even during the daytime. Apparently the area had a bad reputation for drugs, gangs, violence, prostitution. I had no idea if this was true or not but I took his advice and never came back. Not until over 20 years later when I ended up renting an apartment on this very street.

St James Town Today

With 19 highrise towers in a relatively small area, St James Town is the most densely populated neighbourhood in Canada . The “official” population of St James Town today is around 17 000 although it is probably much higher. It is still home to many low income families and is a popular landing place for new immigrants.

Sometime around 2000, the city decided to put some resources towards improving the crumbling neighbourhood. This included plans to clean up and repair the old highrises and renew the parks, playgrounds and public spaces. This is ongoing today.

Eventually, developers started to sniff around one of the last downtown neighbourhoods that had so far escaped gentrification. Condo speculators bought up and fenced off many of the old neglected houses and plots of land. They also gutted and renovated the row of abandoned houses on Glen Road in return for the city’s approval of their development plans. They squeezed in a few new glass and steel towers and tucked little townhouses into the shadows of the old highrises. Since I moved in, no less than 5 new condo buildings have gone up within a 1 minute walk. And many more are on the way.

Living in St James Town

I think that St James Town still has something of a bad reputation today. Reading online, I often see postings where people are nervously asking about safety and crime rates before moving in to the area. And still others (who probably don’t even live here) advise them to be very careful, especially at night.

I have lived here for years and have not had a single incident that would make me feel unsafe. Police, ambulances and fire trucks are a pretty regular sight. But, when you have over 17 000 people living on a few city blocks, this doesn’t seem unusual.

I like that this neighbourhood always has people moving around in it. You are rarely by yourself outside. To me, this feels safe. I used to work at a restaurant directly south of St James Town in Old Toronto. The walk home from there at night felt so unsafe to me during the covid closures that I would carry a police baton with me at all times. Walking on high alert, I wouldn’t feel relaxed until I found myself among the busy highrises of St James Town again.

Maybe the Best Neighbourhood Downtown…

I love living in this neighbourhood . Everything is in walking distance: dentist, doctor, supermarket, subway, Koreatown, Chinatown, Little India, beautiful natural spaces, museums, universities, galleries, live music venues, great restaurants, a fully operating farm, some of the country’s best hospitals…the list goes on. I think this must be one of the most connected neighbourhoods in the city. I haven’t had a car in many years and I never miss it.

The interior of St James Town itself reminds me of the highrise neighbourhood I grew up in when my parents first immigrated to Canada. People are always outside. The parks and public spaces are full even at night. Extended families get together and pass time in the shade of old trees. People who have immigrated from the same place and share language and culture find each other here, in the building hallways and the outdoor playgrounds. They naturally build communities around their shared experiences. If you walk around St James Town, English might be one of the last languages you hear. Tagalog, Hindi, Cantonese, Mandarin, Korean, Tamil, Russian, Bengali….these are much more common.

St James Town is one of the last places where low income Canadians as well as newly landed immigrants can afford to live connected to the downtown core. And because so many of the residents share a common experience, St James Town has a the feeling of a vibrant community. People know their neighbours and I believe that people look out for each other. The neighbourhood has a strong feeling of family. All kinds of family.

Night Walks Through St James Town

Some would say that the clump of old highrises is ugly but I see real beauty in them…in their multicoloured brick exteriors, angular balconies, weird glowing stairwells, old mature trees and especially in the people who call this neighbourhood home. Hopefully some of that will come through in these photos but, if not, take a walk through here on a nice summer night and you may be surprised by how much you enjoy it.

St James Town at night — Three-winged 60’s highrises were typical of the time. St James Town has quite a few toward the south. Hand painted murals reflecting the cultural diversity of the area decorate some of the dozens of concrete stairwells.

Stairwell going down — These concrete stairwells are everywhere in St James Town. Some are in parking lots, others in the middle of parks and fields, others under trees. I assume they are exits from underground parking. I almost never see people use them…who knows what’s really down there? How deep do they go? Makes me think of a Haruki Murakami novel.

Mature trees in St James Town — Typical St James Town skyline…the place has kind of a retro space-age vibe at night. There is something beautiful and mysterious about it. All those huge angled balconies and lit windows in neat rows. You can see two people on the concrete path under the trees…this gives you an idea of how big the trees are.

Glowing stairwell — I call this the snow globe. It is one of only a few covered and lit concrete stairwells.

60s twin towers St James Town — Handsome twin towers in white brick. Big old trees and wide green spaces in front.

A small commercial area on the ground floor of a central highrise. This is close to a discount supermarket and community centre. During the day there is a full time open air flea market here. From VHS tapes to protein powder to (found?) bike seats…it’s all here.

The area is dense with unique buildings. This one is bright and clean with red brick and white metal siding with blue trim. There are no balconies on this one which is unusual. I like the lit windows at night, the warm glow.

Working-class neighbourhood with working-class rides.

One of the weird glowing stairwells to….? These are everywhere.

Korean Spicy Tteok-Bokki Truck — Food truck at rest.

240 Wellesley delivery man — Ubiquitous Toronto food delivery guy on electric motorbike.

Dirty payphone near 240 Wellesley — I wonder how serious the emergency would have to be for me to touch this payphone?

Underground parking ramp with cool green porthole building.

Moms chatting in the park. Trash waiting for morning pickup.

urban art on concrete — Stairwell art, beautiful in its detail. These little panels appear in the most unexpected places. The art itself is respected by the community…these pieces ***never*** get tagged or damaged intentionally.

Another mural on the back of a concrete stairwell entrance.

Beck taxicab on street at night — Beck Taxi parked outside new building construction site.

closed laundromat. Rows of machines — A hold-out from the 50’s. This was originally an Italian tailor’s house and business. When they were planning the original St James Town in the 50’s, he refused to sell so they built all the towers around him. Today, his building still stands, home to the New World Laundry on Parliament Street.

Glen Road at Howard Street, last remnant of original Victorian neighborhood.

Top view of Glen Road..this was the street in St James Town that I first saw when I moved to the city. At that time, all of the houses were abandoned and boarded up. This cobblestone plaza is a new renovation that just opened this summer. When the city first posted plans for this, there was a lot of resistance in the neighbourhood (mostly around losing parking spaces) but I am really happy with the way it turned out.

New pedestrian tunnel Glen Road Toronto — Newly renovated tunnel under Bloor Street which connects to the Morley Callaghan foot bridge.

That’s the pedestrian bridge at the far end of the tunnel. Interestingly, it connects St James Town (one of Toronto’s poorest neighbourhoods) and Rosedale (one of the city’s richest neighbourhoods).

A 54 story condo tower, recent construction, built directly behind the row of victorian houses on Glen Road.

This is an interesting photo of a vacant lot in the springtime fog. All of the old houses you see in the foreground are boarded up and slated for demolition to make way for a new condo. This is what is happening all over this neighbourhood. The city claims there is not enough affordable housing but they keep knocking it down and replacing it with condos that nobody can afford to live in. Those steel and glass buildings in the background are like a line of storm clouds warning of the coming destruction. The little brick houses are cowering in from of them. It’s a good picture.

Convenience Stores

There is a small commercial strip on Howard street with a couple of Filipino restaurants, a fried chicken place, a small pharmacy, an Ethiopian grocery and a Halal butcher. These convenience stores are part of this strip:

Howard Convenience Store — Howard Convenience…cheapest Haagen-Dazs ice cream. You can even buy beer now. A really nice old man runs it. I have been coming here for a long time and we know each other as neighbours. This picture was originally from my green series.

Same “store on the corner”. I have met 3 generations of the family that run this place (and 2 generations of calico cats, both named Nyu-Nyu). A young Chinese couple own it. Shortly after I moved here, the wife became pregnant and later gave birth to a little girl. I asked yesterday and apparently her daughter is 7 years old now!

I used to buy cigarettes here. The wife’s mom (the 7 year old’s grandma) worked there at the time and I would visit her everyday on my way to work and buy a pack of smokes. She would cheerfully sell them to me while telling me that they were bad for my health and that I should stop. One day, I quit smoking and so, I didn’t go in for a few weeks. When I finally stopped in to buy an ice cream, she asked where I had been. I told her that I quit smoking and so I didn’t need to stop by so often. I couldn’t believe how happy she was to hear that. It was as if I was her own son!

Jamestown Convenience — Jamestown convenience store is just south of the highrises on Wellesley Street. An old Korean man and his son run this one. It is FULL of plants and flowers. It’s really like a flower shop pretending to be a convenience store. I think the old man prefers selling ferns over lottery tickets. This one is not directly in St James Town but it is still part of it in my mind.

Winter in St James Town

These are a few pictures of a snowy night walk through St James Town last winter. It really is a pretty place.

Snow in St James Town — Indian couple showing their baby what is probably his first snowfall. Imagine that…your first snow. The address of the white brick building is 666 Ontario Street: the highrise of the Beast!

Ventilation units pushing out clouds of steam from under 240 Wellesley St tower

Snow in St James Town park. Empty benches at night — Central Park, St James Town during a big snowfall. This park was completely redone over the last 2 years with new benches, lighting, playground and basketball courts. It’s normally full of people but I took this picture very late on a cold winter night so everyone was probably bundled up inside.

The Future of St James Town

There is a tremendous amount of demolition and building going on around here. I think the original towers are safe in their big bulky numbers. Hopefully they will continue to see improvements and provide a home for people who can’t afford to move anywhere else.

As for the surviving victorian houses…I am not so sure. Just last year I found out that Concert Realty bought up the whole west side of Glen Road. This is the same developer that is building the 54 story building outside my bedroom window. This means that right now they own a continuous parcel of land that is more than enough to build a second condo tower. They have not submitted plans to the city yet but I think it is only a matter of time. Lately there has been some pull back on new condos so hopefully Glen Road will survive for a few more years…let’s see what happens.

There is so much more…

These pictures just show a little of this neighbourhood. In recent years, the city has put up a brand new community centre complete with sunlit indoor pool, library, indoor basketball courts and community services.

The Rose Avenue Public School right at the centre of St James Town is one of the last original buildings in the area. This brick building with massive old windows was built in 1924 and still operates as a busy public school and day care, surrounded by old trees and brick walkways.

This is the walkway along the side of Rose Avenue Public School at night. It’s a pretty and peaceful spot.

St James Town represents a massive and miscalculated experiment in early city redevelopment. Originally seen as a failure and struggling for decades, I think it has grown into a unique and vital part of the Toronto downtown.

If you have any questions or comments, please leave them below. I am always happy to hear from you.

Thanks for reading! : )

photography, toronto

2 Comments

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Jenny July 28, 2025

Very interesting! Your stuff is always fun to read. 🙂
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  admin July 28, 2025
  
  Thank you for reading : )
  Martin

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