Quote:
Originally Posted by thewave46
The province is spending some bucks on Highway 11-17 near Thunder Bay.
In aggregate it's probably several hundred million dollars.
Even with Northern Ontario, literally more than half of the population is concentrated in the Highway 17 corridor between North Bay and the Sault. Only looking north of that means you're ignoring more than half the population of the region.
So, you're talking ~350,000 people in a province of 14 million. 2.5% of the province of Ontario. Given that the MTO's entire budget is $5.2 billion for 2019, of which $2.2 billion is spent on highways (the bulk of which is spent on repair, not expansion) you're looking at $130 million proportionally speaking for the region for all MTO operations north of Sudbury-North Bay.
If the region you specify received a similar proportion spent on its highways as the south, it would amount to $55 million per year. It probably receives proportionally more due to less transit spending, but you're looking at a budget of <$100 million per year. That doesn't buy a lot given the mileage of roads that need to be maintained - thousands of kilometres of highway.
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Maybe it should not just be based on usage, but actual distance. That is one reason that my local hospital is always over 100% capacity, even when they stopped day surgeries for covid; the province bases it on population, not on actual need.
Getting back to highways, knock out a span and ridiculous drives happen to detour it. Two good examples; one of which has happened, are the Nipigon River Bridge and the Spanish River bridge. The Nipigon River bridge was closed due to a failure a few years ago. That meant all traffic had to detour through the USA. A distance of over 1600km and 18 hours if you were going from one side to the other. The Spanish River bridge on highway 17 would require an 8 hour drive, including driving on a gravel road. Show me where in Southern ON closing a bridge or other highway would result in such sever problems.
Quote:
Originally Posted by sonysnob
Ontario is actively working on twinning routes across their province.
Ontario is currently four-laning more rural stretches of highway than BC or Nova Scotia is.
Ontario and Quebec are twinning a similar amount of routes currently.
What's unique about Ontario is that it is the only province where the major east-west economic axis doesn't follow the alignment of the Trans-Canada Highway.
Most of the important trunk routes have been four laned across the praries, but it's also worth noting that it costs nothing to build roads in the praries relative to what it costs through the shield.
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You can drive from 7 of the 5 capitals in Eastern Canada on 4 laned roads.
To get from the most western capital of Eastern Canada to the next western capital, there is more than 1500km, whereas the BC gap is less than 500km.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dengler Avenue
Let's just say that @swimmer_spe's salty that the freeway around Sudbury (from Markstay to Espanola) is rather limited. Some of us may agree with that sentiment.
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I am salty that it is unlikely that the 400 will reach Sudbury by 2050.
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You will be in your early 70’s. You will still be able to drive to enjoy it. Relax.
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