BC Highway Construction

[Stingray2004]

Looks like the new alignment of Hwy 97 north of Kelowna, from Winfield to Oyama, is gonna open up soon:

[Metro-One]

Awesome! Thanks for a real update finally on this thread! this was a decent sized project, now Peachland is the only 2 lane section left between Vernon and Penticton.

[haljackey]

Looks nice

[craner]

Is that a concrete divider in the median I see ?

[Daguy]

Originally Posted by craner

Is that a concrete divider in the median I see ?

Yep. Entirely divided, grade-separated, four to six lane throughout, and the speed limit is being increased from 80 to 100 km/hr. I drove past there on Thursday, looks very good.

Now they just need bypasses for Vernon and West Kelowna. Good luck!

[Yahoo]

Drove from Chase to Alberta last night. The transCanada Highway was closed in BOTH directions from 8 am until about 4 pm by Revelstoke (with no detour possible). I'm not sure why a head on accident would take so long to clear but it was a real traffic mess for many hours after they opened the highway. I was parked for an hour by the mafia highway - and I left 2 hours after the road opened. Man it was brutal. There were so many transport trucks passing slower trucks that the passing lanes were all but useless.

http://www.revelstokecurrent.com/201...loses-the-tch/

Note that it was a head on collision. My guess is that a car made an unsafe pass attempt on the frustrating highway and hit the truck. I counted 5 people make similar bone-head pass attempts on the busy highway. They should just re-paint the lines and allow no passing outside of passing lanes. I know it's extreme but the road is just too busy and curvy to safely pass.

The new Donald bridge has no center barriers and Clanwilliam only has them for a short section over the bridge. I guess BC wants to save a few bucks at the expense of safety, tourism, trade etc. I really feel bad for the truckers having to put up with the 3rd world BC highway. The only new construction this year after Chase is for signs saying they're twinning the highway (someday - within 100 years I guess). The rest of the announced projects are all in the "planning" stages - and will only amount to a few more Km's when done.

At least the new signs point to a website. A website has some incorrect information I believe - implying a twinned Craigellachie Overhead where it's only 1 lane for example. http://engage.gov.bc.ca/bchwy1/ I'm also concerned that the Salmon Arm West is listed as in the planning stages while the city of Salmon Arm seems to be doing a lot of road widening and utility relocation there as we speak. Hopefully the website is just out of date and this extremely short twinning project is underway. It would be a shame if they had to re-do the work. (Does anyone know why BC keeps creating new websites and then quits updating them?)

[240glt]

3rd world roads lol

The only time I hear comments like that it's from douchebaggy albertans who feel entitled to get to their shacks on the Shuswap an hour faster .. and they'll still drive like idiots even when the road it 4 lanes divided each way.

I've driven that highway hundred of times, including in a 5 tonne car carrier. Never felt unsafe, sometimes it's slow.. but the road doesn't cause people to do stupid stuff.. people do

[Metro-One]

Yeah I laugh at the third wold roads comments as well. The highways are actually really smooth and well surfaced considering how many sparsely populated areas they serve in BC. I was just along the 24 in the Cariboo and not a single pot hole.

The highways in BC are very akin to the quality of Sweden. Major highways near Stockholm and Malmo (akin to Vancouver and the Lower Mainland) with a couple freeways extended a couple hundred km out of the populated area (again, akin to the #1, the Coke, the Sea to Sky) and then 2 lane rural highways everywhere else with the odd interchange near major junctions (again, exactly the same as BC and very similar in quality).

When will people realize the BC is a huge place with amazingly difficult topography and a relatively small population. We do rather well given that we have no true Federal highway program.

For example, how many hundreds of million has the Kicking Hose project cost so far? The Sea to Sky was nearly 600 million. How about the hundreds of millions spent blasting mountains along the Okanagan Corridor (which has improved amazingly over the last 5 years)? What about all of the twinning occurring along the 400km long Cariboo highway (btw was driving there last week and some major sections being twinned right now).

Do people not understand that BC is riddled with canyons, mountain ranges, deep valleys, mountain slopes plunging into fiords, inlets, etc... not to mention that our big city has 2 major Rivers flowing through it (that make anything in Alberta look like a creek) and that the Fraser splits into 3 arms at the Delta, therefore having to spend billions on major bridges that allow river shipping below just to connect entire suburbs that are located on islands) I could go on, but every region wants larger highways, from southern Vancouver Island, Metro Vancouver, the Whistler / Squamish corridor, the Okanagan, the Fraser Canyon, the south east corner, the Cariboo, Prince George to Prince Rupert, the Peace region, etc.... well, without a Federal prgram where do we get this money????

I wish we could just plow over generally flat Prairie, but our topography is both a blessing and a curse. Even building through the shield would be nice, but instead we have to build through countless east / west mountain ranges with valleys, causing our highways to continuously go up to over 1000m in elevation, then back down to 300m, then up to 1200m, then down to 500m, then up to 1000m, then down to 400m, etc... we are given a break a few times, along steep canyon walls! haha!

[dmuzika]

Originally Posted by Metro-One

Yeah I laugh at the third wold roads comments as well. The highways are actually really smooth and well surfaced considering how many sparsely populated areas they serve in BC. I was just along the 24 in the Cariboo and not a single pot hole.

The highways in BC are very akin to the quality of Sweden. Major highways near Stockholm and Malmo (akin to Vancouver and the Lower Mainland) with a couple freeways extended a couple hundred km out of the populated area (again, akin to the #1, the Coke, the Sea to Sky) and then 2 lane rural highways everywhere else with the odd interchange near major junctions (again, exactly the same as BC and very similar in quality).

When will people realize the BC is a huge place with amazingly difficult topography and a relatively small population. We do rather well given that we have no true Federal highway program.

For example, how many hundreds of million has the Kicking Hose project cost so far? The Sea to Sky was nearly 600 million. How about the hundreds of millions spent blasting mountains along the Okanagan Corridor (which has improved amazingly over the last 5 years)? What about all of the twinning occurring along the 400km long Cariboo highway (btw was driving there last week and some major sections being twinned right now).

Do people not understand that BC is riddled with canyons, mountain ranges, deep valleys, mountain slopes plunging into fiords, inlets, etc... not to mention that our big city has 2 major Rivers flowing through it (that make anything in Alberta look like a creek) and that the Fraser splits into 3 arms at the Delta, therefore having to spend billions on major bridges that allow river shipping below just to connect entire suburbs that are located on islands) I could go on, but every region wants larger highways, from southern Vancouver Island, Metro Vancouver, the Whistler / Squamish corridor, the Okanagan, the Fraser Canyon, the south east corner, the Cariboo, Prince George to Prince Rupert, the Peace region, etc.... well, without a Federal prgram where do we get this money????

I wish we could just plow over generally flat Prairie, but our topography is both a blessing and a curse. Even building through the shield would be nice, but instead we have to build through countless east / west mountain ranges with valleys, causing our highways to continuously go up to over 1000m in elevation, then back down to 300m, then up to 1200m, then down to 500m, then up to 1000m, then down to 400m, etc... we are given a break a few times, along steep canyon walls! haha!

The problem is that we have a country to the south with 10x our national population and a federal highway program, so it's easy to compare TCH 1 with I-90 and conclude that we need the same thing in Canada.

I do agree that the Trans Canada needs upgrading, that we need a better federal highway program, and that our national highways are considered some of the worst of the G-8 nations (granted we also have the lowest population density which leads to the above argument). However "3rd World" is exaggerating quite a bit. Just for reference sake, here’s something more akin to a 3rd World highway in Russia:


Source: http://www.ssqq.com/archive/vinlin27c.htm

Even at it’s worse, I don’t think the Trans Canada has ever looked like that between Sicamous and Golden.

Here’s a couple questions I have about TCH upgrading:

1) How was the Trans Canada Hwy upgraded between Fredericton, NB and the New Brunswick/Quebec border? It appears that the Quebec Provincial government is upgrading Hwy 185 to A-85, but was TCH 2 twinned by federal or provincial assistance?

2) Assuming that BC couldn’t get enough federal assistance to upgrade TCH 1, could they make some exemptions regarding their policy on tolls? Currently there has to be a toll-free option before a route can have tolls, but what about upgrading TCH 1 between Sicamous and Golden and putting a toll on the route? The BC government could then put a toll-free exemption on residents living along the Trans Canada Highway so “local” traffic wouldn’t need to pay a toll. For example, if someone shows their drivers license at the toll booth and the mailing address is Golden or Revelstoke, they would not have to pay. Any thoughts?

[Metro-One]

A toll will never fly, it is political suicide.

I wish the #1 could be full freeway standard it's entire length, but again no federal program.

And when you look at BC all of our major centers are connected by major free flow highways for the most part (Metro Vancouver, Kelowna, Kamloops, Metro Victoria). It is no surprise again given our population, density, topography, distances, and lack of a federal program that the scale of our highways drop off dramatically outside of these regions.

That being said the last 10 years has seen amazing improvements throughout the province (I don't feel like listing them again but the Cariboo highway project, the Okanagan Corridor project, the Sea to Sky, and the Kicking Horse Canyon project are all very large improvements just to list a few)

[Denscity]

Originally Posted by Metro-One

A toll will never fly, it is political suicide.

I wish the #1 could be full freeway standard it's entire length, but again no federal program.

And when you look at BC all of our major centers are connected by major free flow highways for the most part (Metro Vancouver, Kelowna, Kamloops, Metro Victoria). It is no surprise again given our population, density, topography, distances, and lack of a federal program that the scale of our highways drop off dramatically outside of these regions.

That being said the last 10 years has seen amazing improvements throughout the province (I don't feel like listing them again but the Cariboo highway project, the Okanagan Corridor project, the Sea to Sky, and the Kicking Horse Canyon project are all very large improvements just to list a few)

Would love to see the Kootenays (the only part of southern BC without one) connected by a freeway to the rest of the province. There actually was an extension of the Coq from Kelowna to Big White then down along Arrow Lake to here in Castlegar. It made newspapers in both cities but is now dormant.

[dmuzika]

Originally Posted by Denscity

Would love to see the Kootenays (the only part of southern BC without one) connected by a freeway to the rest of the province. There actually was an extension of the Coq from Kelowna to Big White then down along Arrow Lake to here in Castlegar. It made newspapers in both cities but is now dormant.

Wasn't there a propsal to extend the freeway as far east as Radium?

[240glt]

Originally Posted by Denscity

Would love to see the Kootenays (the only part of southern BC without one) connected by a freeway to the rest of the province. There actually was an extension of the Coq from Kelowna to Big White then down along Arrow Lake to here in Castlegar. It made newspapers in both cities but is now dormant.

I can understand why someone would want a freeway into those areas.. I really do.. but I would hate it. Making the Kootenays more accessible means greater development and economic opportunities I am sure, but it will also ruin the flavor of the place. Just like if the Jumbo pass road were to be upgraded and paved to give Albertans access to the west side of the Purcells, it'd be detrimental to the Kootenay Lake/ Duncan lake area.

I don't think you'll see one though.. there's just not the population base to suppport it.

[RWin]

Originally Posted by Daguy

Now they just need bypasses for Vernon and West Kelowna. Good luck!

And Kelowna and Winfield. Or at least get ride of all the traffic lights. It probably takes as long to get through Kelowna as it does to get to Vernon from Kelowna.

[Metro-One]

If it were up to me, the next major highway projects in BC should be a Kelowna freeway bypass (including upgrading the highway to freeway standard through West Kelowna), upgrading the 17 to full freeway standard from the ferry terminal in to where it currently ends in Vicotria, and replacing the Malahat between Vicotria and Nanaimo with a 4 lane tolled expressway.

Just my dreams though, hehe.

[RWin]

Originally Posted by Metro-One

If it were up to me, the next major highway projects in BC should be a Kelowna freeway bypass (including upgrading the highway to freeway standard through West Kelowna

As someone who visits Vernon and then drives on through to Vancouver, this would be great. But I think for most, Kelowna is probably the end of the road so is a bypass really necessary? A Westbank freeway is probably likely though.

[Metro-One]

Yeah, the Westbank / West Kelowna portion will for sure be built first, they already have 3 / 4 interchanges built, seems they are slowly chipping away to that conclusion.

[RWin]

Originally Posted by Metro-One

Yeah, the Westbank / West Kelowna portion will for sure be built first, they already have 3 / 4 interchanges built, seems they are slowly chipping away to that conclusion.

Still can't get use to that name change from Westbank to West Kelowna.

[Metro-One]

Same, haha, talk about picking the most boring name possible. The Okanagan is full of some of the most exotic sounding names in Canada: Osoyoos, Naramata, Summerland, Oyama, Peachland... but no they go with West Kelowna...

[Wrecker]

Geezz...as an Albertan who was planning a trip to BC next summer, I think I'll say FO.....after all the anti-Albertan comments on here.