Friday, September 5, 2025
Metrolinx announced that two new tunnel boring machines (TBMs) for the Ontario Line have officially been named.
Following a naming contest launched in June 2025 — which saw more than 900 submissions and over 1,000 votes cast — Metrolinx is excited to formally introduce Libby and Corkie.
Jason Paris submitted the winning names as a tribute to two of the vibrant communities the Ontario Line subway will serve in the City of Toronto: Liberty Village and Corktown. Libby and Corkie will work alongside each other to dig about six kilometres of twin tunnels beneath the city’s downtown core.
The TBMs arrived in Canada on June 9, 2025, at the Port of Oshawa. They were carefully unpacked and transferred to a storage facility, where they are currently being prepared for tunnelling.
Excavation is now complete at the tunnel launch shaft where Libby and Corkie will start their tunnelling journey in early 2026. Construction crews recently broke ground on the second tunnel launch shaft at Gerrard.
The Ontario Line is No. 6 on ReNew Canada’s 2025 Top100 Projects report.
Featured image: The Ontario Line twin TBMs being unloaded from the ship at Port of Oshawa (HOPA)
