Toronto sits on the northwest shore of Lake Ontario. The City of Toronto’s “Toronto at a Glance” page puts the waterfront at 76.5 meters (251 feet) above sea level and the city’s highest point at 209 meters (686 feet), at the intersection of Steeles Avenue West and Keele Street. The slope is cut by river valleys, the old shoreline of a glacial lake, and the Scarborough Bluffs.
Elevation figures and what they mean
Environment and Climate Change Canada’s station list gives the elevations of three climate stations in the city: Toronto City Centre (the island airport) at 76.8 meters (252 feet), Toronto City at 112.5 meters (369 feet), and Toronto Intl A, the Pearson airport station, at 173.4 meters (569 feet). They show the climb from the lake toward the northwest of the city. The City of Toronto’s own figure for the waterfront is 76.5 meters, so the two sources differ by a few tenths of a meter.
| Location | Elevation | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Toronto City Centre station (Toronto Island airport) | 76.8 m (252 ft) | Environment and Climate Change Canada station list |
| Toronto City station | 112.5 m (369 ft) | Environment and Climate Change Canada station list |
| Toronto Intl A (Pearson airport) | 173.4 m (569 ft) | Environment and Climate Change Canada station list |
| Waterfront | 76.5 m (251 ft) | City of Toronto, Toronto at a Glance |
| Highest point, Steeles Avenue West and Keele Street | 209 m (686 ft) | City of Toronto, Toronto at a Glance |
The same City of Toronto page gives the city’s area as 630 square kilometers in its indicators table and 641 square kilometers in its geography section, so the page itself carries two figures. Other sources have given slightly different values for the highest point, and the exact number depends on the elevation dataset used.
The old lake shoreline
Much of downtown Toronto stands on the bed of a former lake. A University of Waterloo article on the city’s landscape explains that meltwater from the retreating ice sheet filled the Lake Ontario basin about 12,000 years ago, forming a proglacial lake called Lake Iroquois, which stood higher than today’s lake and lasted only a few hundred years. In that time it eroded a shorebluff averaging about 15 meters high across the city. Clay and silt settled on the former lake bottom, and part of the flat plain below the bluff underlies downtown, where Toronto was founded. The bluff forms the hillside north of Davenport Road, which began as a path that Native peoples traveled along its base.
The Scarborough Bluffs
In the east, the Scarborough Bluffs rise above the lake. Researchers at the University of Toronto Scarborough describe the cliffs below Scarborough Crescent Park as mostly glaciolacustrine sediments, deposited in large glacial lakes, lying above older sands and clays and capped by sand laid down on the shore of Lake Iroquois. Waves cut the base, and the cliffs fail as the face is undercut. Eroded bluff material is carried west along the shore, and the Toronto Islands are described as spits built from it. This article gives no height or length for the bluffs, because the sources read give none or differ.
The Don and Humber valleys
Two rivers, the Don and the Humber, cut through the city on their way south to the lake. The University of Waterloo article notes that the Don is now confined to an excavated channel, with its former meandering course visible in infilled bends at Riverdale Park, and that the Lake Iroquois shoreline swung north around the flooded Humber valley, where erosion deposited a large baymouth bar across the valley. The rivers also have a flood history, covered below.
The Oak Ridges Moraine to the north
North of the city lies the Oak Ridges Moraine. The Canadian Encyclopedia describes it as an irregular east-west ridge about 60 kilometers north of Lake Ontario, roughly 160 kilometers long, with its highest points at about 430 meters. It acts as a watershed divide: rivers flowing south drain into Lake Ontario, while those flowing north drain into Georgian Bay, Lake Simcoe, and the Trent River.
Is there a tsunami risk in Toronto?
Research in Scientific Reports (2016) describes meteotsunamis in the Great Lakes: waves produced by fast-moving weather systems rather than earthquakes. The authors count an event as a water-level oscillation with a period under two hours and a height above 0.3 meters, and estimate about five such events a year on Lake Ontario, the lowest of the five lakes. A 2014 event on Lake Superior overtopped the Soo Locks and halted shipping. The authors state that current forecasting systems cannot predict these events. No documented tsunami affecting Toronto was found in this research.
Flood history of the Don and Humber, including Hurricane Hazel
Toronto’s worst natural disaster was Hurricane Hazel, which arrived on the night of October 15, 1954. The Environment Canada archive describes up to 225 millimeters of rain on ground already saturated by an unusually wet two weeks, with roughly 90 percent of it running off into rivers and raising water levels by 6 to 8 meters. The archive gives an official death toll of 81, notes that other sources report 80 to 83, and says Raymore Drive in Etobicoke had 35 deaths on that one street. It also reports that 1,896 families were left homeless.
The response reshaped land use. The Environment Canada archive records that Ontario enacted the Conservation Authorities Act in 1946, and that the Metropolitan Toronto and Region Conservation Authority, now Toronto and Region Conservation, was formed in 1957 to replace four smaller authorities. Its 1959 Plan for Flood Control and Water Conservation called for 13 dams and reservoirs built over 10 years, and a land acquisition program began in 1960. The Clairville Dam was completed in 1964 and the Milne and G. Ross Lord dams in 1973. Marie Curtis Park in Long Branch was created on acquired land, where property owners were paid a total of $800,000 for 164 lots.
Frequently asked questions
How high above sea level is Toronto?
From about 76.5 meters at the waterfront to 209 meters at the highest point, according to the City of Toronto. Climate stations at 76.8, 112.5, and 173.4 meters are listed by Environment and Climate Change Canada.
Where is the highest point in Toronto?
The City of Toronto places it at the intersection of Steeles Avenue West and Keele Street, at 209 meters.
Can a tsunami hit Toronto?
No tsunami affecting Toronto was found in the sources checked. Meteotsunamis, waves driven by weather, occur on the Great Lakes, with about five a year estimated for Lake Ontario.
Why did Hurricane Hazel flood Toronto?
Heavy rain fell on ground already saturated by an unusually wet two weeks, so most of it ran straight into rivers such as the Humber, according to the Environment Canada archive.
Sources
- Environment and Climate Change Canada, Historical Climate Data station list (climate-stations): Toronto City Centre, Toronto City, Toronto Intl A
- City of Toronto, “Toronto at a Glance”
- University of Waterloo, “Sculpting Toronto’s landscape” (Lake Iroquois, Don and Humber valleys)
- University of Toronto Scarborough, Planet Earth Lab, “Beautiful but dangerous: Scenic spots and hazards at the Scarborough Bluffs”
- The Canadian Encyclopedia, “Oak Ridges Moraine”
- Rabinovich et al., “Meteotsunamis in the Laurentian Great Lakes,” Scientific Reports 6:37832, November 2016
- Environment Canada archive, Hurricane Hazel: summary, fatalities, mitigation
Related reading
- Toronto weather and climate records
- How the neighborhoods grew
- The Toronto Islands
- Where Toronto is located
- Toronto facts and geography
Last verified: October 2026
Cite this page
APA: History of Toronto. (2026, October 25). Toronto’s Elevation and Topography. https://historyoftoronto.ca/blog/a-comprehensive-guide-to-toronto-elevation-discover-the-heights-and-depths-of-canadas-largest-city
MLA: “Toronto’s Elevation and Topography.” History of Toronto, 25 Oct. 2026, https://historyoftoronto.ca/blog/a-comprehensive-guide-to-toronto-elevation-discover-the-heights-and-depths-of-canadas-largest-city. Accessed .
Chicago: History of Toronto. “Toronto’s Elevation and Topography.” Last modified October 25, 2026. https://historyoftoronto.ca/blog/a-comprehensive-guide-to-toronto-elevation-discover-the-heights-and-depths-of-canadas-largest-city.
The pages have no named author, so the site is given as the author. Add the date you read the page if your style asks for it.