Highway 417 Widening

[HighwayStar]

Originally Posted by roger1818

4 lanes? That stretch of the 417 is already 6 or 8 lanes and sometimes even more. Maitland is already 6 lanes (plus on and off ramps). Do you mean 4 lanes in each direction (ie. 8 lanes)?

AFAIK, for the foreseeable future, the 417 will continue to be 6 lanes between O'Conner and Metcalfe. It will also only be 6 lanes between Holly Acres and Richmond Rds. West of Moodie Drive, it will only be 6 regular lanes (plus 2 HOV/Green lanes and 2 bus lanes).

With the 416/417 interchange, there are effectively 4+ lanes in each direction.

I think the point is that from downtown, there are 4 lanes to Maitland, then 3 lanes to the 416, then back to 4 again (including traffic splitting to either 416 or Kanata). i.e. Maitland to the 416 is a 3 lane bottleneck.

From the MTO website, that stretch is planned to be expanded to 4 lanes "beyond 2021". http://www.mto.gov.on.ca/english/hig...-2017-2021.pdf

Originally Posted by roger1818

Personally, I would like to see 2 of the 8 lanes converted to HOV/Green lanes for the entire stretch between the 416 and 174 splits.

I remain unconvinced that HOV lanes actually change behavior... I think they just reward people who carpool anyway... but that's a debate for another thread

[Dengler Avenue]

Yea, why can’t MTO convert the right shoulders into rush-hour-only HOV lanes (allowing at most 20 km/h over the traffic flow)? If the buses did it just fine, why not normal passenger vehicles?

Edit: I think I was just spewing nonsense. Sorry the extreme heat in GTA is getting to me.

[roger1818]

Originally Posted by HighwayStar

I remain unconvinced that HOV lanes actually change behavior... I think they just reward people who carpool anyway... but that's a debate for another thread

Regardless of weather HOV lanes encourage either carpooling or the purchase of green vehicles or not, I still think it is worth rewarding those who do. That is just my opinion though.

[Dengler Avenue]

Wouldn’t O-Train extension to Moody Drive take a lot of vehicles off The Queensway though?

[roger1818]

Originally Posted by Dengler Avenue

Wouldn’t O-Train extension to Moody Drive take a lot of vehicles off The Queensway though?

It will certainly take buses off of the Queensway. Much of that is in segregated bus lanes but some of it is on the highway (from Pinecrest to Woodroffe for example).

It is to early to say how many cars it will take off of the road. Most of the people taking it will likely already be taking the bus. It may encourage more people to use transit, but not likely those who carpool as they are saving money by sharing costs. I would rather see those in single occupant vehicles start taking transit, as each seat removes a car from the road.

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by Dengler Avenue

Wouldn’t O-Train extension to Moody Drive take a lot of vehicles off The Queensway though?

The problem with the Moodie Drive terminus is that it is in the middle of nowhere. It offers no park n ride facility (which is at the next stop further out) and the average rider has to cross most of the Greenbelt to get there. For the most part, buses are already off the Queensway as far as Moodie, with the exception of the section previously mentioned.

[zzptichka]

I dunno, when I occasionally drive Champlain bridge, the only thing car pool lane does to me is make me butt-hurt when I see single-occupant assholes driving in it. Does RCMP/OPP ever enforce it?

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by zzptichka

I dunno, when I occasionally drive Champlain bridge, the only thing car pool lane does to me is make me butt-hurt when I see single-occupant assholes driving in it. Does RCMP/OPP ever enforce it?

Nothing different than when a**h***s are driving down bus lanes, which sometimes can be dangerous, when it becomes a legal turn lane and some idiot is barreling through at top speed.

[roger1818]

Originally Posted by zzptichka

I dunno, when I occasionally drive Champlain bridge, the only thing car pool lane does to me is make me butt-hurt when I see single-occupant assholes driving in it. Does RCMP/OPP ever enforce it?

Just curious. Does the HOV lane on the Champlain bridge allow single occupant green vehicles similar to the way they can use the HOV lanes on the 400 series highways in Ontario (including the 417)?

[eltodesukane]

== Nicholas St & Mackenzie King Bridge ==
The sign says no car allowed this way, but there is always always cars going through there.
They should either enforce this restriction, or remove it altogether.
As it is now, unlawful drivers have a useful way to the highway, which the stupid lawful drivers can not use.

[Marshsparrow]

[QUOTE=eltodesukane;8634361]== Nicholas St & Mackenzie King Bridge ==
The sign says no car allowed this way, but there is always always cars going through there.
They should either enforce this restriction, or remove it altogether.
As it is now, unlawful drivers have a useful way to the highway, which the stupid lawful drivers can not use.

NEVER noticed that sign - guilty on many counts!

[Acajack]

[QUOTE=Marshsparrow;8634387]

Originally Posted by eltodesukane

== Nicholas St & Mackenzie King Bridge ==
The sign says no car allowed this way, but there is always always cars going through there.
They should either enforce this restriction, or remove it altogether.
As it is now, unlawful drivers have a useful way to the highway, which the stupid lawful drivers can not use.

NEVER noticed that sign - guilty on many counts!

The signage in that area is very confusing.

In all honesty they should probably let regular traffic use that routing.

[J.OT13]

Never used that route. If I take Nicholas coming from the Market, I turn from Dalhousie, right onto Besserer and left onto Nicholas.

During the evening rush-hour, I go down the Mackenzie-King Bridge and turn right onto Nicholas. As much as I would like to change lanes where we're supposed to (where the solid line along the bus lane becomes a dashed line along the turning lane) cars start lining-up almost at the station.

Big thing for me though is the ridiculousness of our truck route, snaking though downtown with such tight turns in fairly narrow areas. A new interpovincial bridge should not be a traffic thing, but a safety thing. And an environmental thing (making thousands of cars and trucks detouring through downtown, when a trip could be done in half the time).

[Gat-Train]

Originally Posted by HighwayStar

I remain unconvinced that HOV lanes actually change behavior... I think they just reward people who carpool anyway... but that's a debate for another thread

It's hard to say. Right now, they're pretty useless, since the HOV lanes end west of where there's congestion during rush hour. If they went all the way downtown and bypassed traffic, perhaps they would make a difference.

[roger1818]

Originally Posted by Gat-Train

It's hard to say. Right now, they're pretty useless, since the HOV lanes end west of where there's congestion during rush hour. If they went all the way downtown and bypassed traffic, perhaps they would make a difference.

That's my thought. If they added HOV lanes from the 416 to the 174 (and on the 174 to Orleans), using it could easily save 20-30 minutes to your commute during rush hour. That would be a strong incentive to carpool or buy an EV*. It would also help the rural bus lines.

* The 174 isn't a provincial 400 series highway, so if it had HOV lanes, single occupant EVs wouldn't be permitted in them unless the bylaw changed.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by Gat-Train

It's hard to say. Right now, they're pretty useless, since the HOV lanes end west of where there's congestion during rush hour. If they went all the way downtown and bypassed traffic, perhaps they would make a difference.

HOV lanes work pretty well here in Gatineau. We don't have them on autoroutes though.

They also extend for long distances and focus on major choke points.

They're generally transit/taxi/3+.

Very efficient when I have had to use them.

[J.OT13]

Not a fan of the 3+ HOVs. I find they are not realistic. Who drives with 3+ people? Families, not typically on the road at rush hour, and students. To find three people who live close enough to each other for convenience and work the same hours is not very common. I prefer Ottawa's 2+. And yes, I am biased.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by J.OT13

Not a fan of the 3+ HOVs. I find they are not realistic. Who drives with 3+ people? Families, not typically on the road at rush hour, and students. To find three people who live close enough to each other for convenience and work the same hours is not very common. I prefer Ottawa's 2+. And yes, I am biased.

It requires people to put their money where their mouth is in terms of ride sharing. Most people who use the 3+ lanes deserve it.

[roger1818]

Originally Posted by J.OT13

Not a fan of the 3+ HOVs. I find they are not realistic. Who drives with 3+ people? Families, not typically on the road at rush hour, and students. To find three people who live close enough to each other for convenience and work the same hours is not very common. I prefer Ottawa's 2+. And yes, I am biased.

I used to be a purest and think it should be 3+ but I tend to agree that 2+ is better. Even with 2 in the car you are halving the number of cars on the road. Once the HOV lanes get congested, then we can think about increasing it to 3+.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by roger1818

I used to be a purest and think it should be 3+ but I tend to agree that 2+ is better. Even with 2 in the car you are halving the number of cars on the road. Once the HOV lanes get congested, then we can think about increasing it to 3+.

The idea is to demand more than just couples travelling to work together.