Caption: The "good old daze" when every streetcar approaching was a CLRV or ALRV, and the ready tracks at Russell Carhouse yard were just teaming with them. In the low-floor accessibility era of the 2000's, the TTC's fleet of high-floor, nearly 30-year old streetcars were earmarked for replacement and living on borrowed time, but owed their survival for another decade to the TTC's pickiness and unique requirements for an articulated, low-floor model that could handle Toronto's tight intersection curves. Despite showing a Bombardier Flexity mock-up as a potential future replacement in 2005, a "made for Toronto" solution wouldn't be in the cards for another decade. In the meantime, the TTC would keep their aging fleet of Canadian-built streetcars going with rebuilds, overhauls, and many hours of dedicated work from their talented shop forces.

During a supervised garage visit of Russell Carhouse yard, here we see the first of the Canadian-built order, 4010 (with old skinny font numbers) parked in the lineup with 4077 and 4043 awaiting their next assignments. The yard was a bit muddy as there was a touch of rain that day. Note the red fire towers for putting out any errant fires in the yard (dating back from the wooden streetcar days of the 1920's).

The first six CLRV prototypes (4000-4005) were SIG Swiss-built, while the bulk of the fleet (4010-4199) were built by UTDC in the old Can-Car Thunder Bay plant. 4010 would be spared the torch and donated for preservation to the Halton County Radial Railway museum upon retirement.