The Provincial Highway Network consists of all the roads in
Ontario
Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central C ...
maintained by the
Ministry of Transportation of Ontario
The Ministry of Transportation (MTO) is the provincial ministry of the Government of Ontario that is responsible for transport infrastructure and related law in Ontario. The ministry traces its roots back over a century to the 1890s, when the ...
(MTO), including those designated as part of the King's Highway, secondary highways, and tertiary roads. Components of the system—comprising of roads and 2,880 bridges
—range in scale from
Highway 401
King's Highway 401, commonly referred to as Highway 401 and also known by its official name as the Macdonald–Cartier Freeway or colloquially referred to as the four-oh-one,
is a controlled-access 400-series highway in the Canadian provin ...
, the busiest highway in North America, to unpaved forestry and mining access roads. The longest highway is nearly long, while the shortest is less than a kilometre. Some roads are
unsigned highway
Road sign along Aurora_to_exit_the_freeway._The_road_at_this_exit_is_officially_designated_ Sigurd_and_Aurora,_Utah">Aurora_to_exit_the_freeway._The_road_at_this_exit_is_officially_designated_Utah_State_Route_259">SR 259,_a_short_connector;_ ...
s, lacking signage to indicate their maintenance by the MTO; these may be remnants of highways that are still under provincial control whose designations were
decommissioned, roadway segments left over from realignment projects, or proposed highway corridors.
Predecessors to today's modern highways include the foot trails and
portages used by
indigenous peoples
Indigenous peoples are culturally distinct ethnic groups whose members are directly descended from the earliest known inhabitants of a particular geographic region and, to some extent, maintain the language and culture of those original people ...
in the time before European settlement. Shortly after the creation of the Province of
Upper Canada
The Province of Upper Canada (french: link=no, province du Haut-Canada) was a part of British Canada established in 1791 by the Kingdom of Great Britain, to govern the central third of the lands in British North America, formerly part of th ...
in 1791, the new government under
John Graves Simcoe
John Graves Simcoe (25 February 1752 – 26 October 1806) was a British Army general and the first lieutenant governor of Upper Canada from 1791 until 1796 in southern Ontario and the watersheds of Georgian Bay and Lake Superior. He founded Yor ...
built overland military roads to supplement water-based transportation, including
Yonge Street
Yonge Street (; pronounced "young") is a major arterial route in the Canadian province of Ontario connecting the shores of Lake Ontario in Toronto to Lake Simcoe, a gateway to the Upper Great Lakes.
Once the southernmost leg of provincial H ...
and
Dundas Street. At the time, road construction was under the control of the
township
A township is a kind of human settlement or administrative subdivision, with its meaning varying in different countries.
Although the term is occasionally associated with an urban area, that tends to be an exception to the rule. In Australia, C ...
and
county
A county is a geographic region of a country used for administrative or other purposes Chambers Dictionary, L. Brookes (ed.), 2005, Chambers Harrap Publishers Ltd, Edinburgh in certain modern nations. The term is derived from the Old French ...
governments. Local township roads were financed and constructed through a statute labour system that required landowners to make improvements in lieu of taxes. Private companies constructed
corduroy
Corduroy is a textile with a distinctively raised "cord" or wale texture. Modern corduroy is most commonly composed of tufted cords, sometimes exhibiting a channel (bare to the base fabric) between them. Both velvet and corduroy derive from fu ...
and later
plank roads and charged
tolls in the second half of the 19th century. The rising popularity of the bicycle led to the formation of
Ontario Good Roads Association
Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central Cana ...
, which advocated for the improvement of roads and recreation as the automobile rose to prominence.
By the early 20th century, the province had taken interest in road improvement and began funding it through counties. The increasing adoption of the automobile resulted in the formation of the Department of Public Highways of Ontario (DPHO) in 1916. The passing of the
Canada Highways Act
The ''Canada Highways Act'' was a 1919 act of the Dominion Parliament of Canada. The Act established a fund to support the construction of provincial highways as part of the post- World War I reconstruction program of Robert Borden's Unio ...
in 1919 resulted in the establishment of a provincial network of highways. The DPHO assigned internal highway numbers to roads in the system, and in 1925, the numbers were signposted along the roads and marked on maps. In 1930, provincial highways were renamed ''King's Highways'' and the familiar crown route markers created. The DPHO was also renamed the Department of Highways (DHO).
The 1930s saw several major depression relief projects built by manual labour, including the first inter-city divided highway in North America along
the Middle Road
The Middle Road was the name for a historic highway in the Canadian province of Ontario, which served to link the cities of Toronto and Hamilton. The name was used between 1931 and 1939, after which the road became the northern section of the Que ...
, which would become the
Queen Elizabeth Way
The Queen Elizabeth Way (QEW) is a 400-series highway in the Canadian province of Ontario linking Toronto with the Niagara Peninsula and Buffalo, New York. The freeway begins at the Peace Bridge in Fort Erie and travels around the western ...
in 1939. In 1937, the DHO merged with the
Department of Northern Development
The Ministry of Transportation (MTO) is the provincial ministry of the Government of Ontario that is responsible for transport infrastructure and related law in Ontario. The ministry traces its roots back over a century to the 1890s, when the pr ...
, extending the highway network into the
Canadian Shield and
Northern Ontario
Northern Ontario is a primary geographic and quasi-administrative region of the Canadian province of Ontario, the other primary region being Southern Ontario. Most of the core geographic region is located on part of the Superior Geological Pro ...
. Significant traffic engineering and surveying through the
war years, during which construction came to a near standstill, led to the planning and initial construction of
controlled-access highways. The
400-series highways were built beginning in the late 1940s and numbered in 1952.
The vast majority of modern road infrastructure in Ontario was built throughout the 1950s, 1960s, and early 1970s. The cancellation of the
Spadina Expressway
William R. Allen Road, also known as Allen Road, the Allen Expressway and colloquially as the Allen, is a short Controlled-access highway, expressway and arterial road in Toronto. It starts as a controlled-access expressway at Eglinton Avenue, Eg ...
and the introduction of the
Environmental Assessment Act in the 1970s resulted in a decline in new highway construction in the decades since. In the late 1990s, nearly of provincial highways were transferred, or "downloaded" back to lower levels of government. Few new provincial highways have been built in the early years of the 21st century, although several major infrastructure projects including the
Herb Gray Parkway and expansion of
Highway 69 have proceeded. Recent construction has included the controversial
Bradford Bypass and
Highway 413.
Naming, signage and regulations
In Ontario, all public roads are legally considered highways under the Highway Traffic Act (HTA), which sets forth regulations for traffic, or the
rules of the road Rules of the road may refer to:
Transportation
*Rules of the Road (Ireland), the official road safety manual for Ireland
*Rules of the road in China
*International Regulations for Preventing Collisions at Sea
*
Arts and entertainment
* ''Rules of ...
.
The Public Transportation and Highway Improvement Act (PTHIA) sets forth the regulations concerning roads that are under the authority of the Province of Ontario. The act distinguishes and sets out the applicability of the HTA to provincial highways, which are designated as part of The King's Highway (primary), a secondary highway, or a tertiary road. Tertiary roads may also be designated as a resource road, allowing for vehicles otherwise prohibited from public roads. Industrial roads are privately owned routes with which the MTO has entered an agreement to improve or allow public access, and are not considered part of the provincial highway network.
The
407 ETR
King's Highway 407, commonly referred to as Highway 407 and colloquially as the "four-oh-seven", is a tolled 400-series highway in the Canadian province of Ontario. Comprising a privately leased segment as well as a publicly owned segment, the r ...
is likewise not considered part of the provincial highway network. While it is still subject to the rules set forth by the HTA, it is otherwise governed independently under the legislation of the Highway 407 Act.
Speed limits on provincial highways are legislated by sections of the road, and vary between and . Freeways, including the 400-series highways, are generally signed at , although sections exist that are signed lower.
Three segments of freeway are part of an ongoing pilot project to test speed limits of 110km/h in rural areas that are not subject to congestion. A fourth segment, located in
Northern Ontario
Northern Ontario is a primary geographic and quasi-administrative region of the Canadian province of Ontario, the other primary region being Southern Ontario. Most of the core geographic region is located on part of the Superior Geological Pro ...
, was set to be announced in 2020, but has been delayed since.
Marker design
![01HWY_6](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/36/01HWY_6.JPG)
Ontario uses two distinct shapes of signage to mark the King's Highways. Confirmation markers, or
reassurance marker
A reassurance marker or confirming marker is a type of traffic sign that confirms the identity of the route being traveled on. It does not provide information found on other types of road signs, such as distances traveled, distances to other locat ...
s, are utilized along the designated road to confirm (near intersections) or reassure (elsewhere) drivers that they are on the correct route. The markers, known as ''shields'', feature the route number within an outline in the
shape of a shield, topped by a
St Edward's Crown
St Edward's Crown is the centrepiece of the Crown Jewels of the United Kingdom. Named after Saint Edward the Confessor, versions of it have traditionally been used to crown English and British monarchs at their coronations since the 13th cen ...
. In other cases, particularly when approaching the junction of another highway, a square ''crown'' marker is used, featuring the route number within an outline of the St Edward's Crown, paired with an arrow plate; exit signs on freeways and at major junctions also use this crown symbol. For secondary highways, the route number is within an outline of an
isosceles trapezoid
In Euclidean geometry, an isosceles trapezoid (isosceles trapezium in British English) is a convex quadrilateral with a line of symmetry bisecting one pair of opposite sides. It is a special case of a trapezoid. Alternatively, it can be defin ...
, while tertiary roads place the number within an outline of a rectangle. When these markers appear along or at an intersection with the indicated highway, they feature black text on a reflective white background. There are two exceptions to this: The QEW, which features blue text on a yellow background; and the provincially-maintained section of the tolled
Highway 407, which feature white text on a blue background, with an orange plate with ''TOLL'' below in black.
Signs prior to 1993 had the words "The King's Highway" below the crown, but current versions do not have the words.
In addition to regular highway markers, there are trailblazers, which indicate a route ''towards'' that highway. These are the same shape as their corresponding highway marker. Trailblazers for the King's Highway, which can be shields or crowns, feature white text on a reflective green background, with the exception of trailblazers for the QEW, which feature yellow text on a reflective blue background. For secondary highways, trailblazers simply add the word "TO" above the route number.
Since August 2004, "Highway of Heroes" shields featuring a diagram of a
poppy
A poppy is a flowering plant in the subfamily Papaveroideae of the family Papaveraceae. Poppies are herbaceous plants, often grown for their colourful flowers. One species of poppy, '' Papaver somniferum'', is the source of the narcotic drug o ...
have been posted along Highway401 between
Toronto
Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the anch ...
and
CFB Trenton
Canadian Forces Base Trenton (also CFB Trenton), formerly RCAF Station Trenton, is a Canadian Forces base located within the city of Quinte West, Ontario. It is operated as an air force base by the Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF) and is the hub ...
. These were erected to honour fallen Canadian soldiers, whose bodies were repatriated from
Afghanistan
Afghanistan, officially the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan,; prs, امارت اسلامی افغانستان is a landlocked country located at the crossroads of Central Asia and South Asia. Referred to as the Heart of Asia, it is bordere ...
in funeral convoys along that stretch of the highway.
Classification
Ontario has several distinct classes of highways:
The King's Highway
The King's Highway is the primary highway network of Ontario, and constitutes the majority of the principal inter-urban roadways in the province. As a whole, it is referred to in the singular form as opposed to as a group of its parts (i.e. "the King's Highway", not "the King's Highways").
Individual highways are known as "part of the King's Highway" or "the King's Highway known as ''n''".
However, in common parlance they are simply referred to as "Highway ''n''".
Ontario highways rank second safest in North America for fatality rates, with 0.55 fatalities per 10000 licensed drivers in 2019.
The 400-series highways and the QEW form the backbone of the King's Highway, with other routes numbered from 2 to 148.
The Ministry of Transportation never designated a Highway 1.
Some highway numbers are suffixed with a letter ''A'' ("alternate route"),
''B'' ("business route"),
or ''N'' ("new route").
In the past, there have also been routes with ''C'' and ''S'' ("scenic route") suffixes.
The entire King's Highway network is fully paved.
The term "the King's Highway" was first adopted in place of "provincial highway" in 1930, and signs similar to the current design replaced the previous triangular signs at that time.
Some legislative acts refer to roads that are under the jurisdiction of the province as "provincial highways".
400-series
The 400-series highways are a network of controlled-access highways throughout the
southern portion of Ontario, forming a special subset of the provincial highway network. They are analogous to the
Interstate Highway System
The Dwight D. Eisenhower National System of Interstate and Defense Highways, commonly known as the Interstate Highway System, is a network of controlled-access highways that forms part of the National Highway System in the United States. T ...
in the
United States
The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...
or the
Autoroute system of neighbouring
Quebec
Quebec ( ; )According to the Canadian government, ''Québec'' (with the acute accent) is the official name in Canadian French and ''Quebec'' (without the accent) is the province's official name in Canadian English is one of the thirtee ...
, and are regulated by the MTO.
The 400-series designations were introduced in 1952, although Ontario had been constructing divided highways for two decades prior.
Initially, only Highways400, 401 and 402 were numbered; other designations followed in the subsequent decades.
While older freeways have some lapses in safety features, contemporary 400-series highways have
design speed
The design speed is a tool used to determine geometric features of a new road or street during road design. Contrary to the word's implication, the design speed of the road or street is not necessarily its vehicle speed limit or maximum safe s ...
s of ,
speed limit
Speed limits on road traffic, as used in most countries, set the legal maximum speed at which vehicles may travel on a given stretch of road. Speed limits are generally indicated on a traffic sign reflecting the maximum permitted speed - expre ...
s of , various collision avoidance and traffic management systems, and several design standards adopted throughout North America.
Of note are the
Ontario Tall Wall median barrier and the
Parclo A-4 interchange design, the latter which became standard in the design for the widening of Highway 401 through Toronto in 1962. The Institute of Traffic Engineers subsequently recommended this design to replace the cloverleaf interchange throughout North America.
Secondary
Secondary highways exist solely within the districts of Northern Ontario that lack a
county road system, to which they are analogous. The sole exception to this is
Highway 537 in
Greater Sudbury. They generally serve to connect remote communities to the King's Highway, or to interconnect the King's Highway. A few secondary highways remain
gravel-surfaced, although most have been paved.
The speed limit on nearly all of these routes is , although
Highway 655 is posted at .
The Secondary Highway system was introduced in 1956 to service regions in Northern and
Central Ontario
Central Ontario is a secondary region of Southern Ontario in the Canadian province of Ontario that lies between Georgian Bay and the eastern end of Lake Ontario.
The population of the region was 1,123,307 in 2016; however, this number does not in ...
, though it once
included a route as far south as Lake Ontario. Many routes that would become secondary highways were already maintained by the province as development roads prior to being designated.
Since 1998, none have existed south of the districts of
Parry Sound
Parry Sound is a sound or bay of Georgian Bay on Lake Huron, in Ontario, Canada. It is highly irregularly shaped with many deep bays and islands. Killbear Provincial Park is located on the large peninsula that separates the sound from Georgian B ...
and
Nipissing.
Secondary highways are numbered in the 500s and 600s, with existing highways numbered between 502 and 673.
Tertiary
Tertiary roads are remote routes entirely within Northern Ontario that provide access to resources (e.g. mining and forestry). Tertiary roads are numbered in the 800s, with the five existing highways numbered between 802 and 811. Most of these roads are gravel-surfaced and of low-standard. The speed limit on these routes is , although design standards generally prevent such.
Unlike other roads in the Provincial Highway Network, the MTO is not responsible for winter maintenance nor liable for damage incurred as a result of using these routes.
The MTO introduced the Tertiary Road system in 1962.
With the exception of
Highway 802, none end in settlements.
Trans-Canada
![400 exit 12 TCH](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/ac/400_exit_12_TCH.jpg)
The
Trans-Canada Highway
The Trans-Canada Highway (French: ; abbreviated as the TCH or T-Can) is a transcontinental federal–provincial highway system that travels through all ten provinces of Canada, from the Pacific Ocean on the west coast to the Atlantic Ocean on ...
(TCH) forms several major routes across Canada. The provincial governments are entirely responsible for signage and maintenance of the routes, except through
National Parks
A national park is a natural park in use for conservation purposes, created and protected by national governments. Often it is a reserve of natural, semi-natural, or developed land that a sovereign state declares or owns. Although individua ...
. It is signed with distinctive green markers with a white
maple leaf
The maple leaf is the characteristic leaf of the maple tree. It is the most widely recognized national symbol of Canada.
History of use in Canada
By the early 1700s, the maple leaf had been adopted as an emblem by the French Canadians along th ...
on them throughout Canada. While other provinces generally place a highway number within the maple leaf of the TCH marker (with a shared "Highway 1" designation across the
western provinces
Western Canada, also referred to as the Western provinces, Canadian West or the Western provinces of Canada, and commonly known within Canada as the West, is a Canadian region that includes the four western provinces just north of the Canada– ...
), Ontario places them below or beside provincial shields and either leaves them blank or inserts a name instead; these are the ''Central Ontario Route'', ''Georgian Bay Route'', ''Lake Superior Route'', ''Northern Ontario Route'' and ''Ottawa Valley Route''.
Several portions of King's Highways are designated as part of the Trans-Canada Highway system within Ontario, with the TCH having a main route and several branches, often only following sections of any given provincial highway. They are:
Others
In addition to these classes of highways, the MTO maintains other roads, such as resource roads or industrial roads, that are of strategic importance to the provincial government. These roads are designated with 7000-series numbers for internal inventory purposes, though they are not publicly marked as such. They are often, but not always, former highway segments which were decommissioned as a King's Highway, but remain important as connecting routes to communities or other highways in areas without municipal governance.
There were formerly several designated
Ontario Tourist Routes that were located throughout the entire province.
However, beginning in February 1997, Tourism-Oriented Directional Signs (TODS) began to appear on highways.
Tourist Routes no longer appeared on maps after 1998.
History
Before 1791: Native footpaths
Prior to the arrival of Europeans in the 17th century, transportation across what became Ontario was generally via the thousands of lakes and rivers. Short trails existed between bodies of water, known as a
portage or carrying place, as well as along the shorelines of the larger lakes.
In 1615, French explorer
Samuel de Champlain was the first European to pass through the lands between the
Great Lakes
The Great Lakes, also called the Great Lakes of North America, are a series of large interconnected freshwater lakes in the mid-east region of North America that connect to the Atlantic Ocean via the Saint Lawrence River. There are five lak ...
, accompanied by
Huron
Huron may refer to:
People
* Wyandot people (or Wendat), indigenous to North America
* Wyandot language, spoken by them
* Huron-Wendat Nation, a Huron-Wendat First Nation with a community in Wendake, Quebec
* Nottawaseppi Huron Band of Potawatomi ...
and
Iroquois
The Iroquois ( or ), officially the Haudenosaunee ( meaning "people of the longhouse"), are an Iroquoian-speaking confederacy of First Nations peoples in northeast North America/ Turtle Island. They were known during the colonial years to ...
guides. His emissary
Étienne Brûlé
Étienne Brûlé (; – c. June 1633) was the first European explorer to journey beyond the St. Lawrence River into what is now known as Canada. He spent much of his early adult life among the Hurons, and mastered their language and learne ...
as well as
Franciscan
, image = FrancescoCoA PioM.svg
, image_size = 200px
, caption = A cross, Christ's arm and Saint Francis's arm, a universal symbol of the Franciscans
, abbreviation = OFM
, predecessor =
, ...
Récollets
The Recollects (french: Récollets) were a French reform branch of the Friars Minor, a Franciscan order. Denoted by their gray habits and pointed hoods, the Recollects took vows of poverty and devoted their lives to prayer, penance, and spirit ...
such as
Joseph Le Caron Joseph Le Caron, O.M.R., (c. 1586 near Paris – March 29, 1632 in Gisors, France) was one of the four pioneer missionaries of Canada, (together with Father Denis Jamet, Father Jean Dolbeau, and Brother Pacifique du Plessis, all Recollect fria ...
and
Joseph de La Roche Daillon Joseph de La Roche Daillon (died 1656, Paris) was a French Catholic missionary to the Huron Indians and a Franciscan ''Récollet'' priest. He is best remembered in Canada as an explorer and missionary, and in the United States as the discoverer of o ...
were the first to explore various lands of the area, all with the assistance of the local First Nations.
For the next 150years, France and Britain wrestled for control of the
colony of Canada while simultaneously exploiting the land for the
fur trade of North America.
This culminated in the global
Seven Years' War
The Seven Years' War (1756–1763) was a global conflict that involved most of the European Great Powers, and was fought primarily in Europe, the Americas, and Asia-Pacific. Other concurrent conflicts include the French and Indian War (175 ...
that ended with the signing of the
Treaty of Paris in 1763, which ceded Canada to the British.
The colony of Canada was renamed the
Province of Quebec
Quebec ( ; )According to the Canadian government, ''Québec'' (with the acute accent) is the official name in Canadian French and ''Quebec'' (without the accent) is the province's official name in Canadian English is one of the thirteen p ...
until 1791, when it was divided into
Upper Canada
The Province of Upper Canada (french: link=no, province du Haut-Canada) was a part of British Canada established in 1791 by the Kingdom of Great Britain, to govern the central third of the lands in British North America, formerly part of th ...
(modern Southern Ontario) and
Lower Canada
The Province of Lower Canada (french: province du Bas-Canada) was a British colony on the lower Saint Lawrence River and the shores of the Gulf of Saint Lawrence (1791–1841). It covered the southern portion of the current Province of Quebec an ...
(modern Southern Quebec) by the
Constitutional Act.
This was done to provide a British-style governance to the
United Empire Loyalist
United Empire Loyalists (or simply Loyalists) is an honorific title which was first given by the 1st Lord Dorchester, the Governor of Quebec, and Governor General of The Canadas, to American Loyalists who resettled in British North America du ...
s fleeing north following the
American Revolution
The American Revolution was an ideological and political revolution that occurred in British America between 1765 and 1791. The Americans in the Thirteen Colonies formed independent states that defeated the British in the American Revoluti ...
.
In addition to the native portages and lake shore trails, routes developed alongside significant rivers such as the
St. Lawrence
Saint Lawrence or Laurence ( la, Laurentius, lit. " laurelled"; 31 December AD 225 – 10 August 258) was one of the seven deacons of the city of Rome under Pope Sixtus II who were martyred in the persecution of the Christians that the Roma ...
,
Ottawa,
Humber
The Humber is a large tidal estuary on the east coast of Northern England. It is formed at Trent Falls, Faxfleet, by the confluence of the tidal rivers Ouse and Trent. From there to the North Sea, it forms part of the boundary between t ...
and
Grand
Grand may refer to:
People with the name
* Grand (surname)
* Grand L. Bush (born 1955), American actor
* Grand Mixer DXT, American turntablist
* Grand Puba (born 1966), American rapper
Places
* Grand, Oklahoma
* Grand, Vosges, village and c ...
Rivers. These meandering trails followed the lay of the land, as opposed to the straight
tangent
In geometry, the tangent line (or simply tangent) to a plane curve at a given point is the straight line that "just touches" the curve at that point. Leibniz defined it as the line through a pair of infinitely close points on the curve. Mo ...
s of the surveyed roads yet to come. Some roads in Ontario still closely follow these early Native and European trails,
including the Kente Portage Trail (Old Portage Road) in
Carrying Place, the oldest continuously used road in the province.
1792–1849: Settlement of Upper Canada
John Graves Simcoe
John Graves Simcoe (25 February 1752 – 26 October 1806) was a British Army general and the first lieutenant governor of Upper Canada from 1791 until 1796 in southern Ontario and the watersheds of Georgian Bay and Lake Superior. He founded Yor ...
, the first
Lieutenant Governor of Upper Canada
The following is a list of lieutenant governors of Ontario and the lieutenant governors of the former colony of Upper Canada. The office of Lieutenant Governor of Ontario was created in 1867, when the Province of Ontario was created upon Confed ...
, landed at Niagara on July26, 1792, after overwintering in
Quebec City
Quebec City ( or ; french: Ville de Québec), officially Québec (), is the capital city of the Canadian province of Quebec. As of July 2021, the city had a population of 549,459, and the metropolitan area had a population of 839,311. It is t ...
,
from England and set forth to colonize the province in the image of Britain.
The ambitious
abolitionist
Abolitionism, or the abolitionist movement, is the movement to end slavery. In Western Europe and the Americas, abolitionism was a historic movement that sought to end the Atlantic slave trade and liberate the enslaved people.
The British ...
statesman, whom served the British during the
American Revolutionary War
The American Revolutionary War (April 19, 1775 – September 3, 1783), also known as the Revolutionary War or American War of Independence, was a major war of the American Revolution. Widely considered as the war that secured the independence of t ...
, was appointed to lead the new colony on September12, 1791.
Although
Niagara-on-the-Lake (then known as Newark) served as the capital for a year, Simcoe moved it to what is now Toronto after July30, 1793, at the behest of French merchant
Philippe de Rocheblave, following the arrival of news in May of France's
declaration of war against Britain.
Having reformed the
Queen's Rangers
The Queen's Rangers, also known as the Queen's American Rangers, and later Simcoe's Rangers, were a Loyalist military unit of the American Revolutionary War. Formed in 1776, they were named for Queen Charlotte, consort of George III. The Queen ...
, whom he fought alongside during the American War, Simcoe set out to establish military roads to connect his new capital with the Upper Great Lakes and other strategic points.
The first road he ordered built was Dundas Street, from the head of Lake Ontario near present-day
Dundas to the forks of the
Thames River
The River Thames ( ), known alternatively in parts as the River Isis, is a river that flows through southern England including London. At , it is the longest river entirely in England and the second-longest in the United Kingdom, after the R ...
in present-day
London
London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...
. His Rangers began work on this route on September10, 1793.
Between September25 and October14, Simcoe travelled with native guides to
Penetanguishene
Penetanguishene , sometimes shortened to Penetang, is a town in Simcoe County, Ontario, Canada. It is located on the southeasterly tip of Georgian Bay. Incorporated on February 22, 1882, this bilingual (French and English) community has a populati ...
and back. Following the advice of an
Ojibwa named Old Sail, the return voyage followed the east branch of the
Holland River
The Holland River is a river in Ontario, Canada, that drains the Holland River watershed into Cook's Bay, the southern extremity of Lake Simcoe. The river flows generally north, and its headwaters lie in the Oak Ridges Moraine. The Holland Riv ...
and thence south to Toronto (known as York from 1793 to 1834); this would become the route of
Yonge Street
Yonge Street (; pronounced "young") is a major arterial route in the Canadian province of Ontario connecting the shores of Lake Ontario in Toronto to Lake Simcoe, a gateway to the Upper Great Lakes.
Once the southernmost leg of provincial H ...
.
Simcoe's Rangers would commence "run
ing
Ing, ING or ing may refer to:
Art and media
* '' ...ing'', a 2003 Korean film
* i.n.g, a Taiwanese girl group
* The Ing, a race of dark creatures in the 2004 video game '' Metroid Prime 2: Echoes''
* "Ing", the first song on The Roches' 1992 ...
the line of the new road" with Surveyor General
Augustus Jones
Augustus Jones ( – November 16, 1836) was an American-born Upper Canadian farmer, land speculator, magistrate, militia captain and surveyor. Jones trained as a surveyor in New York City, and fled as a United Empire Loyalist to Uppe ...
in February 1794.
By mid-May, the Rangers had cleared and marked 14lots from
Eglinton Avenue
Eglinton Avenue is a major east–west arterial thoroughfare in Toronto and Mississauga in the Canadian province of Ontario. The street begins at Highway 407 (but does not interchange with the tollway) at the western limits of Mississauga, as ...
to just north of
Sheppard Avenue
Sheppard Avenue is an east–west principal arterial road in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The street has two distinct branches near its eastern end, with the original route being a collector road leading to Pickering via a turnoff, and the main ro ...
before being redirected to defend
Fort Miami.
William Berczy — and the nearly 200
Pennsylvania Dutch settlers whom accompanied him from the US into Upper Canada in July 1794 — would complete the opening of the route to
Bond Lake by the end of 1794. The remainder to
Holland Landing was opened by the Rangers, under the supervision of Augustus Jones, between December28, 1795, and February16, 1796.
![Road Between Kingston and York, Upper Canada](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d5/Road_Between_Kingston_and_York%2C_Upper_Canada.jpg)
In 1798,
Asa Danforth
Asa Danforth (1746-1818) was father of salt manufacturer and an early colonizer Asa Danforth Jr. Danforth was originally from Worcester, Massachusetts and moved his family to the Onondaga Valley area of New York. He was known to have anti-Briti ...
was hired by the government of Upper Canada to build a road to the
Trent River, in what in now
Trenton, by July1 of the following year. He began at the
Don River
The Don ( rus, Дон, p=don) is the fifth-longest river in Europe. Flowing from Central Russia to the Sea of Azov in Southern Russia, it is one of Russia's largest rivers and played an important role for traders from the Byzantine Empire.
Its ...
, where
Queen Street crosses it today, on June5 of that year, and proceeded east.
Danforth was paid $90 per mile to cut a road wide, of which the middle half was cut to the level of the ground. He was also to build -wide causeways "wherever necessary" and ensure that slopes were gradual enough for a sleigh or carriage to pass. He completed the first to
Port Hope by December.
The government ultimately decided that his road was unacceptable, and reportedly paid him less than owed. Portions of Danforth's road were later incorporated into
Highway 2, as well as several local roads in
Scarborough Scarborough or Scarboro may refer to:
People
* Scarborough (surname)
* Earl of Scarbrough
Places Australia
* Scarborough, Western Australia, suburb of Perth
* Scarborough, New South Wales, suburb of Wollongong
* Scarborough, Queensland, su ...
.
The majority of settlers up to this point were
United Empire Loyalist
United Empire Loyalists (or simply Loyalists) is an honorific title which was first given by the 1st Lord Dorchester, the Governor of Quebec, and Governor General of The Canadas, to American Loyalists who resettled in British North America du ...
s — settlers of the
Thirteen Colonies
The Thirteen Colonies, also known as the Thirteen British Colonies, the Thirteen American Colonies, or later as the United Colonies, were a group of British colonies on the Atlantic coast of North America. Founded in the 17th and 18th cent ...
loyal to Britain who fled north to the new colony. These pioneers endured starting anew in untamed wilderness, with little provisions beyond what they could carry.
Many were strategically placed along Yonge Street and Dundas Street, and given the duty of clearing half the width of a road along the front of their property lot. Settlers were responsible for the upkeep, and often the building of roads in this period, with each male over 21years of age required to perform three or more days of
statute labour per year, based on the value of their land. The intention was for settlers throughout the length of the roads to work on the portion fronting their lot, which was generally twenty
chains, or long.
However, many lots were given to absent clergymen and English nobles, resulting in these "roads" being poorly-maintained quagmires of mud.
During the early 1800s, the government of Upper Canada appropriated settlers to various lots which had been surveyed along the lake shores of
Lake Erie
Lake Erie ( "eerie") is the fourth largest lake by surface area of the five Great Lakes in North America and the eleventh-largest globally. It is the southernmost, shallowest, and smallest by volume of the Great Lakes and therefore also h ...
and
Lake Ontario
Lake Ontario is one of the five Great Lakes of North America. It is bounded on the north, west, and southwest by the Canadian province of Ontario, and on the south and east by the U.S. state of New York. The Canada–United States border ...
. The townships established along these fronts contained generally fertile land composed of
glacial till
image:Geschiebemergel.JPG, Closeup of glacial till. Note that the larger grains (pebbles and gravel) in the till are completely surrounded by the matrix of finer material (silt and sand), and this characteristic, known as ''matrix support'', is d ...
and clay-rich
loam. As these townships filled up, business opportunities presented themselves for investors to purchase
native
Native may refer to:
People
* Jus soli, citizenship by right of birth
* Indigenous peoples, peoples with a set of specific rights based on their historical ties to a particular territory
** Native Americans (disambiguation)
In arts and entert ...
lands and open them to settlement. The
Canada Company was the most successful of these ventures and brought settlers to vast areas of land in what would become
Southwestern Ontario by building routes such as
Huron Road and
Toronto–Sydenham Road
King's Highway 10, commonly referred to as Highway 10 and Hurontario Street, is a provincially maintained highway in the Canadian province of Ontario. The highway connects the northern end of Highway 410 just north of Brampton with Owen Sound o ...
during the 1830s and 1840s.
1850–1893: Colonization roads and the railway
As the second township frontage along Lake Ontario also filled, the government came under pressure to open up the unforgiving terrain of the
Canadian Shield to settlement and sought to establish a network of east–west and north–south roads between the
Ottawa Valley
The Ottawa Valley is the valley of the Ottawa River, along the boundary between Eastern Ontario and the Outaouais, Quebec, Canada. The valley is the transition between the Saint Lawrence Lowlands and the Canadian Shield. Because of the surroun ...
and
Georgian Bay
Georgian Bay (french: Baie Georgienne) is a large bay of Lake Huron, in the Laurentia bioregion. It is located entirely within the borders of Ontario, Canada. The main body of the bay lies east of the Bruce Peninsula and Manitoulin Island. To ...
. This area was known as the
Ottawa–Huron Tract.
In 1847, an exploration
survey
Survey may refer to:
Statistics and human research
* Statistical survey, a method for collecting quantitative information about items in a population
* Survey (human research), including opinion polls
Spatial measurement
* Surveying, the techniq ...
was carried out by
Robert Bell to lay out the lines that would become the Opeongo, Hastings, and Addington
colonization roads. The Public Lands Act, passed in 1853, permitted the granting of land to settlers who were at least 18. Those settlers who cleared at least within four years, built a house within a year, and resided on the grant for at least five years would receive the title to that land. The government subsequently built over of roads over the following 20years to provide access to these grants, although the roads were often little more than a trail cut through the forest wide enough for a wagon.
Like the lands to the south, statute labour was responsible for the majority of road development and maintenance. However, by 1860, due to the unsuitability of much of the land for any kind of settlement or agriculture, the roads were almost impassable in many places, except when frozen in winter or dry in summer. The large timber drive that was clearing the forests of the Ottawa–Huron Tract in this period contributed somewhat to road construction and maintenance, but the settlers themselves were largely left to their own resolve.
Statute labour was gradually abolished around the turn of the 20th century.
Malden Township was the first to do so in 1890,
and a majority of other municipalities followed suit by the 1920s. However, the law remained in place provincially until being officially repealed on January1, 2022.
Beginning in 1852, the
Grand Trunk Railway
The Grand Trunk Railway (; french: Grand Tronc) was a railway system that operated in the Canadian provinces of Quebec and Ontario and in the American states of Connecticut, Maine, Michigan, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Vermont. The rail ...
gradually assembled together many of the various
shortline railroad
:''Short Line is also one of the four railroads in the American version of the popular board game Monopoly, named after the Shore Fast Line, an interurban streetcar line.''
A shortline railroad is a small or mid-sized railroad company that opera ...
s in what was soon to become Ontario to form a single route across the province, connecting
Sarnia
Sarnia is a city in Lambton County, Ontario, Canada. It had a Canada 2021 Census, 2021 population of 72,047, and is the largest city on Lake Huron. Sarnia is located on the eastern bank of the junction between the Upper and Lower Great Lakes w ...
with Montreal via Toronto, by 1884. Simultaneously, the
Canadian Pacific Railway constructed a route across northern Ontario, connecting Thunder Bay with Ottawa by 1880.
The government largely subsidized these endeavours, and funding for road construction fell to the wayside, despite the pleas of townships, villages and settlers.
In 1896, the provincial Instructor in Road Making reported "It is doubtful if there is a mile of true macadam road in Ontario outside of a few towns or cities... by far the greatest part of the milage of the province is mud, ruts and pitch-holes..."
1894–1915: The Good Roads Movement
![Perry Doolittle 1880](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/87/Perry_Doolittle_1880.jpg)
The cries of municipalities went unanswered, but it would not stop their ambition. Coupled with the increasing adoption of the bicycle as a means of transport, and the desire of farmers to get their goods to market quicker, the
Ontario Good Roads Association
Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central Cana ...
was formed in 1894 by representatives from numerous townships, villages and cities. The
Good Roads Movement
The Good Roads Movement occurred in the United States between the late 1870s and the 1920s. It was the rural dimension of the Progressive movement. A key player was the United States Post Office Department. Once a commitment was made for Rural F ...
encouraged education on the building of proper roads, and later equipment to aid in the improvement of roads, as well as lobbying the various levels of government to fund road development and maintenance. Members would travel from town to town and across the countryside, espousing the value of properly built roads to communities.
Two of the most influential members in its early days were
Archibald William Campbell and Dr.
Perry Doolittle.
"Good Roads" Campbell would become the province's first Instructor in Roadmaking when the position was established on April15, 1896, under the
Department of Agriculture. Doolittle, a Toronto physician, became one of the earliest automobile owners in Canada, and spurred the good roads movement.
He became the first person to drive across Canada in 1925, utilizing the railways around Lake Superior where no roads existed, and is known as the "Father of the Trans-Canada Highway".
The arrival of automobiles rapidly changed the approach to roads and roadbuilding in the first years of the 20th century. In 1900, the provincial Instructor in Roadmaking was renamed as the Commissioner of Public Highways in 1900, as well as the Deputy Minister in the new Department of Public Works in 1905. The first legislation on driving was introduced in 1903, and included the first speed limits (). The first license plates were created that year, the first highway patrol established in 1907, licences for
chauffeurs in 1909 (regular drivers did not require a licence until 1927), and safety requirements such as headlights. These laws culminated in the creation of the
Highway Traffic Act
The ''Highway Traffic Act'' (HTA) (the Act) is legislation in Ontario, Canada, which regulates the licensing of vehicles, classification of traffic offences, administration of loads, classification of vehicles and other transport-related issues ...
in 1923.
Roadbuilding advanced considerably, with the most notable project of the period being the Toronto–Hamilton Highway, the first paved intercity road in Ontario. The highway was chosen to run along the
macadamized
Macadam is a type of road construction, pioneered by Scottish engineer John Loudon McAdam around 1820, in which crushed stone is placed in shallow, convex layers and compacted thoroughly. A binding layer of stone dust (crushed stone from the o ...
old Lake Shore Road between the two cities, instead of Dundas Street to the north, because of the numerous hills encountered along Dundas.
In November 1914, the proposed highway was approved,
and work began quickly to construct the road known today as
Lake Shore Boulevard
Lake Shore Boulevard (often incorrectly compounded as Lakeshore Boulevard) is a major arterial road running along more than half of the Lake Ontario waterfront in the city of Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Prior to 1998, two segments of Lake Shore ...
and
Lakeshore Road
Lakeshore Road (originally Lake Shore Road) is a historic roadway in the Canadian province of Ontario, running through the city of Burlington and the town of Oakville in Halton Region, as well as the city of Mississauga in Peel Region. As its n ...
from Toronto to Hamilton. The road was finished in November 1917, wide and nearly long, becoming the first concrete road in Ontario.
The highway became the favourite drive of many motorists, and it quickly became a tradition for many families to drive it every Sunday.
1916–1933: The first provincial highways
Roads and highways in Ontario were given their first serious consideration by the provincial government when the Department of Public Highways (DPHO), predecessor to the modern
Ministry of Transportation of Ontario
The Ministry of Transportation (MTO) is the provincial ministry of the Government of Ontario that is responsible for transport infrastructure and related law in Ontario. The ministry traces its roots back over a century to the 1890s, when the ...
, was established on January 17, 1916. Until then, the majority of the primary roads through southern Ontario formed part of the county road systems. The Department of Public Works paid up to 60% of the construction and maintenance costs for these roads, while the counties were responsible for the remaining 40%.
The Ontario government passed an act in 1917 to permit the newly formed Department of Public Highways (DPHO) to take over (or assume) responsibility and upkeep of a provincial highway system. The initial system, between
Windsor
Windsor may refer to:
Places Australia
* Windsor, New South Wales
** Municipality of Windsor, a former local government area
* Windsor, Queensland, a suburb of Brisbane, Queensland
**Shire of Windsor, a former local government authority around Wi ...
and
Quebec
Quebec ( ; )According to the Canadian government, ''Québec'' (with the acute accent) is the official name in Canadian French and ''Quebec'' (without the accent) is the province's official name in Canadian English is one of the thirtee ...
, was bookended by branches to Niagara and
Ottawa.
In 1919, the federal government passed the
Canada Highways Act
The ''Canada Highways Act'' was a 1919 act of the Dominion Parliament of Canada. The Act established a fund to support the construction of provincial highways as part of the post- World War I reconstruction program of Robert Borden's Unio ...
, which provided $20,000,000 to provinces under the condition that they establish an official highway network; up to 40% of construction costs would be subsidized. The first network plan was approved on February 26, 1920. At this time, Campbell was now the Federal Commissioner of Highways.
Until the summer of 1925, Ontario highways were named rather than numbered. When route numbering was introduced, the following numbers were allotted:
*
Highway 2 (Windsor–Quebec, )
*
Highway 3 (Windsor–Niagara Falls, )
*
Highway 4 (St. Thomas–Elginfield, )
*
Highway 5 (Jarvis–Toronto, )
*
Highway 6 (Hamilton–Owen Sound, )
*
Highway 7 (Sarnia–Brampton, )
*
Highway 8 (Goderich–Niagara Falls, )
*
Highway 9 (Kincardine–Arthur, )
*
Highway 10 (Port Credit–Owen Sound, )
*
Highway 11 (Toronto–Severn River, )
*
Highway 12 (Whitby–Lindsay, )
*
Highway 12A (Port Hope–Peterborough, )
*
Highway 14 (Picton–Foxboro, )
*
Highway 15 (Kingston–Ottawa, )
*
Highway 16 (Prescott–Ottawa, )
*
Highway 17 (Pembroke–Quebec boundary, )
The number of Provincial Highways—as they were initially known—expanded quickly from there. The provincial highway network did not extend into the
Canadian Shield nor
Northern Ontario
Northern Ontario is a primary geographic and quasi-administrative region of the Canadian province of Ontario, the other primary region being Southern Ontario. Most of the core geographic region is located on part of the Superior Geological Pro ...
initially, and ''Trunk Roads'' in the north were instead under the mandate of the
Department of Northern Development
The Ministry of Transportation (MTO) is the provincial ministry of the Government of Ontario that is responsible for transport infrastructure and related law in Ontario. The ministry traces its roots back over a century to the 1890s, when the pr ...
. The two primary trunk routes were extensions of
Highway 11 and
Highway 17, to
North Bay and
Sault Ste. Marie, respectively.
Seeking to open the far north, construction of a road to connect North Bay and
Cochrane began in 1925,
The new gravel highway was officially opened on July2, 1927, by Minister of Lands and Forests
William Finlayson. He suggested at the opening that the road be named the
Ferguson Highway
The Ferguson Highway was a long gravel trunk road in Ontario, Canada. Built between 1925–1927 from the city of North Bay to the town of Cochrane, it was created to connect the growing agricultural and mining communities of Northern Ontario wi ...
in honour of premier Ferguson. The name was originally suggested by North Bay mayor Dan Barker.
Despite the official opening, a section between
Swastika and Ramore wasn't opened until August.
The Ferguson Highway name was also applied to the Muskoka Road between Severn Bridge and North Bay.
During the 1920s, the DPHO began to examine possible remedies to chronic congestion on along Highway2, particularly between Toronto and Hamilton (
Lakeshore Road
Lakeshore Road (originally Lake Shore Road) is a historic roadway in the Canadian province of Ontario, running through the city of Burlington and the town of Oakville in Halton Region, as well as the city of Mississauga in Peel Region. As its n ...
), eventually deciding upon widening the roadway midway between Lakeshore Road and
Highway 5 (Dundas Street), or
the Middle Road
The Middle Road was the name for a historic highway in the Canadian province of Ontario, which served to link the cities of Toronto and Hamilton. The name was used between 1931 and 1939, after which the road became the northern section of the Que ...
. It was to be more than twice the width of Lakeshore Road at and would carry two lanes of traffic in either direction.
Construction on what was then known as the
''Queen Street Extension'' west of Toronto began in early 1931.
Before the highway could be completed,
Thomas McQuesten
Thomas Baker McQuesten (June 30, 1882 – January 13, 1948) was a politician in Ontario, Canada. He was a Liberal member of the Legislative Assembly of Ontario from 1934 to 1943 who represented the riding of Hamilton—Wentworth. He served as a ...
was appointed the new minister of the renamed DHO, with
Robert Melville Smith
Robert Melville Smith (14 October 1887 – 16 November 1950) was a civil engineer, who, as deputy minister of the Ontario Department of Highways (now the Ministry of Transportation) between 1928 and 1943, designed and constructed the Queen Elizabe ...
as deputy minister, following the
1934 provincial elections.
1934–1948: Dual highways and the Queen Elizabeth Way
Smith, inspired by the German
autobahn
The (; German plural ) is the federal controlled-access highway system in Germany. The official German term is (abbreviated ''BAB''), which translates as 'federal motorway'. The literal meaning of the word is 'Federal Auto(mobile) Track' ...
s—new "dual-lane
divided highway
A dual carriageway ( BE) or divided highway ( AE) is a class of highway with carriageways for traffic travelling in opposite directions separated by a central reservation (BrE) or median (AmE). Roads with two or more carriageways which are ...
s"—modified the design for Ontario roads,
[Stamp pp. 19–20.]
and McQuesten ordered the Middle Road be converted into this new form of highway.
[Stamp pp. 11–12.]
A
right-of-way
Right of way is the legal right, established by grant from a landowner or long usage (i.e. by prescription), to pass along a specific route through property belonging to another.
A similar ''right of access'' also exists on land held by a gov ...
was purchased along the Middle Road and construction began to convert the existing sections to a divided highway. Work also began on Canada's first
interchange at Highway 10.
The Middle Road was ceremoniously renamed the
Queen Elizabeth Way
The Queen Elizabeth Way (QEW) is a 400-series highway in the Canadian province of Ontario linking Toronto with the Niagara Peninsula and Buffalo, New York. The freeway begins at the Peace Bridge in Fort Erie and travels around the western ...
during the
1939 royal tour of Canada
The 1939 royal tour of Canada by King George VI and Queen Elizabeth was undertaken in the build-up to World War II as a way to emphasise the links between Britain and Canada. The royal tour lasted from 17 May to 15 June, covering every Canadia ...
, taking its name from
Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother, and was completed between Toronto and Niagara Falls on August26, 1940.
Beginning in 1935, McQuesten applied the concept of a dual-highway to several projects along Highway2, including along Kingston Road in Scarborough Township.
When widening in Scarborough reached the
Highland Creek ravine in 1936, the Department of Highways began construction on a new bridge over the large valley, bypassing the former alignment around
West Hill.
From here the highway was constructed on a new alignment to Oshawa, avoiding construction on the congested Highway 2. As
grading and bridge construction neared completion on the new highway between West Hill and Oshawa in September 1939,
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...
broke out and gradually tax revenues were re-allocated from highway construction to the war effort.
As the war came to a close, planning began in 1945 on the Toronto–Barrie Highway to ease the congestion on the parallel routes of
Highway 11 and
Highway 27. The highway followed a completely new alignment, and featured interchanges at nearly all crossroads. Construction of an extension around Barrie began in 1950, and the completed freeway was opened on July1, 1952. The expressway between Highland Creek and Oshawa was also completed in this period, and opened as far as Ritson Road in December 1947, becoming the progenitor to Highway401.
1950–1971: The freeway age and the Trans-Canada Highway
When Ontario signed the Trans-Canada Highway Agreement on April25, 1950, it had already chosen a Central Ontario routing via Highway7, Highway12,
Highway 103 and Highway69;
Highway17 through the
Ottawa Valley
The Ottawa Valley is the valley of the Ottawa River, along the boundary between Eastern Ontario and the Outaouais, Quebec, Canada. The valley is the transition between the Saint Lawrence Lowlands and the Canadian Shield. Because of the surroun ...
was announced as a provincially-funded secondary route of the Trans-Canada the following day.
Amongst some of the most difficult terrain encountered in Canada, the of wilderness known as "the Gap" was a missing link in the Trans-Canada Highway between
Nipigon
Nipigon () is a township in Thunder Bay District, Northwestern Ontario, Canada, located along the west side of the Nipigon River and south of the small Lake Helen running between Lake Nipigon and Lake Superior. Lake Nipigon is located approximat ...
and
Sault Ste. Marie. Construction began in 1956,
and it was completed and ceremoniously opened to traffic on September17, 1960, uniting the two segments and completing the route of Highway17 from the Manitoba border to the Quebec border.
The construction boom following the war resulted in many new freeway construction projects in the province. The Toronto–Barrie Highway (Highway400), Trans-Provincial Highway (Highway401),
a short expansion of Highway7 approaching the
Blue Water Bridge
The Blue Water Bridge is a twin-span international bridge across the St. Clair River that links Port Huron, Michigan, United States, and Sarnia, Ontario, Canada. The Blue Water Bridge connects Highway 402 in Ontario with both Interstate 69 ...
in Sarnia (
Highway 402),
and an expansion of Highway27 (eventually designated as
Highway 427 by the mid-1970s) into part of the Toronto Bypass were all underway or completed by the early 1950s.
Seeking a way to distinguish the controlled-access freeways from the existing two-lane King's Highways, the Department of Highways created the 400-series designations in 1952. By the end of the year, Highway400, 401, and 402 were numbered, although they were only short stubs of their current lengths.
Highway401 was assembled across the province in a patchwork fashion,
becoming fully navigable between Windsor and the Quebec border on November10, 1964;
Highway400 was extended north to
Coldwater on Christmas Eve 1959;
Highway402 was extended to London between 1972 and 1982.
In addition to this network backbone, plans for additional 400-series highways were initiated by the late 1950s, comprising the Chedoke Expressway (
Highway 403) through
Hamilton Hamilton may refer to:
People
* Hamilton (name), a common British surname and occasional given name, usually of Scottish origin, including a list of persons with the surname
** The Duke of Hamilton, the premier peer of Scotland
** Lord Hamilt ...
;
the
Don Valley Parkway
The Don Valley Parkway (DVP) is a municipal expressway in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, which connects the Gardiner Expressway in downtown Toronto with Highway 401. North of Highway 401, it continues as Highway 404. The parkway ru ...
Extension (
Highway 404) northward from the soon-to-be constructed Toronto expressway;
Highway 405 to connect with the American border near
St. Catharines;
Highway 406 south from St. Catharines to
Welland
Welland is a city in the Regional Municipality of Niagara in Southern Ontario, Canada. As of 2021, it had a population of 55,750.
The city is in the centre of Niagara and located within a half-hour driving distance to Niagara Falls, Niagara-on ...
;
Highway407 encircling the Greater Toronto Area (GTA), though not built for another 40 years;
Highway 409 to connect Highway401 with
Toronto International Airport;
and The Queensway (
Highway 417) through Ottawa.
The first sections of these freeways were opened in 1963,
1977,
1963, 1965,
1997,
1974,
and 1960,
respectively. In 1963, transportation minister Charles MacNaughton announced the widening of Highway401 in Toronto from four to a minimum of 12lanes between
Islington Avenue
Islington () is a district in the north of Greater London, England, and part of the London Borough of Islington. It is a mainly residential district of Inner London, extending from Islington's High Street to Highbury Fields, encompassing the ar ...
and
Markham Road Markham may refer to:
It may also refer to brand of of clothing which originates from South Africa which saw it's establishment in 1873.
Biology
* Markham's storm-petrel (''Oceanodroma markhami''), a seabird species found in Chile and Colombia
* ...
. Construction began immediately; while the plan initially called for construction to end in 1967, it continued for nearly a decade. At least four lanes were always open during the large reconstruction project, which included complex new interchanges at Highway27, Highway400, the planned Spadina Expressway and the Don Valley Parkway.
Throughout the mid-to-late 1960s, the provincial government also funded numerous urban expressways, including the
Conestoga Parkway
The Conestoga Parkway, officially the Kitchener–Waterloo Expressway,
is a controlled-access highway in the Canadian province of Ontario, located entirely within the Regional Municipality of Waterloo. The route travels east and then north thr ...
in
Kitchener–
Waterloo, the
Thunder Bay Expressway
The Thunder Bay Expressway, originally known as the Lakehead Expressway is a high-capacity at-grade suburban limited-access road around the western side of Thunder Bay in the Canadian province of Ontario. The route travels in a generally north– ...
in Thunder Bay,
Highbury Avenue
Highbury Avenue is an arterial road located in the Canadian province of Ontario. In addition to serving as a primary north–south thoroughfare in eastern London – through which part of it is a limited-access freeway – the road also provides ...
in
London
London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...
, the
Hanlon Expressway into
Guelph
Guelph ( ; 2021 Canadian Census population 143,740) is a city in Southwestern Ontario, Canada. Known as "The Royal City", Guelph is roughly east of Kitchener and west of Downtown Toronto, at the intersection of Highway 6, Highway 7 and Wel ...
and most infamously the
Spadina Expressway
William R. Allen Road, also known as Allen Road, the Allen Expressway and colloquially as the Allen, is a short Controlled-access highway, expressway and arterial road in Toronto. It starts as a controlled-access expressway at Eglinton Avenue, Eg ...
into
Downtown Toronto
Downtown Toronto is the main central business district of Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Located entirely within the district of Old Toronto, it is approximately 16.6 square kilometres in area, bounded by Bloor Street to the northeast and Dupont Str ...
. While the others were built, the Spadina became a heated debate in the late 1960s between
Metropolitan Toronto
The Municipality of Metropolitan Toronto was an upper-tier level of municipal government in Ontario, Canada, from 1953 to 1998. It was made up of the old city of Toronto and numerous townships, towns and villages that surrounded Toronto, whic ...
and urban activists including
Jane Jacobs
Jane Jacobs (''née'' Butzner; 4 May 1916 – 25 April 2006) was an American-Canadian journalist, author, theorist, and activist who influenced urban studies, sociology, and economics. Her book '' The Death and Life of Great American Cities ...
. The battle culminated when premier
Bill Davis
William Grenville Davis, (July 30, 1929 – August 8, 2021) was a Canadian politician who served as the 18th premier of Ontario from 1971 to 1985. Davis was first elected as the member of provincial Parliament for Peel in the 1959 provincia ...
rose in the legislature and declared "If we are building a transportation system to serve the automobile, the Spadina Expressway would be a good place to start. But if we are building a transportation system to serve people, the Spadina Expressway is a good place to stop."
1972–1995: Growth of public transit
The cancellation of the Spadina Expressway led to the demise of
other proposed expressways in Toronto and elsewhere in the province, as well as a decline in new road building proposals.
It remains, to this day, a controversial decision.
The Environmental Assessment Act, introduced in 1975, further restricted new highway building, and as a result the 1970s and 1980s saw less new highway construction compared to prior decades.
Despite this, several existing freeways were extended or expanded, including Highway402 from Sarnia to London between 1972 and 1982,
Highway403 through Mississauga between 1978 and late 1982,
the
Don Valley Parkway
The Don Valley Parkway (DVP) is a municipal expressway in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, which connects the Gardiner Expressway in downtown Toronto with Highway 401. North of Highway 401, it continues as Highway 404. The parkway ru ...
as Highway404 north from Toronto to
Newmarket between 1976 and 1989,
Highway406 through
St. Catharines between 1977 and 1984,
Highway417 from Ottawa to the Quebec boundary between 1970 and late 1975,
and the expansion of Highway27 into Highway427 between 1968 and late 1971,
as well as its extension from Highway401 to Highway7 between 1976 and 1991.
Highway 410 was also built, initially as a two lane road, between 1975 and late 1978.
1996–1999: Highway Transfers
As part of a series of budget cuts initiated by premier
Mike Harris
Michael Deane Harris (born January 23, 1945) is a Canadian retired politician who served as the 22nd premier of Ontario from 1995 to 2002 and leader of the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario (PC Party) from 1990 to 2002. During his time ...
under his
Common Sense Revolution
The phrase Common Sense Revolution (CSR) has been used as a political slogan to describe conservative platforms with a main goal of reducing taxes while balancing the budget by reducing the size and role of government. It has been used in places ...
platform in 1995, numerous highways deemed to no longer be of significance to the provincial network were decommissioned and responsibility for the routes transferred to lower levels of government, a process referred to as ''
downloading''. Several thousand kilometres of provincially maintained highways were transferred to the various
municipalities
A municipality is usually a single administrative division having corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate.
The term ''municipality'' may also mean the go ...
in which they are located. These transfers were performed under the reasoning that they served a mostly local function, as a cost-saving measure and as part of a broader exchange of responsibilities between the province and its municipalities.
On April1, 1997, of highways were removed from the King's Highway system.
This was followed by the removal of on January 1, 1998,
for a total of ; the move was criticized by the media.
In the 1980s and 1990s,
Highway 416 was constructed through a process known as twinning in which a second
carriageway
A carriageway (British English) or roadway (North American English) consists of a width of road on which a vehicle is not restricted by any physical barriers or separation to move laterally. A carriageway generally consists of a number of tra ...
is built parallel to the existing road. In addition, existing intersections were rebuilt as
grade-separated interchanges.
Highway 16 New was built during the 1960s and 1970s, establishing the right-of-way and alignment of a future freeway as a two-lane highway.
Planning for a connection to
Highway 417 began in 1987,
and was completed on July31, 1997.
Work to twin Highway16 New began in mid-1996,
and was completed in sections between June 1997,
and September 1999, after which nearly the entire length of Highway16 was redesignated as Highway416.
2000–2022: Recent history
In recent years, highway construction has generally been limited to the expansion of existing highways, principal among them Highway11, Highway400/69, and the Herb Gray Parkway extension of Highway401 into Windsor. The four-laning of of Highway11 between Barrie and North Bay was a long-term expansion that was completed August8, 2012, having been worked on since 1955.
The four-laning of Highway69, which will be replaced by Highway400, has progressed northward from
Waubaushene since 1991,
reaching as far as
Nobel on October26, 2010.
Work has also progressed south from Sudbury since 2005,
and as of 2022 has reached the
French River, leaving a gap of two-lane highway between Toronto and Sudbury.
Construction began in 2012 on a provincially operated long extension to the 407ETR, known as Highway407 East (or 407E) during planning, with the project undertaken in two separate phases. Phase1 was opened on June20, 2016, consisting of a extension to Harmony Road in Oshawa, as well as the Highway412.
The extension was free of tolls until February1, 2017.
Phase2A, which opened on January2, 2018, added a extension to Taunton Road at the future Highway418 interchange.
Phase2B, which opened on December9, 2019, added a extension to Highway35 and Highway115, as well as the Highway418.
In 2004, a joint announcement by the
federal government of the United States
The federal government of the United States (U.S. federal government or U.S. government) is the national government of the United States, a federal republic located primarily in North America, composed of 50 states, a city within a fe ...
and
Government of Canada
The government of Canada (french: gouvernement du Canada) is the body responsible for the federal administration of Canada. A constitutional monarchy, the Crown is the corporation sole, assuming distinct roles: the executive, as the ''Crown ...
confirmed a new Canada–U.S. border crossing would be constructed between
Detroit
Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at t ...
and Windsor. The MTO took advantage of this opportunity to extend Highway 401 to the Canada–US border and began an
environmental impact assessment on the entire project in late 2005.
Despite protest from area residents,
as well as a dismissed lawsuit from
Ambassador Bridge
The Ambassador Bridge is a tolled international suspension bridge across the Detroit River that connects Detroit, Michigan, United States, with Windsor, Ontario, Canada. Opened in 1929, it is the busiest international border crossing in North ...
owner
Matty Moroun,
it was announced on May1, 2008, that a preferred route had been selected and the new route would be named the ''Windsor–Essex Parkway''.
The below-grade route has six through-lanes and follows Huron Church Road from the former end of Highway401 to the E.C. Row Expressway, which it then follows alongside to near the border.
Construction began in August 2011,
It was partially opened on June28, 2015,
and completed to the
Ojibway Parkway
King's Highway18, commonly referred to as Highway18, was a provincially maintained highway in the Canadian province of Ontario, located entirely within Essex County. Since 1998, the majority of the former route has been known as Essex County ...
on November21,
The
Gordie Howe International Bridge
The Gordie Howe International Bridge (french: Pont International Gordie-Howe), known during development as the Detroit River International Crossing and the New International Trade Crossing, is a cable-stayed international bridge across the De ...
is scheduled for completion in 2024, and will tie Highway401 in with
Interstate 75 and
Interstate 96 in
Detroit
Detroit ( , ; , ) is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is also the largest U.S. city on the United States–Canada border, and the seat of government of Wayne County. The City of Detroit had a population of 639,111 at t ...
.
Future
The current proposals by the consist of two new freeways in the and continued widening and four-laning of existing highways.
Highway 413 is a proposed four-to-six lane freeway bypass of the GTA around
Brampton
Brampton ( or ) is a city in the Canadian province of Ontario. Brampton is a city in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) and is a lower-tier municipality within Peel Region. The city has a population of 656,480 as of the 2021 Census, making it ...
, connecting Highway401 and Highway407 with Highway400 north of Vaughan. The route would include extensions of Highway410 and Highway427 as well as a right-of-way for a
transitway
Bus rapid transit (BRT), also called a busway or transitway, is a bus-based public transport system designed to have much more capacity, reliability and other quality features than a conventional bus system. Typically, a BRT system includes ...
; the highway has attracted considerable attention, with opinions divided over the benefits of shorter travel times versus irreversible environmental impacts and
urban sprawl
Urban sprawl (also known as suburban sprawl or urban encroachment) is defined as "the spreading of urban developments (such as houses and shopping centers) on undeveloped land near a city." Urban sprawl has been described as the unrestricted growt ...
.
The
Bradford Bypass is a proposed four lane rural freeway connecting Highway400 and Highway404 north of
Bradford and Newmarket.
Like Highwaay413, it has attracted criticism for its environmental impact,
though it has the support of adjacent municipalities.
Preliminary construction works for the route are underway as of 2022.
While planning for the twinning of Highway11/17 between Thunder Bay and
Nipigon
Nipigon () is a township in Thunder Bay District, Northwestern Ontario, Canada, located along the west side of the Nipigon River and south of the small Lake Helen running between Lake Nipigon and Lake Superior. Lake Nipigon is located approximat ...
began in 1989,
construction did not begin until 2009.
As of 2022, of two-laned highway remains to be twinned or bypassed, almost all of which is in the engineering phase.
The four-laning of the remaining gap of Highway69 has been promised by multiple governments, but no timeline for completion has been announced as of 2022.
See also
*
List of Ontario provincial highways
Provincial highways in Ontario include all roads maintained by the Ministry of Transportation as part of the Ontario Provincial Highway Network.
__TOC__
King's Highway
Although all roads in the provincial highway network are legally part of ...
References
Footnotes
Bibliography
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GIS datasets
External links
Ministry of Transportation of Ontario (MTO)MTO 100th Anniversary - HistoryOfficial Ontario road mapOntario 511 Traveller Information- Highway conditions
Ontario's Highway ProgramsRoad maps of Ontario, 1923–2010
{{DEFAULTSORT:Provincial Highway Network of Ontario
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1920 establishments in Ontario