Highways in Canada

[SignalHillHiker]

I don't think we'll ever see 110 in Newfoundland and Labrador. In fact, most of the new highways we've built since the TCH have 80-90 km/hr limits.

Of course, traffic flow is usually a bit faster. I routinely do 115-120 on the highway and the majority of traffic passes me. I've only really sped a few times, and I've only been stopped for speeding once - at 140, and it was only a warning.

[Dengler Avenue]

Originally Posted by MonctonRad

I know where you're coming from and I partially agree with you that slow truck traffic serves as an impediment to other vehicles, but there is a logarithmic relationship between velocity and stopping distance, as well as energy at impact.

For example, a pedestrian hit by a car going at 50 km/hr rather than a car going 25 km/hr doesn't experience twice the force of impact, it's considerably more than that.

I don't know what the answer is. The most logical thing to do if we want to have uniformity of speed on a roadway is to make everyone slow down to "truck speed", but I doubt that would be acceptable to the motoring public..........

I wonder how this scenario plays out when all vehicles are autonomous.

Originally Posted by SignalHillHiker

I don't think we'll ever see 110 in Newfoundland and Labrador. In fact, most of the new highways we've built since the TCH have 80-90 km/hr limits.

Of course, traffic flow is usually a bit faster. I routinely do 115-120 on the highway and the majority of traffic passes me. I've only really sped a few times, and I've only been stopped for speeding once - at 140, and it was only a warning.

NL RCMP’s are pretty chill.

[SignalHillHiker]

Originally Posted by Dengler Avenue

I wonder how this scenario plays out when all vehicles are autonomous.

NL RCMP’s are pretty chill.

This one was, at least. Probably only because the rest of traffic (like the two other cars on the highway - this was the road to Argentia) were doing the same. Ayreonaut was with me and he was surprised.

The funny thing is the RCMP has the opposite reputation here. I don't know how accurate this is, but people assume Royal Newfoundland Constabulary officers are all Newfoundlanders, and RCMP officers are all mainlanders. So they just of expect the RCMP ones to not get it, not be invested in the community, not know everyone, etc.

[swimmer_spe]

Originally Posted by Spocket

Does anybody know why speed limits for trucks are always lower than for passenger vehicles? I mean, without thinking about, the answer seems obvious but on closer inspection, I can't really see what difference it makes in terms of safety. If you can do 100 in a semi, it seems reasonable to assume that you could do 120 without any real difference. Air brakes? Wear and tear on the road somehow? As a safety measure, it seems counterintuitive. After all, the idea should be to minimize higher speed maneuvers, right? So, if trucks are clogging things up, people (who would be ideally doing the speed limit for their class of vehicle) would have to change lanes to avoid them. If that's the case, how does that improve safety? Seems more like it would decrease highway safety. Granted, if a truck hits something, it's going to do a lot more damage but at highway speeds I wouldn't think many people would be expected to live in a head on or similar anyway.

Think off this as a physics question. Higher speed means longer to stop, and in the event of a sudden stop, there will be more force applied to what ever may be impacted.

Think of how bad collisions with trucks are at city speeds and at highway speeds. So, what would happen at 120 or higher?

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by SaskScraper

, also Quebec and the Atlantic provinces getting so much snow I'm not too surprised that Quebec doesn't have highest speed limit in Canada either and limited to 100km/hr..

We've had snow plowing in Quebec and Atlantic Canada for at least a couple of years now.

And I mean, out of all of the thousands of hours of driving time in a given year, what percentage of them do you think expressways in Quebec-Atlantic Canada would have the road surface covered in snow?

[SaskScraper]

^^ oh, well I'm glad Quebec has hopefully solved some of their snow removal problems from a couple years ago, that should give residence of Montreal who use expressways there some added confidence when they venture out on cold snowy winters.

https://www.google.ca/amp/s/amp.reddit.c...ind_through_a_snowstorm_qu%25C3%25A9bec/

• Video Link

I'm not sure what percentage of year Quebec has snow on highways, some places most of year, some places less?
...but must have snow enough of the time to implement mandatory snow tire law, especial if province has a compensation package for drivers that are suck on Montreal expressways for hours at a time, I've never heard of such thing anywhere else ever before.

...Under the terms of the agreement, people who were trapped in their cars for four hours or less will receive $350 from the provincial government. The payments increase according to the amount of time people were stuck, rising to $1,100 for drivers and passengers who spent 10 hours or more in their vehicles.

Children aged under 12, seniors over 75, pregnant women and people with medical conditions will receive bonuses worth 25 per cent of the payment, for a maximum of $1,375 per plaintiff.

Roughly 2,500 people have so far registered to take part in the class action. The agreement with the Quebec government needs to be authorized by the Superior Court before plaintiffs can be compensated...

https://www.google.ca/amp/s/nationalpost...-trapped-on-highway-after-2017-storm/amp

https://www.google.ca/amp/s/www.cbc.ca/amp/1.4986538

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by SaskScraper

^^ oh, well I'm glad Quebec has hopefully solved some of their snow removal problems from a couple years ago, that should give residence of Montreal who use expressways there some added confidence when they venture out on cold snowy winters.

https://www.google.ca/amp/s/amp.reddit.c...ind_through_a_snowstorm_qu%25C3%25A9bec/

• Video Link

I'm not sure what percentage of year Quebec has snow on highways, some places most of year, some places less?
...but must have snow enough of the time to implement mandatory snow tire law, especial if province has a compensation package for drivers that are suck on Montreal expressways for hours at a time, I've never heard of such thing anywhere else ever before.



https://www.google.ca/amp/s/nationalpost...-trapped-on-highway-after-2017-storm/amp

https://www.google.ca/amp/s/www.cbc.ca/amp/1.4986538

So you're citing one, isolated, highly-publicized screw-up as if it's the way things always are? What grade are you in again?

I live in a climate similar to Montreal's and there are expressways near my place (A-50 and A-5) that I use in the winter. You're driving on bare or slightly wet pavement on them upwards of 90-95% of the time in winter.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by SaskScraper

I'm not sure what percentage of year Quebec has snow on highways, some places most of year, some places less?

On rural highways, yes. On expressways? Snow on the road for most of the winter (not the year of course, that's silly)... never. Expressways are generally totally clear within a few hours of most snowfalls.

[esquire]

Not that highways are ever closed due to snowstorms in Saskatchewan or anything

[Airboy]

Highway 16 (Yellowhead) was closed west of Edson today as a wildfire jumped the highway. Evacuations being conducted in that ares. About 200 km west of Edmonton.

[Dengler Avenue]

Sometimes I find it mind-boggling that Edmonton’s 280 km from AB/BC boundary via Yellowhead Highway...

[Corndogger]

Originally Posted by Dengler Avenue

Sometimes I find it mind-boggling that Edmonton’s 280 km from AB/BC boundary via Yellowhead Highway...

Did you think it was a lot closer?

[Pinus]

Originally Posted by Dengler Avenue

Sometimes I find it mind-boggling that Edmonton’s 280 km from AB/BC boundary via Yellowhead Highway...

Edmonton is 392 kms from that location on the AB/BC border. So basically 400 kms from the city centre.

[Chadillaccc]

Originally Posted by Acajack

On rural highways, yes. On expressways? Snow on the road for most of the winter (not the year of course, that's silly)... never. Expressways are generally totally clear within a few hours of most snowfalls.

As with everywhere in the country.

[Dengler Avenue]

Originally Posted by Corndogger

Did you think it was a lot closer?

Originally Posted by Pinus

Edmonton is 392 kms from that location on the AB/BC border. So basically 400 kms from the city centre.

I’ve always thought the distance would be in double digits. The same goes for Calgary.

[esquire]

Originally Posted by Dengler Avenue

I’ve always thought the distance would be in double digits. The same goes for Calgary.

By contrast, it's 250 km from Edmonton to the Sask border.

[Chadillaccc]

Originally Posted by Dengler Avenue

I’ve always thought the distance would be in double digits. The same goes for Calgary.

The line of sight distance between Calgary and the nearest of the front ranges, Prairie Mountain, is 53 km (a 28 minute drive when going the speed limit [110 km/h]). Driving distance, the nearest of the front ranges is 66 km away (40 minute drive going on country roads). Canmore - with about 15 000 people and about 30 km inside the front ranges - is a 1 hour drive from Downtown Calgary going the speed limit.

With that data in mind, you thought correctly in Calgary's case.

Canmore source: https://www.google.ca/maps/dir/Calgary,+...!2m2!1d-114.0708459!2d51.0486151!1m0!3e0

Prairie Mountain source: https://www.google.ca/maps/dir/Calgary,+...!1d-114.0708459!2d51.0486151!1m0!3e0!5i1

Line of sight source: https://www.scadacore.com/tools/rf-path/rf-line-of-sight/

[Airboy]

Driving west out of Edmonton its just under 2hrs drive before you first see the mountains. Pretty much the same going south.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by Chadillaccc

As with everywhere in the country.

Indeed. But I was just responding to a poster who is insinuating that the amounts of snow that fall in Quebec (and some parts of Ontario) are so enormous that crews just can't keep up, and that we're driving on snow-covered expressways for most of the winter.

[Chadillaccc]

Originally Posted by Acajack

Indeed. But I was just responding to a poster who is insinuating that the amounts of snow that fall in Quebec (and some parts of Ontario) are so enormous that crews just can't keep up, and that we're driving on snow-covered expressways for most of the winter.

Ohh I see. I get you now. That actually does happen in some areas of Alberta, specifically Jasper National Park along highway 93. However, no one in their right mind would consider 93 an expressway, it's merely the connecting road between the two national parks down an extremely narrow, avalanche-prone valley. I've seen it happen in BC too, specifically this past November driving to Vancouver. We drifted all the way across the Park Bridge (about 200 meters long) over the Kicking Horse River. It was literally the most terrifying/exciting experience of my life, but I almost died of heart failure. I don't think any of us took a breath for 50 seconds.