The 401

[Dengler Avenue]

Originally Posted by haljackey

We're in year 2 of 5 for construction work around the Highbury avenue interchange. I'm still cheezed that after all this time and effort, traffic lights will remain on the freeway stretch of Highbury. This was the time to make it right, even if it meant making the 5 year project take 6 or more years.

401 gets beat up a lot more than your typical freeway due to the high % of heavy trucks using it. That means the road wears a lot faster, so more upkeep/construction is needed. Some parts are also approaching the end of their design life (1950s/60s over/underpasses) and thus there is more construction activity now to replace them. Obviously traffic volumes are also growing, so that means widening projects add further, lengthy construction times.

We've beat the dead horse many times about this. 401 is a single point of failure. Another freeway running north of London and K/W towards Toronto would distribute the use and give you an alternate when there's a lot of construction. So would more trains and transit choices... but here we are in 2024 with just the 401 still.

Can it be that MTO doesn’t want to add the flyover ramps between 401 and Highbury Avenue until 401 gets 8 lanes through London (just like the 8E to 401W and 401E to 8W connections)?
I suspect that, when the cloverleaf interchange was redesigned as an A4 parclo, MTO had thought about keeping the free-flow (just like 401E to Yonge Street North). That said, the design might still be there even though it wasn’t used.

[Innsertnamehere]

MTO has no plans for flyovers at Highbury as far as I know. The plan is to leave it as a 6-lane arterial for the foreseeable future.

[MolsonExport]

London (pop 608,343): No highways, no rapid transit
KWC (pop 673,910): highways and rapid transit (LRT). And an expanded 401.

[Snark]

Originally Posted by MolsonExport

London (pop 608,343): No highways, no rapid transit
KWC (pop 673,910): highways and rapid transit (LRT). And an expanded 401.

The items of highways (I believe you mean internal freeways) and an expanded 401 aren't comparable, as the circumstances at either location that prompted those works are very different. Rapid transit is directly comparable though: the Region of Waterloo drove hard to acquire the best possible system no matter what the capital and operating cost will be (LRT mode, and those costs are an awful lot). The City of London chose a inferior mode (BRT) that, when completed, will operate on a grossly incomplete network. Politicians at the Region of Waterloo took a great deal of criticism and general public heat during decision time over the cost, but nonetheless pressed forward with the project. Politicians at the City of London caved in to local pressures surrounding general skepticism of the value of rapid transit, NIMBYism, and entrenched interests (Western U). The result will be a system that will achieve little and satisfy no one.

[sonysnob]

Don't mind me while I spam this group with highway photos. It's the best time of year to go out with a camera.

Looking east towards the 35/115 interchange from the Bennett Road overpass in Bowmanville:

http://www.asphaltplanet.ca/ON/hwy_401_images/401_cl_435_east_C_Oct24_42x28.jpg

[Gresto]

Hey, that's our exit to cottage country! I have been going that way and back since 1975, when I was an infant. I remember way back when the 115 was an undivided highway. There were a couple of traffic lights along that stretch, one at Kirby and maybe another in Orono. Often traffic was backed up for kilometres. It took them absolute ages to construct the divided highway in the '80s. Must have been close to a decade, while we zigged and zagged back and forth between built and unbuilt sections.
There's an ugly-as-ass housing development under construction just northeast of this exit.

[sonysnob]

Some of the land accessible from Lovekin Road is currently for sale, with a big "employment land" sign on it.

[MolsonExport]

lovely power pylons marching off into the distance.

[sonysnob]

Looking west from Nielson towards Scarborough City Centre:

http://www.asphaltplanet.ca/ON/hwy_401_images/401_cl_385_west_WB_Oct24_42x28.jpg

[MolsonExport]

That's a nice shot.

18 lanes.

[sonysnob]

The view looking westerly from the Nielson overpass is one of my favourites.

I've shot from this overpass more times than I care to admit.

[Gresto]

Nice shot, sonysnob. Now Scarborough just needs some new, taller scrapers. There hasn't been a new addition in about 20 years. Scarborough mostly slept through Toronto's condo boom.

[sonysnob]

Yeah, Scarborough Town Centre has been pretty quiet for development. Most of Scarborough's new condos seem to be following the Stouffville GO Line.

I'm sure the subway extension will see some new towers built around the Town Centre. There are a couple of vacant parcels to the east of McCowan that seem ripe for a tower.

[MolsonExport]

Yeah, it is sort of strange that there was a flurry of construction 20-25 years ago, but very little since then, in Scarborough Town Centre.

I recall STC back in the late 70s, when it was just the mall and the civic centre.



As a kid, I loved the hot air balloons in the mall:



There was a rash of construction in the 80s

[MolsonExport]

Do any old timers remember the original rest stations on the 401 that looked like spaceships? Featuring "Scott's" (KFC)?







under the dome:

[MolsonExport]

[MolsonExport]

[Gresto]

Those spaceships were before my time, but they look nifty. Now we just have those anodyne "ON Route" things (admittedly a pretty clever name).
I also dig that 401 pic above. Appears to be mid-'70s.

[MolsonExport]

The On-Routes are banal. Alas, the food is overpriced and without much variety between locations...too many Wendys (with their ice-cold tasteless burgers, and tepid fries), and Rim Whoreton's (the lineups...for what is basically hospital-grade food and watery brown coffee).

[Djeffery]

I don't know about eastern Ontario but the spaceship service centre at Woodstock in the eastbound side only closed down within the last 15 years. Google Maps goes back to Aug 2009 and it's there, and then Oct 2011 shows the new On Route.

https://www.google.com/maps/@43.0673308,..._ep=EgoyMDI0MTEwNi4wIKXMDSoASAFQAw%3D%3D