On October 21, 2013, Premier Kathleen Wynne announced Ontario’s Open Government initiative. This initiative, governed by Ontario’s Open Data Directive, maximizes access to government data by requiring all data to be made public on the Ontario Data Catalogue, unless it is exempt for legal, privacy, security, confidentiality or commercially-sensitive reasons.

Open Data enables the sharing of government data online so that application developers, non-profit organizations, researchers and others can help solve problems that affect Ontarians every day. It is structured data that is machine-readable, freely shared, used and built on without restrictions, and must be:

• Available and Accessible: the data must be available as a whole preferably by downloading over the internet. The data must also be available in a convenient and modifiable form.
• Re-useable and Allowed for Redistribution: the data must be provided under terms that permit re-use and redistribution.
• Available for Universal Participation: everyone must be able to use, re-use and redistribute. There should be no discrimination against persons or groups.

Metrolinx is currently finalizing an inventory of datasets which will be available on this page in the near future.