How do you walk a ravine when the ravine is fenced off? For St. Andrew-Windfields households whose route runs from Windfields Park toward Wilket Creek and Edwards Gardens, that has been a real question since September. As of mid-November, the honest answer is that the most complete ravine visit at Toronto Botanical Garden is the one inside the Visitor Centre.
The trail closure is the start of a longer stretch. The storm repairs have no end date. On top of that, a separately planned City bridge replacement in Wilket Creek Park is scheduled to run from 2027 into the summer of 2028. Between now and then, the parts of this landscape you can count on are the formal gardens above the creek and the Garden's indoor calendar.
What the fence covers, and what it doesn't
Toronto Botanical Garden posted this notice on its visitor planning page:
"Updated September 17, 2026 – Recent storm damage has caused significant washouts to sections of the ravine trail system and bridges at Edwards Gardens. For public safety, affected areas are closed until further notice. Assessment and repair work is underway; however, a reopening timeline is not yet available."
The notice went up about two weeks after the September 2 storm, which CityNews reported dropped more than 100 millimetres of rain in some areas, tore down trees and power lines, and generated just shy of 1,500 calls to Toronto fire officials over a 24-hour period.
The damage reached beyond the Garden's own grounds. Toronto Photo Walks had planned a September 19 walk from the Wilket Creek Park Picnic Area #2 parking lot at 1120 Leslie Street up to Edwards Gardens. It rerouted the walk because storm damage had closed "some of the path between Sunnybrook and Edwards Gardens," and sent the group west along the Serena Gundy Park Trail instead.
The garden above the ravine is still running on its normal terms. Admission is free, the gardens are open from dawn to dusk, and the Visitor Centre is open daily from 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. The Garden counts 17 themed gardens of local, native and pollinator-friendly plants. Self-guided maps are available, and the "What's in Bloom" cart in the Visitor Centre shows cuttings of whatever is flowering and where to find it. In November, that cart is a quicker guide to the season than the beds themselves.
The ravine, moved inside
At the same time the trails closed, the Garden was running an exhibit about exactly what is behind the fence. "Toronto Gone Wild: Ravines," presented with the Museum of Toronto, is a free indoor exhibit about the city's ravines, their plants and wildlife, and the stories of the people who use them. It is open daily from 10:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. through December 2026.
For anyone who has walked Wilket Creek for years, this is the most direct way back into the ravine this season, and it runs on fixed hours instead of trail conditions. It also ends with the calendar year, so it overlaps with the closure only for the next several weeks.
The Garden's events calendar also lists "Christmas with Milne House" on December 8, 2026.
A calendar built around the gardens above the creek
With the ravine closed, the Garden's events carry most of the season. Here is how the next seven weeks look from publish day, Thursday, November 12:
| Date | What's on | Details |
|---|---|---|
| Weekends to Nov 29 | Dandelion Café | Weekends only, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.; closed in December |
| Daily through December | "Toronto Gone Wild: Ravines" | Free, 10:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., indoors |
| Nov 20 to 22 | Holiday EcoMarket, first weekend | Free; Friday 2 to 6 p.m., Saturday and Sunday 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. |
| Dec 8 | "Christmas with Milne House" | Listed on the Garden's events calendar |
| Dec 18 to 20 | Holiday EcoMarket, second weekend | Same hours, free admission |
Three Dandelion Café weekends are left after publish day: November 14 and 15, 21 and 22, and 28 and 29. The middle one coincides with the first EcoMarket weekend, which makes November 21 and 22 the busiest days on the site before the café closes for December.
The Holiday EcoMarket brings in more than 100 local vendors, with an outdoor firepit with marshmallows and family craft activities on the weekend days. The December weekend runs after the café has closed, so the vendors and the firepit are the main draw that weekend.
Getting there when the trail isn't the way in
When the ravine path is closed, the route in from St. Andrew-Windfields is by road to 777 Lawrence Avenue East at Leslie Street. For anyone driving, the Garden's paid parking costs $4 an hour, capped at $16 a day. Under terms effective June 1, 2026, it is enforced 24 hours a day and overnight parking is not permitted. Garden members get free parking year-round, along with discounts at the Garden Shop and the Dandelion Café. For a household planning both EcoMarket weekends plus a few visits to the exhibit, that is worth weighing against the daily cap.
Dog walkers need a separate plan. Dogs are not permitted at Toronto Botanical Garden, though trained service animals are welcome. When the ravine was open, a walk could pass the garden without entering it. With sections of the ravine closed, the garden itself is the main thing left to visit, and dogs cannot go in.
Closer to home, the City's page for Windfields Park showed no alerts or closures in early November. The City lists the park as part of the Wilket Creek Trail. The City's Edwards Gardens page repeats the storm-damage closure notice and lists current alerts. It is the page to check before heading downstream.
The next closure is already on the City's schedule
Apart from the storm repairs, the ravine also faces a planned project. The City's Wilket Creek Park Bridge Improvements project is unrelated to the September washouts. It will replace the bridge near the park's washroom building and repair the retaining wall next to it so the crossing can safely carry emergency vehicles. Toronto and Region Conservation Authority is delivering the work for the City in two phases.
The published timeline, last modified September 29, 2026:
- Fall 2026: Hire a construction team, as detailed design wraps up.
- Spring to summer 2027: Build a new emergency access route into the park from Salonica Road. Maintenance and construction vehicles will also use it during the bridge work.
- Fall 2027: Bridge replacement and retaining wall repair begin.
- Summer 2028: Construction complete and the bridge reopens.
The City notes that the timeline is subject to change. While the bridge is closed, vehicles will not be able to enter the park from Leslie Street beyond the adjacent parking lot. A temporary pedestrian crossing will be built near the closed bridge, and the nearby washrooms will stay open. People on foot will still have a way across, while drivers headed for the picnic areas will lose the Leslie Street entrance beyond the first lot.
Further down the creek, Toronto and Region Conservation Authority says detailed design is underway for Reach 3, the last section of its Wilket Creek rehabilitation project, with construction expected in 2027 or later.
The storm-damaged sections are closed with no reopening date. The bridge project is scheduled to close part of the park from fall 2027 to summer 2028, and TRCA expects construction on its last creek reach to begin in 2027 or later. For the next several seasons, the ravine walk will be open in some places and interrupted in others. The formal gardens and the Visitor Centre at Lawrence and Leslie are the parts residents can plan around this winter.
At Ample Realty Team, we follow the park and creek projects around St. Andrew-Windfields as closely as the market, because they shape how the neighbourhood is used day to day. If you live near Windfields Park and want to talk through how projects like the Wilket Creek bridge replacement might come up when you sell, Frank Fu Feng can walk you through it with a Free Home Valuation.
