Tower Terminal Inn

The Tower Terminal existed for 13 years and was located on the site of the Canadian entrance of the Rainbow International Bridge.

In the Fall of 1927, the Tower Terminal Inn was built to provide a new passenger terminal for the Niagara, St. Catharines & Toronto Electric Car Line.

Formerly this street car line had a terminal at the base of Bridge Street, where passengers could then board the International Railroad Company or Great Gorge Railway.

The Tower Inn was built in the fashion of a Tudor style, constructed of stone, this building was three stories high.

The top of this building had a small tower from which with look-out balconies on three sides provided visitors with a panoramic view of the American Falls and Horseshoe Falls. It also housed a restaurant and gift shop. The building also served as the terminal for Gray Coach Bus Lines.

The Tower Inn was completed and officially opened in July of 1928 and became the center hub of three sets of street car rail lines.

One half of Newman Hill consisted of tow sets of trolley rails which connected the Tower Terminal Inn to the NS&T trolley line located on Victoria Avenue. The other half of the Newman Hill cut contained two lanes for automobile traffic.

When the Queen Elizabeth Highway traffic circle was built at the western end of Niagara Falls in 1939-1940, the trolley rail bed on Newman Hill was removed and converted for automobile traffic in 1941.

The collapse of the Falls View Bridge on January 27th 1938 and the closing of the International Railway Company were the primary factors. The 1932 Clifton Hotel fire and the subsequent demolition of the Lafayette Hotel amounted to the final factors which hasten its demise.

The replacement Rainbow International Bridge was designed to connect directly to the Queen Elizabeth Highway. So on September 27th 1940, the Tower Terminal Inn was closed and demolished.

The Rainbow International Bridge opened in May of 1942.  A new bus terminal was built on a portion of the former Tower Inn Terminal site with its entrance on Falls Avenue.

Today, all the remnants of the Tower Terminal Inn and the electric railways have long since disappeared.

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