Pearson Airport to Toronto Metropolitan University

How do I get from Pearson to Toronto Metropolitan University?

TMU is the one university in the province where the train is a real alternative: the UP Express from Pearson to Union takes twenty-five minutes and Dundas station on Line 1 is two stops north, with the campus at the top of the stairs. For a student with one bag it is the right answer and this page says so. For a student with the contents of a room, for a family, for a landing at midnight when the train runs every half hour, and for anyone whose residence is on Jarvis rather than at Dundas, the chauffeur is the version that ends at the door.

The campus and its doors

TMU occupies the blocks east of Yonge between Dundas and Gerrard, with buildings threaded through the city rather than set apart from it. The residences: Pitman Hall at 160 Mutual Street, the largest, with a drop-off on Mutual; the International Living/Learning Centre at 240 Jarvis Street, an ordinary Jarvis address with a lay-by; the Daphne Cockwell Complex at 288 Church Street, the tower above the health sciences building, with an entrance on Church; HOEM at 186 Jarvis, the newer private residence. None can be reached by stopping on Yonge Street, which is why the chauffeur comes up Jarvis or Church rather than through Yonge-Dundas Square. The Ted Rogers School of Management is on Bay Street at Dundas, the Mattamy Athletic Centre — the old Maple Leaf Gardens — is on Carlton at Church, and the Image Arts building, the Student Learning Centre and the library are on Gould and Victoria Streets, all within a five-minute walk of each other.

Move-in and the international arrival

TMU's move-in runs over the Labour Day weekend with staggered arrival windows, and the side streets — Mutual, Gould, Church — are coned for unloading. The chauffeured version is a Sprinter or SUV sized for the load, timed to the window, stopped in the coned zone while the family carries up; the chauffeur helps with the bags to the lobby and waits. International students arrive in late August for orientation and are the heart of this route: a single arrival from a long-haul flight, met inside Terminal 1 or 3 with a name board if the meet-and-greet add-on is chosen, driven to the residence check-in desk and delivered with the luggage inside. The pickup page explains the meeting points; the family and accessible page explains the luggage allowance and the extra time we build in for a first arrival.

Parents, visits and the hotels next door

Parents visiting a TMU student have the easiest hotel choice in the province: the Chelsea Hotel is on Gerrard Street a block from Pitman Hall, the Marriott Downtown at Eaton Centre is across Yonge, the Kimpton Saint George is on Yonge at Charles, and the Bond Place and the Pantages are on Dundas and Victoria. The arrival from Pearson to any of them is the same downtown fare, and the weekend is walkable. What the chauffeur adds is the day out: Niagara Falls for a family that has flown in from overseas, the Toronto Zoo or Canada's Wonderland for younger siblings, or a chauffeured half-day around the city with the student collected at the residence — the ROM, Casa Loma, the Distillery District, the waterfront — for the family that wants to see more than Yonge Street. Convocation in June is held at the Mattamy Athletic Centre, a five-minute walk from the residences, and the family car afterwards goes to lunch or to the airport.

The working campus: Ted Rogers, the DMZ and the visitor's day

TMU's professional traffic is corporate: executives on the Ted Rogers School's programmes, founders and investors visiting the DMZ incubator on Dundas, guest lecturers, and the recruiters who run interview days in the Ted Rogers building on Bay. A visitor's day is a hotel-to-campus transfer in the morning, a chauffeured block for the meetings that move between the campus, the financial district six blocks south and the MaRS building on College, and a departure timed to the flight — booked on a corporate account with monthly invoicing. Events at the Mattamy Athletic Centre — TMU Bold games, concerts, the convocation — and at Massey Hall and the Elgin Theatre two blocks away are on the event page.

Departures: the flight home

The departure from a TMU residence is the downtown departure with one wrinkle: the Yonge-Dundas block is pedestrian-heavy at every hour and the chauffeur collects from the side-street door — Mutual, Jarvis, Church — rather than the Yonge frontage. The pickup time is planned backwards from the flight with the terminal finder confirming Terminal 1 or 3, ninety minutes before a domestic departure and two and a half to three hours before an international one, plus the Gardiner buffer for the hour; the departures page explains both. The end-of-April departure carries a year's belongings, and the vehicle is sized for it at booking.

What the fare includes

The fare from Pearson to TMU is the fixed downtown fare by vehicle class and includes the chauffeur, the vehicle, fuel, tolls, taxes, curbside pickup at the pre-arranged area and the included waiting — sixty minutes international, thirty domestic — with the flight tracked. Meet and greet inside the arrivals hall is the paid add-on; gratuity is never added; a cancellation before dispatch is free; parents overseas book and pay in their own currency.

Graduate, exchange and mid-year arrivals

TMU's January intake, its exchange students on a single term, and its graduate programmes bring the arrivals that fall outside move-in weekend: a master's student landing in the first week of January into the coldest week of the year, an exchange student from Europe or Australia for the winter term, a visiting scholar with a family and a year's luggage. The addresses are different too — the graduate residence, a sublet in Cabbagetown or the St. Lawrence Market neighbourhood found on a listing site, a hotel for the first week — and the chauffeur handles each the same way: the address on the booking, the flight tracked, the luggage sized at booking, and the child seats fitted for a family. The winter arrival is where meet and greet inside the hall earns its price: a student who has never seen snow, landing at 9 pm in a squall, walked to a warm car by a chauffeur with a name board.

Sport, the Mattamy Athletic Centre and the events campus

TMU's campus is an events venue: the Mattamy Athletic Centre — Maple Leaf Gardens, the most famous arena in the country until 1999 — hosts TMU Bold hockey and basketball, concerts and the convocation; the Yonge-Dundas Square outside the campus hosts the free summer concerts and the TIFF outdoor screenings; and Massey Hall, the Elgin and Winter Garden Theatres and the Ed Mirvish Theatre are within three blocks. A visiting family's evening at any of them is on the event pattern, with the chauffeur waiting on the side street after the show; a visiting team or a touring company for the Mattamy is a Sprinter booking on a manifest. The Rogers Centre and Scotiabank Arena are ten minutes south for the Blue Jays, the Raptors and the Leafs.

The airport and the station: two gateways five minutes apart

TMU is five minutes by car from Union Station, which makes the chauffeured transfer the connection for a student continuing by VIA Rail to Kingston, Montréal or Ottawa after a Pearson landing, and for a parent arriving at Union by train for convocation. Billy Bishop airport on the island is fifteen minutes from the campus and the right departure for Montréal, Ottawa, Halifax and the US north-east on Porter; the Billy Bishop page covers the tunnel and the timing.

Book Pearson to TMU