Excerpt from HAUNTED CANADA 3
by Pat Hancock
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The Lady in Red
Toronto, Ontario
Toronto’s subway system has two Bay Street stations — the one thousands of riders walk through every day, and another one below it that is closed to the public. Lower Bay, as it’s known, was opened back in 1966 to help link the new east-west Bloor-Danforth to the existing north-south Yonge Street line. But after just six months, the Toronto Transit Commission decided it was better to keep the two lines separate, because when a train broke down on either line the entire system ground to a halt. So the stairs connecting the upper and lower Bay stations were blocked off, and the white-tiled lower station became a storage site for escalator parts and some maintenance equipment.
These days Lower Bay is often used by television film crews shooting subway scenes. It’s still used for storage too, and for testing new system signs and experimenting with possible changes to subway platforms. But a few TTC employees don’t like being asked to spend time down there, especially not at night, because they don’t want to meet up with the station’s ghost.
The spectral “lady in red” drifts through the tunnel toward the station, occasionally moaning pitifully as she approaches. Wavy brown hair frames her face and falls across the shoulders of her long red dress. The apparition lasts just twenty to thirty seconds, but that’s more that enough time for a frightened observer to see the dark hollows where her eyes should be. Even more disturbing is how she moves. She seems to have no legs – appearing to float just above the ground.
Is this lady in red the ghost of a victim of some terrible crime on the station platform, or of a tragic accident on the tracks below? No one knows. But it’s easy to understand why a worker seeing her late at night wouldn’t look forward to the possibility of encountering her ever again.
From Haunted Canada 3, copyright © 2005 by Pat Hancock. All rights reserved.
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