In 2024, an Ashdale resident submitted a planning application to the City to build a back deck. The documents they filed include a site plan mentioning a "board fence", which anyone who's walked along Craven below the train tracks will recognize as a hallmark of the street.
The site plan also refers to the "widening" of the road in 1913 (when Craven was called Erie Terrace) and the "1-foot reserve" on which the board fence stands:
"The Works Department has a number of vexatious street problems on hand…. One is on Erie Terrace in the Midway. It runs north from Queen street to Danforth avenue, and the width varies from 15 to 22 feet. There are small frame houses along one side, and on the other are the backyards of houses which front on an adjoining street. It is proposed to add about ten feet to the width of Erie Terrace, taking the land from these yards.
"But what then? Who will pay? The houses now built on the Terrace will have to pay their share, the city will have to pay its share, but what about the share which would ordinarily be paid by the properties on the opposite side of the street? The people whose back yards are taken get no benefit from the street improvement, for their residences front on another thoroughfare. Erie Terrace is their back lane, and they don't care whether it is ten feet wide or thirty-five.
"There is not enough room to build houses on both sides of the Terrace, and the city will have to find some way out of the difficulty."
In October 1912, the Star followed up with a photo and a front-page feature:
"The City Fathers have decided to put Erie Terrace in better shape, but the problem which confronts them on that street is difficult of solution. It came into the city with the "Midway" district, and has puzzled municipal authorities ever since.…
"It is thought inadvisable to put a pavement on a street only 20 feet wide, yet if it were widened, the residents along the one side would have to pay for the widening and for the whole of the pavement. The other side cannot be built upon, as there are nothing but backyards on it, and 20 feet taken off these would not leave room for houses.
"What will the city do with Erie Terrace, which threatens to become a permanently undesirable street a mile and a half long?"
An answer came in January 1913:
"Erie Terrace, with 6,000 feet of frontage exclusive of street intersections, is the biggest problem the city has to face in the shape of a narrow street.… City Hall officials groan whenever they hear the name.
"Ald. Robbins has had the courage to undertake a solution. He wishes the city to buy 15 feet or thereabouts off the back yards in question, so that Erie terrace can be made 45 feet wide.
"It will be a street with houses on one side, and the owners of these will have to pay the share of local improvements which would be borne by neighbours across the street in ordinary cases. It is said, however, that they would rather do this than have the place remain as at present."
The next month, in February 1913:
"What is to be done? Whatever plan is adopted, the burden on Erie Terrace residents will be heavy. The proposal likely to be favored is the widening of the Terrace to a uniform width of thirty-three feet by expropriating from nine to fourteen feet off the rear of Ashdale avenue lots.
"This will be done partially as a local improvement, and even if the city bears over 25 per cent. of the cost, the burden upon Erie Terrace properties will be $5 per foot frontage.
"The Terrace will always remain a one-sided street, as the city will impose a restriction preventing the erection of buildings within, say, fifteen feet of the street line on the unbuilt side. This will prevent the erection of practically back-yardless houses on the rear of Ashdale avenue lots.…
"The cost per foot frontage to Erie Terrace property… will mean about $2 per foot per year for a term of ten years – a heavy tax on land worth only $20 per foot. But there seems no other way out of the difficulty."
Sure enough, in May 1913, Toronto World published a Local Improvement Notice:
"Take notice that the Council of the Municipal Corporation of the City of Toronto intends to widen Erie Terrace, from Queen Street to the Grand Trunk Railway right-of-way, to a width of 33 feet, by taking the necessary land off the rear of the lots on Ashdale Avenue, on the west side of Erie Terrace, and intends to specially assess a part of the cost upon the land abutting directly on the said work.…
"40%… is to be paid by the Corporation… Erie Terrace, east side... [is] to bear 56.57% of the estimated cost.… The rate per foot… is $4.85… paid in 10 annual instalments."
Problem solved? Not quite. In October 1913, the Star sighed, "Erie Terrace Problem Again":
"New Phase of Much Discussed Civic Puzzle:
"Residents on Ashdale avenue are asking for a right-of-way on to Erie terrace, but the residents of Erie terrace have strong objections to their neighbors deriving benefit from the widening of their street, an improvement they have to pay for.
"In the widening of Erie terrace there was a foot reserved strip left between the rear of the Ashdale avenue lots and the new roadway on Erie terrace. This strip was reserved to prevent the property owners on Ashdale avenue building on the street line on Erie terrace.
"Alderman Walton has interested himself in the request of the residents of Ashdale avenue, and has expressed his opposition to the right-of-way being granted. He holds the opinion that the property owners on Erie terrace should be protected in their rights."
March 1916 was the last time that the Star saw the "Erie Terrace Case Up Again."
It seems a certain Mr. East owned a lot fronting on Ashdale, of which the City had expropriated the rear 14 feet to widen Erie Terrace. Unwisely, Mr. East later sold the front 90 feet, leaving himself with 30 feet of inaccessible rear land,
"because in widening Erie terrace the city is erecting a high fence to prevent the residents of Ashdale avenue obtaining access thereto. Consequently Mr. East can only obtain access to his property from Ashdale avenue over the land sold by him."
Ashdale residents like Mr. East have challenged the fence's existence dozens of times since it was built, and Craven residents have defended it every time.
