Highway 417 Widening

[1overcosc]

http://www.highway417expansion.com/h...11%20_FULL.pdf

Enjoy.

[BenTheGreat97]

Originally Posted by 1overcosc

http://www.highway417expansion.com/h...11%20_FULL.pdf

Enjoy.

Thank you, I didn't know they were also going to widen the Terry Fox bridge as well.

[1overcosc]

The Lees overpass is going to be taken down on June 21. The bridge will remain out, and Lees will be closed in the area, until September, when the new bridge (currently under construction in the adjacent field) will be placed in.

This is basically the same as the Carling area rapid replacements, except that there's a 3 month delay between removing the old bridge and installing the new one. This is because they need to regrade a lot of the area at the base of the bridge and there needs to be nothing there for that to work.

Rapid replacements of the Belfast & Riverside overpasses are also coming up later this year.

They're starting to enter the home stretch of the widening, which is pretty amazing given that they only just started building it a year ago. East of Belfast bridge it looks like they'll be ready to shift traffic over (they're opening the new lanes & closing the old innermost lanes to create staging area for median work) sometime this summer. Heck, between the St. Laurent overpass & the split, the new lanes are mostly paved already.

May 27, 2014
Construction Update
Highway 417 Expansion Project - Lees Avenue Underpass Rapid Replacement

The Lees Avenue underpass rapid replacement will be completed in two phases. The removal of the existing structure will occur over the weekend of June 21, 2014 and the new structure will be installed approximately 12 weeks later. This work will require closures to Lees Avenue and Highway 417.

Lees Avenue Closure

Lees Avenue, between Chapel Crescent and the Transitway, will be closed to all traffic in advance of the removal of the existing structure, beginning June 16, 2014, and will remain closed for 13 weeks to permit the construction of the new underpass, construction of the roadway approaches, installation of the new underpass and construction of new approach slabs and barriers.

During the week of June 16, preparatory work will occur on the existing Lees Avenue underpass and will include removal of the bridge end spans. During this activity, noise levels are anticipated to be moderate to loud in the daytime and overnight, and will include saw cutting of the bridge components.

During the closure of Lees Avenue, traffic will be diverted to Main Street and Greenfield Avenue. Pedestrian and cyclists will be detoured along the Rideau River multi-use pathways during the closure of Lees Avenue; this detour is subject to change throughout the closure, advance notice will be provided.

Highway 417 Full Closure

The existing Lees Avenue underpass structure will be removed the weekend of June 21, 2014. To be able to safely remove the underpass, Highway 417 will be closed in both directions, starting on Saturday, June 21, beginning at 6 p.m. until Sunday, June 22, at 11 a.m., at which time a single lane of traffic will be reinstated in both directions. All lanes on Highway 417, in both directions, will be reopened by Monday, June 23, at 5 a.m.

During the full closure of Highway 417, traffic will be detoured as follows:

Eastbound traffic will be required to exit Highway 417 no further east than the Metcalfe Street and will be detoured via Main Street and Riverside Drive where they may again access Highway 417 to continue travelling eastbound
Westbound traffic will be required to exit Highway 417 no further west than Vanier Parkway and will be detoured via Riverside Drive and Bronson Avenue where they may again access Highway 417 to continue travelling westbound.
There will be no access to the following Highway 417 on-ramps:

Highway 417 eastbound from Nicholas Street
Highway 417 eastbound from Isabella/Metcalfe streets
Highway 417 westbound from Vanier Parkway/Riverside Drive
A second full highway closure will be required over a weekend in September when the new Lees Avenue underpass structure is installed. Advance notice will be provided.

For more information on the Confederation Line, what we are building where as well as weekly construction summaries, please visit our website at www.ottawa.ca/confederationline.

If you have any questions or concerns or would like to be added to our email distribution list please contact your Community Liaison Officer, Evelyn Danilko:

Evelyn Danilko

Rail Implementation Office

Tel: (613) 580-2424 ext. 12527

Email: Evelyn.Danilko@ottawa.ca

[Cre47]

The Castlefrank/Kanata ave. ramp is now blocked (actually was for at least two weeks now), as the extra two lanes per direction work is well underway (at least in the section from the Centrum to Eagleson), though not paved just yet. Seems the 417 widening in Kanata is taking ages. Haven't see any of the new signs yet west of Woodroffe either

[1overcosc]

Tell me about it. At this rate the widening in the east end will be finished in half the time it took them to widen through Kanata. Things really speed up when there's deadlines! (Nicholas-Split HAS to be 8 lanes by October 2015 at the absolute latest in order to be ready for LRT detours).

[BenTheGreat97]

They're supposed to finish the widening in the West this summer. The Carp River bridges are coming along now. Last I saw they had the wood framework around the Steel beams.

[Richard Eade]

I think that we will soon see a quickening of the widening of the 417 from the 416 to Carling; certainly speeding it up so that there are at least four lanes in each direction from the 416 to the exits to downtown as this will be needed during Stage 2 of the LRT conversion. I am expecting that buses will be redirected onto dedicated bus-lanes along Woodroffe, from the SJAM Parkway to Baseline Station. In order to temporarily take two of Woodroffe’s existing four traffic lanes for buses, there will need to be alternate routes for Barrhaven folks to drive to work; I think that one of those routes could be the 416.

[DarkArconio]

I think woodroffe from the 417 to baseline station would be undoubtedly expanded to 6 lanes for phase two, the city very rarely reduces traffic lanes, and definitely wouldn't on such an important road. I would also guess the 4th lane of the 417 would be used for buses to kanata and barrhaven, built under a similar schedule to the current expansion. That said, I don't think any of these plans would be prepared for another few years yet with construction starting in 4 years at the soonest.

[MountainView]

Is there any room to make Woodroffe 6 lanes between Baseline and the 417? I drive it daily and there seems like there is limited room for that. If you live East of Woodroffe or closer to Woodroffe than Greenbank in Barrhaven, the 416 is really back tracking to get to the 417. Personally, it's probably quicker but people prefer to take the traffic-filled Woodroffe for their commutes to the 417. Luckily I no longer live in Barrhaven and do not contend with this traffic.

[MaxHeadroom]

Originally Posted by MountainView

Is there any room to make Woodroffe 6 lanes between Baseline and the 417?

Not without expropriating houses.

[1overcosc]

I'm trying to figure how exactly the eastbound 417 BRT will work for the Transitway diversion.

The westbound is obvious, the buses will probably take the 174->St-Laurent ramp and go across St-Laurent Boulevard and get on the highway at St-Laurent, and use the right-hand lane as a bus lane to Nicholas.

But how will it work eastbound? The 174 exit lanes on the 417EB are on the left. Buses will have to get on the highway in the right lane and move over the left. If buses have their own EB lane on the right, they'll have to cross left at some point to get to the 174. If buses have their own EB lane on the left, they'll have to cross traffic to get to the lanes when getting on at Nicholas! Unless there's plans for a flyover at the Split to let a right bus lane cross over the 174 (which I doubt, because if so we'd likely see the beginnings of that bridge being built now), I can't see how this will work without serious delays to eastbound transit riders in the PM peak.

[DarkArconio]

Originally Posted by MaxHeadroom

Not without expropriating houses.

The intersection with Iris is already 5 lanes, and if you look on Google Maps there is basically space for a lane between the sidewalk and the road already. I'm always surprised how another lane can be squeezed into a road when I thought home expropriations would be required. It would eat away at a lot of people's front yards, but the city has the right to do that... I'm sure it would be controversial, but I'm not sure what alternatives there are. I suspect the expansion has been in city plans for a while with the 6 lane baseline intersection.

Perhaps a reversible lane is possible, but that has more long term maintenance costs and the city hasn't gone for it anywhere else (other than an interprovincial bridge, but that's a different case in my opinion.)

[MountainView]

Originally Posted by DarkArconio

The intersection with Iris is already 5 lanes, and if you look on Google Maps there is basically space for a lane between the sidewalk and the road already. I'm always surprised how another lane can be squeezed into a road when I thought home expropriations would be required. It would eat away at a lot of people's front yards, but the city has the right to do that... I'm sure it would be controversial, but I'm not sure what alternatives there are. I suspect the expansion has been in city plans for a while with the 6 lane baseline intersection.

Perhaps a reversible lane is possible, but that has more long term maintenance costs and the city hasn't gone for it anywhere else (other than an interprovincial bridge, but that's a different case in my opinion.)

Could they revert the 6 lanes back to 4 afterwards or is this a complete waste of money. Obviously traffic is bad between the 417 and Baseline in peak periods but will this just add to more traffic or make it better post-detour.

[DarkArconio]

It would probably make it better in the short term while the increased road supply makes it worse long term. And with long term the bus lanes farther south of woodroffe returning to normal traffic, there is a logic to removing the bottle neck between the 417 and baseline that would probably appeal to city traffic engineers and planners.

The bigger question I have is where buses would feed into woodroffe. Would it be from the 417 and bronson, or from the parkway and carling?

Also I feel like this is a bit of a tangent off the 417 expansion discussion at this point Still, I suspect the two projects will be tied together!

[rocketphish]

Brace for Queensway chaos June 21-23 during Lees Ave. bridge removal

Blair Crawford, Ottawa Citizen
Published on: June 11, 2014, Last Updated: June 12, 2014 1:12 PM EDT

Sentimental types will have their last chance to cross the Lees Avenue overpass this weekend. The bridge will be closed Monday for the next 13 weeks as crews work to replace the structure. Traffic will be diverted to Main Street and Greenfield Avenue, while cyclists and pedestrians will travel along the Rideau River pathway.

The full effect of the closure won’t be felt until the following weekend — June 21-23 — when Highway 417 will be closed in both directions east of downtown overnight Saturday and reduced to a single lane each way on Sunday. The shutdown is necessary to allow crews to remove the old overpass.

Beginning at 6 p.m. Saturday, June 21, the eastbound lanes will be completely closed between Metcalfe Street and the Vanier Parkway and the westbound lanes closed from the Vanier Parkway to Nicholas Street.

Traffic will resume at 11 a.m. on Sunday, June 22, but will be restricted to a single lane in each direction. The highway will be fully opened by 5 a.m. Monday, June 23.

http://ottawacitizen.com/news/local-...bridge-removal

[orleans_man]

Originally Posted by 1overcosc

I'm trying to figure how exactly the eastbound 417 BRT will work for the Transitway diversion.

The westbound is obvious, the buses will probably take the 174->St-Laurent ramp and go across St-Laurent Boulevard and get on the highway at St-Laurent, and use the right-hand lane as a bus lane to Nicholas.

But how will it work eastbound? The 174 exit lanes on the 417EB are on the left. Buses will have to get on the highway in the right lane and move over the left. If buses have their own EB lane on the right, they'll have to cross left at some point to get to the 174. If buses have their own EB lane on the left, they'll have to cross traffic to get to the lanes when getting on at Nicholas! Unless there's plans for a flyover at the Split to let a right bus lane cross over the 174 (which I doubt, because if so we'd likely see the beginnings of that bridge being built now), I can't see how this will work without serious delays to eastbound transit riders in the PM peak.

I would be interested in the answer as well...

However, I think that the city expects signigicant delays once the transitway goes off-line. That's why we are seeing all of the crazy construction right now as part of "Ottawa-on-the-move". They are hoping to get as much of it completed so that there will me minimal contrsuction disruptions during transitway conversion.

[gmarshall]

Here's a pic of the bridge in question, taken May 19th:

[BenTheGreat97]

Will the Nicholas Street bridge be removed sometime as well? Looking on Google street view while on the 417 it doesn't look wide enough to allow 8 lanes of traffic underneath it.

[DarkArconio]

No, it's not, and they're not planning 8 lanes under Nicholas st, they end at that interchange and resume at kent. As far as I know no plans exist to make the downtown portion of the 417 8 lanes.

[waterloowarrior]

Originally Posted by DarkArconio

No, it's not, and they're not planning 8 lanes under Nicholas st, they end at that interchange and resume at kent. As far as I know no plans exist to make the downtown portion of the 417 8 lanes.

The original plan was

-Widening Highway 417 from three to four mainline lanes in each direction from Highway 416 to Carling Avenue and from Metcalfe Street to Ottawa-Road (OR) 174;
- Retaining the existing number of mainline lanes from Carling Avenue to Metcalfe Street;
- Widening Highway 417 from two to three lanes in each direction from OR 174 to east of Walkley
Road;

This contract only goes up to Nicholas though... the Nicholas to Metcalfe widening design work is part of a separate contract that I will assume also will include or be coordinated with the connection to the Alta Vista Parkway.