Biiiiink

We're in town for the weekend for Mr B to land...and are considering swapping our drivers licenses on the Saturday. The only two offices open on Saturdays are at these addresses, and I have no clue where they are in relation to downtown where our hotel is.

5555 Eglinton Ave. W.
Etobicoke

and

65 Grand Marshall Drive
Toronto

We're not hiring a car so we're talking taxi/public transport. Is it ridiculous to even attempt to get to one of these places or is it quite do-able? Toddler in tow too I ought to mention...

Anyone know? Thanks

Biiiiink

Fluffy Boogie

Your best bet would be to use Mapquest.ca and type in the address of your hotel and then type in one of the addresses above - it will show you the distance in relation to where you are staying (and give driving directions).
Hope this helps! I know it doesn't give transit info, but maybe the city of T.O. has a website for that somewhere???
Fluffy

AnyaT

They are both rather far away from the centre - I know Etobicoke is not really on the subway line, and the Grand Marshall Dr location is out past Scarborough in the east. It might be a challenge to get there, but you can check the transit info at www.ttc.ca

Glaswegian

I think you'll have to take the go train to get to either, the map is here:
http://www.gotransit.com/publicroot/access/systfr.htm

SimonG

Can only advise you on the Eglington Ave one. It's nowhere near any public transport. It's about 2 miles before Dixie as you travel westbound on Eglington. As you travel west you go past centennial park on the left, then there's a bowling place and then a small mall on the left. The drivers centre is in there.

sysclp

Before we moved in November, we lived about a mile from this one. To get to it from downtown via public transit will take you a good hour and a half and three or four changes. Get on the subway (be sure to get transfers for everyone, if you get on way downtown you will also have to change from that line to the eastbound line at Yonge St.) and go to the end of the line east at Kennedy then change over to the Scarborough RT and take it to Scarborough Town Centre (next to last stop, total trip about an hour). Go downstairs and get on the north bound Midland bus. Take it to Sheppard Ave. (not far, first main street after you cross 401) and change there to the Sheppard bus. That one will drop you off right in front of the driver's license office after a rather lengthly trip. It is one the right across from the Home Depot. I would call first to make sure they do the swaps there before taking that long trip. I know I had to go to two different offices before I found one that would do it, althought that was 4 years ago now.

My husband used to take this route home when he worked downtown and it was a good hour and a half starting at 9pm so it could take longer during the day when transit is busier.

SimonG

Just remembered as well, I don't think they are open all day.

sysclp

PS: Taxi would probably run you close to $50 from downtown but would certainly be much quicker.

prodigyking

Try this:

http://maps.google.com/maps?q=Toront...518%2C0.248373

You can zoom in, out, move around, do local searches, driving directions.

I love google!

Biiiiink

Thanks all. Wow, that sounds like a helluva journey on public transport! If it was just us I'd go for it and save my pennies but I don't think Biiiiink Jr would sit still that long.

We'll give it a go and take a taxi to the Etobicoke centre and see if we can get new licenses. Mr B's paper bit is looking rather tatty and is almost in six pieces so I don't know if they'll accept it but hey, worth a try. And mine is too new so apparently I can only have a G1 one? Or was it G2? Who knows. No motorways or something...hmmpphh!!!

I'll call ahead just to check the opening hours but their website says Sat 8:30-5:30 so we're hopeful.

Thanks again for all your responses

Biiiiink

iaink

I dont see the point in the big rush to do it. If you are just going to be here for a few days when landing, then I can think of better (and less stressfull) things to do. DL isnt that high a priority if you ask me, do it later when you have more time.

Biiiiink

It means we can go straight to Manitoba in May without the hassle of breaking our journey in Ontario, lugging our gear for 2mths with us to a Toronto hotel/back out to the airport. We're only in town for 48hrs this weekend, apart from buying a stroller we don't have much else to do. Not interested in touristy stuff, done it all before!

If it doesn't work out this time, we'll have to do the above, but for the taxi fare we may as well give it a shot. We need a car as soon as we arrive in Manitoba and Mr B is reluctant to buy one unless he has a canadian license in his pocket. He's convinced he'd fail a test so he'd rather go down the swapsie route

Otherwise, I agree with you. I'd make the full use of my two or three months and not bother getting a license until the last minute.

B

AnyaT

I'm confused. You are immigrating to Manitoba? Even if you get an Ontario driving license, you will have to exchange it for a Manitoba license once you arrive there, so why not avoid the extra hassle and just get it in Manitoba?

Biiiiink

Yep, but Manitoba don't swap British ones, you have to re-test. So the plan is to swap in Ontario (no re-test for a British license), and then swap the Ontario one for a Manitoba one.

I wanted to do it in Alberta at leisure where I have a place, but they haven't finalised their swapsie-regulations yet so we've abandoned the idea and are trying to do it in Ontario instead.

wizzard

Have you checked the rules in Manitoba with regard to swapping provincial licences?

I remember people wanting to do something similar back before Ontario swapped UK licences. They wanted to go to quebec, do the swap there with no test, then come back to Ontario and swap the Quebec one for the Ontario one. Problem is that to swap a licence from any other province in Ontario you have to have at least 2 years experience in the last 3 *in the jurisdiction of the licence you are swapping*. I bet Manitoba has a similar rule to prevent what you are suggesting. They will want to see a few years driving experience with the Ontario licence to swap it with no test. I'd check to be sure but it would suck to go to all that trouble and find when you get to Manitoba they won't swap it and worse they treat you like a new driver because you have had the Ontario one for less than a year.

Drew