Highways in Canada

[Metro-One]

Originally Posted by MonctonRad

Given the abomination of the highway system in BC, that's quite a claim!!!

Umm, Manitoba has very favorable topography for building highways, and yet it doesn’t have a single stretch of true fully controlled access freeway. That automatically makes it the worst IMO.

Also, for all of its flaws BC does have around 400 or 500 km of full freeway.

Building the Coquihalla, the Sea to Sky, the 97 on cliff sides along the Okanagan Lake, through the Yoho Canyon, etc... are all very very technically challenging and expensive. Not to mention mega structures such as the Port Mann Bridge, Alex Fraser Bridge, Golden Ears Bridge, etc... which Manitoba largely does not need to construct.

The new Pattullo Bridge alone will cost 1.3 billion for example. How many km of full freeway could that build near Winnipeg?

And while BC does need to make massive improvements to its highway network I would argue that it does have western Canada’s two best freeway segments, the #1 from 200th in Langley to the Cassiar Tunnel and the Coquihalla from Hope to Kamloops.

[Corndogger]

Originally Posted by hipster duck

I'd say BC has the worst highway system in the developed world.

I haven't been to Manitoba, but the Manitoban cities (OK, Winnipeg, Portage-la-Prairie and Brandon), at least seem to have 4-lane bypass roads.

Vancouver's highway system is roughly the same size as Ottawa's - probably less, if you also count the highways in Gatineau. This is a city more than twice the size of Ottawa, and Ottawa's freeway network is already below average in sufficiency, I would say.

Victoria doesn't have a highway. It has two roads which have a couple of stretches with exits on them that peter out into arterial surface roads on either end.

Kelowna has 200,000 people and the whole region is dependent on one, jammed arterial road.

There's only one road leading out of Victoria to the rest of Vancouver island (the majority of whom live within 2 hours of Victoria) and it's a 2-lane highway.

For a place that claims it's so well off financially B.C.'s highway system is pathetic. They're refusal (or is just plain stupidity) to build proper divided highways is unconscionable. Do they not care about safety? Manitoba doesn't sound much better and has no excuse not to have at least a proper freeway system in and/or around Winnipeg.

[Andy6]

Originally Posted by Metro-One

In my view Winnipeg is the largest urban area in a developed nation with no true freeway that I have seen.

Winnipeg isn't particularly hard to get around in though. It kind of raises the question of how necessary the expenditures on freeways were in many other cities.

[Spocket]

Originally Posted by Corndogger

For a place that claims it's so well off financially B.C.'s highway system is pathetic. They're refusal (or is just plain stupidity) to build proper divided highways is unconscionable. Do they not care about safety? Manitoba doesn't sound much better and has no excuse not to have at least a proper freeway system in and/or around Winnipeg.

Winnipeg does actually have an excuse in that it had proposed a freeway system quite some time ago and the whole thing was met with so much opposition that it was cancelled. I suspect that the same may very well apply to Vancouver. Of course, Winnipeg will at least finally be joining the 20th century as the Perimeter highway will be upgraded in the south to freeway standard soon. And, as Andy said above, Winnipeg has managed to function very well in terms of traffic despite the lack of proper freeways.

[Corndogger]

Originally Posted by Spocket

Winnipeg does actually have an excuse in that it had proposed a freeway system quite some time ago and the whole thing was met with so much opposition that it was cancelled. I suspect that the same may very well apply to Vancouver. Of course, Winnipeg will at least finally be joining the 20th century as the Perimeter highway will be upgraded in the south to freeway standard soon. And, as Andy said above, Winnipeg has managed to function very well in terms of traffic despite the lack of proper freeways.

What's your definition of "soon"? Based on what people in the MB/SK thread say it sounds like this could be way off in the future.

[sonysnob]

Originally Posted by Andy6

Winnipeg isn't particularly hard to get around in though. It kind of raises the question of how necessary the expenditures on freeways were in many other cities.

Winnipeg doesn’t have a lot of regional traffic though. It’s not that large of a city in an area that is relatively sparsely populated.

[Ottawaresident]

On Google Maps the Perimeter looks freeway like for most of its length

[Dengler Avenue]

Originally Posted by Ottawaresident

On Google Maps the Perimeter looks freeway like for most of its length

Honestly though, google map views are so deceptive nowadays.

[Andy6]

Originally Posted by sonysnob

Winnipeg doesn’t have a lot of regional traffic though. It’s not that large of a city in an area that is relatively sparsely populated.

It’s a city that, unlike eastern cities with narrow streets and western cities built on a rigid grid system, has lots of broad thoroughfares that radiate out of the downtown. The chokepoints in Winnipeg are the bridges ... it would be more productive to improve the number and capacity of the bridges than to worry about controlled access roadways.

[sonysnob]

^ I don't disagree with what you just posted, but I don't think it really addresses my point. In a larger city, or in a similar sized city with a more populated region, it wouldn't just be the bridges that would be the choke points, rather it would be the signalized intersections.

On my drive to work every morning, there is one particular traffic signal that typically takes four or five cycles to get through. I'm guessing there are less examples of such congestion at traffic signals in a city the size of Winnipeg, simply due to the small overall traffic load.

[Ottawaresident]

Well in Ottawa the "Split" the lights on the SJAM the lights on the 417-5 mess and arterial intersections are the choke points.

[Treplow]

Montreal is really the only major Canadian city that has an American style freeway network, and even that has some coverage gaps (i.e. the surface section of the A20 through Vaudreuil).

[Ottawaresident]

Originally Posted by Treplow

Montreal is really the only major Canadian city that has an American style freeway network, and even that has some coverage gaps (i.e. the surface section of the A20 through Vaudreuil).

I think Toronto and Halifax counts too, though Toronto has alot of cancellations and Halifax's stops short of downtown.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by Ottawaresident

I think Toronto and Halifax counts too, though Toronto has alot of cancellations and Halifax's stops short of downtown.

If we are including metros of less than a million, then I think Quebec City wins this.

[Ottawaresident]

Oh yeah! I forgot

[hipster duck]

Originally Posted by Treplow

Montreal is really the only major Canadian city that has an American style freeway network, and even that has some coverage gaps (i.e. the surface section of the A20 through Vaudreuil).

No Canadian city really has a freeway system that compares favourably with an American city of similar size, especially if we’re talking about an American city in the sunbelt.

American urban interstates are much more sophisticated. They have things like HOV lanes, full shoulders, tall wall crash barriers, decent acceleration lanes, stack interchanges rather than archaic cloverleafs, and usually a minimum of 3 lanes per direction - often 4, 5 or 6. They also have better road surfaces, even in places with similar climates, and more sophisticated interchanges with surface roads.

MTO and the new Alberta urban freeways are built to American standards but Lack the network size, while Quebec and the Maritimes go for the “quantity over quality” approach. BC and MB have neither.

[ghYHZ]

Originally Posted by Ottawaresident

I think Toronto and Halifax counts too, though Toronto has alot of cancellations and Halifax's stops short of downtown.

The last vestiges of the proposed 1960s era Halifax Harbour Expressway…..the ‘Cogswell Interchange’ will soon disappear:


https://www.halifax.ca/about-halifax/reg...n-projects/cogswell-district/design-plan

https://historicnovascotia.ca/items/show/29


In the late 1960’s the Scotia Square urban renewal project was completed and with it, the Cogswell Interchange. About 2000 ft of 4 lane highway was constructed which was eventually to be part of a Harbourfront Expressway linking the then new Mackay Bridge to the south end of the city. A lot of old buildings dating back to the early 1800’s and Halifax’s seafaring traditions would have been demolished…….but saner heads prevailed. Those old buildings are now restaurants, pubs and shops and a boardwalk links the old piers extending from the cruise-ship terminal to the naval dockyard.


https://goo.gl/maps/bEmvZAuKySK2


Plans now are to demolish the Interchange and return all roads to at grade intersections……so gone will be this wall that effectively divides part of the downtown from the restored harbourfront.






Currently this short section of Freeway does work well feeding traffic from Barrington St onto Hollis Street (one-way southbound) and collecting it northbound from Lower Water Street. The majority of downtown parking garages and lots are in this area.

Here’s the narrow single-lane Lower Water Street……but walk around the corner and it’s four lanes.

[Marty_Mcfly]

I've been hearing about Halifax fixing/demo'ing the Cogswell Interchange for many, many years now. Is there actually movement happening on it? It'd definitely be a huge plus to downtown Halifax.

[Acajack]

I've always found INBOUND and OUTBOUND to be cool directions for highways, as opposed to the usual EAST WEST NORTH SOUTH.

[ghYHZ]

Originally Posted by Acajack

I've always found INBOUND and OUTBOUND to be cool directions for highways, as opposed to the usual EAST WEST NORTH SOUTH.

In Halifax’s case….I think that’s a holdover from when there was only two entrance points onto the peninsula. Old Highways 2 and 3 looped through the downtown…then headed back out of the city towards St. Margaret’s Bay and Bedford. Now you also have the two bridges and highway102.