This unlikely nature preserve is now home to more than 300 bird species, 50 butterfly species, and rich and varied vegetation and landscapes.
The story of The Spit began in 1959 when the city, anticipating an increase in shipping activity with the opening of the St. Lawrence seaway, started to build a breakwater for the outer harbor. They did this by dumping hundreds of truck loads of construction debris into Lake Ontario. This debris was made up of old bricks, remnants of neighborhoods lost to development, and bits of demolished 19th-century buildings.
By the 1970s the plan for the breakwater was scrapped and the land was left to sit. It was around this time that nature began to take over the peninsula. The Spit became an important stop over for birds migrating over Lake Ontario and in 2000 the area was declared a globally Significant Bird Area.
The balance between human use and environmental respect is ever precarious but the Leslie Street Spit has managed to endure and even thrive through decades of shifting public priorities and existential threats.