by Richard White, Roman Fomin
The last H4 train ran on January 27, 2012 before being retired. As planned, the train arrived at Kennedy Station at about 7:27 AM and was designated run 64. It did only one trip in this snowy morning.
By the time of retirement, the H4 Series of trains was the oldest in the fleet with its orange padded seats, orange doors, brown paneling, noisy ceiling fans and of course no air conditioning. Upon receipt of the Toronto Rocket trains in late 2011, the H4 trains have gradually been replaced with the T1 series of trains, sent over from the Yonge-University-Spadina Line.
This run was the last opportunity to see such cars in service and for many of us out there it will be dearly missed (with the exception for the lack of air conditioning and overabundance of heat).
Previous H-Series cars have already been retired and some remain as work cars with the TTC including pairs of H1 and H2 cars. The cars were built by the Hawker-Siddely company out of Thunder Bay, Ontario hence the H-series cars.