British Columbia Highway 101, also known as the Sunshine Coast Highway, is the main north-south thoroughfare on the Sunshine Coast,

British Columbia British Columbia (commonly abbreviated as BC) is the westernmost province of Canada, situated between the Pacific Ocean and the Rocky Mountains. It has a diverse geography, with rugged landscapes that include rocky coastlines, sandy beaches, ...

, Canada. Highway 101, which first opened in 1962, is divided into two separate land segments, with a

ferry A ferry is a ship, watercraft or amphibious vehicle used to carry passengers, and sometimes vehicles and cargo, across a body of water. A passenger ferry with many stops, such as in Venice, Italy, is sometimes called a water bus or water taxi ...

link in between. The highway is maintained by Capilano Highway Services. Despite its location on the mainland, the highway is unique for not being connected to the rest of the British Columbia highway system. Access to the highway can only be obtained by taking ferries from Horseshoe Bay to the south end in Gibsons or Comox to Powell River. Highway 101 between Langdale and Powell River is designated as a feeder route of the Canadian National Highway System.

Route description

The total distance of Highway 101, including the ferry link, is approximately . The highway begins in the south at the

BC Ferries British Columbia Ferry Services Inc., operating as BC Ferries (BCF), is a former provincial Crown corporation, now operating as an independently managed, publicly owned Canadian company. BC Ferries provides all major passenger and vehicle ferry ...

terminal at

Langdale Great Langdale is a valley in the Lake District National Park in North West England, the epithet Great distinguishing it from the neighbouring valley of Little Langdale. Langdale is also the name of a valley in the Howgill Fells, elsewhere ...

, which connects the Sunshine Coast to

Vancouver Vancouver ( ) is a major city in western Canada, located in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. As the List of cities in British Columbia, most populous city in the province, the 2021 Canadian census recorded 662,248 people in the ...

via a ferry route across

Howe Sound Howe Sound (french: Baie (de /d')Howe, squ, Átl'ka7tsem, Nexwnéwu7ts, Txwnéwu7ts) is a roughly triangular sound, that joins a network of fjords situated immediately northwest of Vancouver, British Columbia. It was designated as a UNESCO Biosph ...

to Horseshoe Bay. The southern land section of Highway 101 is long, and includes from south to north, the communities of

Gibsons Gibsons is a coastal community of 4,605 in southwestern British Columbia, Canada on the Strait of Georgia. Although it is on the mainland, the Sunshine Coast is not accessible by road. Vehicle access is by BC Ferries from Horseshoe Bay in West ...

, Roberts Creek,

Sechelt Sechelt (, Shishalh language chat'lich) is a district municipality located on the lower Sunshine Coast of British Columbia. Approximately 50 km northwest of Vancouver, it is accessible from mainland British Columbia by a 40-minute ferry tr ...

Halfmoon Bay Half Moon Bay is a city in San Mateo County, California Half Moon Bay may also refer to: Australia * Halfmoon Bay (Tasmania), a bay in Tasmania, near * Half Moon Bay (Victoria), a bay in Black Rock, Victoria In Canada * Half Moon Bay (Nunavut) ...

and

Pender Harbour Pender Harbour is a harbour community on British Columbia's Sunshine Coast, on the east side of Malaspina Strait. The harbour itself is an intricate amalgam of bays and coves that encroach inland for five kilometres and provide over 60 kilometres ...

. The ferry link across the

Jervis Inlet , image = MtFWAir.jpg , image_size = 260px , pushpin_map=British Columbia , caption = Mount Frederick William & the "elbow" of the inlet , image_bathymetry = Carte simplifiée baie Jervis.svg , caption_bathymetry = Map of Jervis Inlet , locat ...

lasts between Earls Cove to the south and Saltery Bay to the north. The northern land section of Highway 101 includes, from southeast to northwest, the hamlets of Stillwater and Lang Bay, the city of Powell River, the

Tla'amin Nation The Tla'amin First Nation (Comox language: ɬəʔamɛn), formerly Sliammon Indian Band or Sliammon First Nation, is a First Nations self governing nation whose lands and traditional territories are located on the upper Sunshine Coast in southwes ...

and the community of

Lund Lund (, , ) is a city in the southern Swedish provinces of Sweden, province of Scania, across the Øresund, Öresund strait from Copenhagen. The town had 91,940 inhabitants out of a municipal total of 121,510 . It is the seat of Lund Municipali ...

, at the northern terminus of the highway.

Fixed link proposals

The provincial government has conducted several feasibility studies on connecting Highway 101 to the

Lower Mainland The Lower Mainland is a geographic and cultural region of the mainland coast of British Columbia that generally comprises the regional districts of Metro Vancouver and Fraser Valley. Home to approximately 3.05million people as of the 2021 Canadia ...

, as well as replacing the Earls Cove–Saltery Bay ferry. A study launched by the BC Liberal government in 2015 identified four proposals costing between $2.1 billion and $4.4 billion: * A extension of Highway 101 along the west shore of

that would connect to Highway 99 near Squamish. * A extension of Highway 101 across Howe Sound on a pair of

suspension bridges A suspension bridge is a type of bridge in which the deck is hung below suspension cables on vertical suspenders. The first modern examples of this type of bridge were built in the early 1800s. Simple suspension bridges, which lack vertical ...

via the Anvil Island, with a connection to Highway 99 near

Lions Bay Lions Bay ( Sḵwx̱wú7mesh: Ch'ích'iyúy Elx̱wíḵn, ) is a small residential community in British Columbia, Canada, located between Vancouver and Squamish on the steep eastern shore of Howe Sound. In the 2021 census the community had a pop ...

. The

Islands Trust The Islands Trust is a federation of local governments on the islands in the Strait of Georgia, Howe Sound and Haro Strait in British Columbia. It was established by, and is operated under, the ''Islands Trust Act'', enacted by the Government of ...

opposes this option. * A new highway connecting Powell River to Squamish with a pair of tunnels under the Coast Mountains. * A highway link between the two sections of Highway 101 eliminating the ferry between Saltery Bay and Earls Cove via a pair of suspension bridges. All four options were considered feasible, with positive cost to benefit ratios for the two bridge options. The study was inconclusive and recommended further analysis of the four options. The NDP government announced in December 2017 that the study would not move forward due to technical and financial issues.

Major intersections

From south to north:

References

External links

{{BCHighways 101 Coast of British Columbia Sunshine Coast (British Columbia)