Episode 5: Building the Transit Hubs

Step into a high-speed rail hub in Madrid or Tokyo and you’ll feel the pulse of a city. Commuters stream off platforms into cafés, students meet in libraries above the concourse, office workers take elevators straight to their towers, and travellers stroll past shops, art, and music. These aren’t train stations. They are living centres.

For Ontario Connected, hubs are the heart of the project. Trains connect cities, but hubs connect people to their daily lives. They are where vision becomes visible, where a rail project transforms into a community project.

More Than a Stop: A New Way of Living

In Ontario, stations have often been afterthoughts — bare platforms, parking lots, and long walks to the next bus. A connected Ontario cannot repeat this mistake. Hubs must be built as ecosystems: places where housing, healthcare, education, culture, and business converge.

Imagine a hub in Kitchener: students step off the train and walk directly to a new university campus built alongside the station. Families arrive to shop, eat, and enjoy weekend festivals. Offices rise above, bringing thousands of jobs. An Indigenous cultural centre hosts exhibits that remind travellers of the land they are crossing.

Every hub becomes a destination — not just a stop along the way.

Housing Around the Hubs

Ontario is in a housing crisis. Transit hubs present a once-in-a-generation opportunity to build homes where people need them most: connected to jobs, schools, and healthcare.

By planning for mixed-use developments, hubs can include:

  • Affordable housing units for students and families.

  • Mid-rise apartments for workers and young professionals.

  • Senior-friendly housing with direct transit access.

  • Temporary and transitional housing to support vulnerable communities.

Housing around hubs isn’t just about convenience. It’s about equity — ensuring that the benefits of Ontario Connected are shared by everyone, not just those who can afford condos in downtown Toronto.

Health, Education, and Culture

Hubs should not only move people; they should serve them. Imagine stepping off a train and walking directly into a new medical clinic, or students arriving at a campus designed beside the hub. Indigenous nations can shape cultural centres that celebrate history and art, reminding every traveller that this land has a deeper story than tracks and tunnels.

Hospitals, libraries, theatres, galleries, community centres — hubs must be designed with these in mind. A hub is where transportation meets quality of life.

Indigenous Partnerships at the Centre

Ontario cannot repeat the mistakes of past infrastructure projects that treated Indigenous communities as afterthoughts. Hubs must include Indigenous voices from the design phase onward.

This means:

  • Revenue-sharing agreements that ensure benefits are mutual.

  • Indigenous-led cultural spaces within hubs.

  • Employment and training opportunities for Indigenous youth in construction and operations.

  • Respectful design that honours the land and its history.

In this way, hubs can become not just transit centres, but symbols of reconciliation.

Economic Engines

Every hub generates economic gravity. Shops, restaurants, hotels, and local businesses thrive when thousands of people pass through daily. Small businesses can set up kiosks. Farmers’ markets can flourish. Local artisans can sell goods to travellers.

Hubs also attract investment. Companies want offices where employees can travel easily. Universities want campuses that are accessible from across the province. Hospitals want facilities linked to reliable transport.

The economic return of a well-designed hub is exponential — it sparks growth far beyond the station walls.

Accessibility and Equity

For too long, Ontario transit has left behind seniors, people with disabilities, and those without cars. Hubs must be built with universal accessibility — wide platforms, elevators, ramps, clear signage, and services that make travel seamless for all.

Affordability is just as critical. Ontario Connected cannot become a luxury service. Fares must be fair, so families, students, and workers see it as their system, not an elite option.

Integration With Local Transit

A hub is only as strong as its connections. High-speed rail must integrate seamlessly with GO Transit, TTC, LRT, buses, cycling paths, and even regional airports. A traveller should step off the high-speed train and immediately find options for the “last mile” of their journey.

That means unified ticketing, real-time scheduling, and physical design that puts buses, subways, and trains under one roof. No more confusing transfers. No more long walks in bad weather. Just a system that works together.

The Ontario Model of Hubs

Ontario has the chance to create its own model of transit hubs:

  • Human-centred design: prioritising comfort, accessibility, and beauty.

  • Sustainability: solar panels, green roofs, and energy-efficient systems.

  • Community focus: spaces for culture, healthcare, and education.

  • Economic growth: jobs, housing, and local business opportunities.

If done right, these hubs can become the beating hearts of a connected Ontario — as iconic as Union Station, but more inclusive, more sustainable, and more forward-looking.

Closing Vision

Episode 5 shows that Ontario Connected is not just about moving faster. It is about living better. Hubs are the places where Ontario’s 50-year vision touches daily life — where housing, culture, healthcare, and business intertwine with the flow of trains.

This is the future Ontario deserves: stations that are not cold platforms but vibrant centres of community.

Next comes Episode 6: The Trains and the Technology — where we step aboard the vehicles themselves and explore the clean, fast, futureproof systems that will carry Ontario into the next century.