Highway 32 is a highway in southwestern

Saskatchewan Saskatchewan ( ; ) is a Provinces and territories of Canada, province in Western Canada, western Canada, bordered on the west by Alberta, on the north by the Northwest Territories, on the east by Manitoba, to the northeast by Nunavut, and on t ...

, connecting

Leader Leadership, both as a research area and as a practical skill, encompasses the ability of an individual, group or organization to "lead", influence or guide other individuals, teams, or entire organizations. The word "leadership" often gets vi ...

and

Swift Current Swift Current is the fifth largest city in the Canadian province of Saskatchewan. It is situated along the Trans Canada Highway west of Moose Jaw, and east of Medicine Hat, Alberta. Swift Current grew 6.8% between 2011 and 2016, ending up at ...

. It is about long, connecting several rural communities along the route including

Abbey An abbey is a type of monastery used by members of a religious order under the governance of an abbot or abbess. Abbeys provide a complex of buildings and land for religious activities, work, and housing of Christian monks and nuns. The conce ...

, Cabri, Cantaur and

Success Success is the state or condition of meeting a defined range of expectations. It may be viewed as the opposite of failure. The criteria for success depend on context, and may be relative to a particular observer or belief system. One person mig ...

History

The first travel in this area was by foot, two wheeled ox carts and horse drawn freight wagons using trails on the sod. The first train arrived in

Lancer A lancer was a type of cavalryman who fought with a lance. Lances were used for mounted warfare in Assyria as early as and subsequently by Persia, India, Egypt, China, Greece, and Rome. The weapon was widely used throughout Eurasia during the M ...

in 1913. The late 1920s and 1930s saw the automobile arrive to a few families in the area.

Maintenance

The winter of 2000 saw resurfaced on this highway. The road west of Cabri to the east of Shackleton was repaired. In 2005, were resurfaced. Construction work began on highway 32 at the entrance to

and continued west for . Wheel ruts and surface detoriation were levelled and filled and a microsurface treatment was put into place to restore resistance to skidding. The highway has become infamous for its extremely poor condition, which can primarily be attributed to a substandard pavement design (not built for heavy

truck A truck or lorry is a motor vehicle designed to transport cargo, carry specialized payloads, or perform other utilitarian work. Trucks vary greatly in size, power, and configuration, but the vast majority feature body-on-frame construction ...

s in the mostly

agricultural Agriculture or farming is the practice of cultivating Plant, plants and livestock. Agriculture was the key development in the rise of Sedentism, sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of Domestication, domesticated species created food ...

and

oil An oil is any nonpolar chemical substance that is composed primarily of hydrocarbons and is hydrophobic (does not mix with water) & lipophilic (mixes with other oils). Oils are usually flammable and surface active. Most oils are unsaturated ...

-producing area) and claims of lack of maintenance. The condition of the route is so bad that

ambulance An ambulance is a medically equipped vehicle which transports patients to treatment facilities, such as hospitals. Typically, out-of-hospital medical care is provided to the patient during the transport. Ambulances are used to respond to medi ...

s are avoiding the route as much as possible. On May 17, 2006, Southwest TV News produced a three part series regarding the highway and its road condition. A

Letter of understanding A Letter of Understanding (LOU) is a formal text that sums up the terms of an undertakings of a contract which may have been negotiated up to this point only in spoken form or otherwise informally. It reviews the terms of an agreement for a serv ...

(LOU) was signed by 22 southwest towns, municipalities and government offices. In 2006, of highway 32 were converted to a gravel road to alleviate the asphalt surface potholes. Residents lobbying for highway repairs published a "Pothole of the Month" calendar, "I Survived Highway 32" bumper stickers and a billboard was erected on the roadside. The Leader ambulance travels on another route a -hour longer to the Regional Hospital in Swift Current because of bad road conditions. Action Southwest, Area Transportation Planning Council (ATPC), Department of Highways, Highway 37 partnership and Highway 32 partnership came together to resolve the transportation problems and it was decided to undertake Action Southwest has appointed a transportation study steering committee as well as two consulting firms to monitor progress. "Thin-membrane" highways are secondary routes providing a dust-free surface, but were never engineered for heavy truck traffic. Heavy trucks need to be rerouted to refurbished routes designed for truck traffice said Highways Minister Eldon Lautermilch. Saskatchewan comprises of thin-membrane highway. From the southwest to the northeast of Cabri, of the highway was resurfaced in the summer of 2007 a part of Phase I Saskatchewan Highways and Infrastructure's 2008 Tender Release. Highways and Transportation Minister Pat Atkinson allocated $1 million in the spring of 2001. Summer crews resurfaced beginning west of Cabri and further westerly. This repair would now handle heavier truck loads on the route. At a cost of $31.8 million, the stretch of the Highway between

Shackleton Sir Ernest Henry Shackleton (15 February 1874 – 5 January 1922) was an Anglo-Irish Antarctic explorer who led three British expeditions to the Antarctic. He was one of the principal figures of the period known as the Heroic Age of An ...

and

Prelate A prelate () is a high-ranking member of the Christian clergy who is an ordinary or who ranks in precedence with ordinaries. The word derives from the Latin , the past participle of , which means 'carry before', 'be set above or over' or 'pref ...

was upgraded from thin membrane surface (TMS) road to a fully structural paved road designed for full regular highway traffic. This work started on May 4, 2009 and was completed on October 13, 2010.

Communities

The Great Sandhills are located to the south of Highway 32, and the South Saskatchewan river runs to the north of Highway 32. The

CPR Cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) is an emergency procedure consisting of chest compressions often combined with artificial ventilation in an effort to manually preserve intact brain function until further measures are taken to restore sponta ...

allocated land along the rail line for the village of Prussia, and soon the

RCMP The Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP; french: Gendarmerie royale du Canada; french: GRC, label=none), commonly known in English as the Mounties (and colloquially in French as ) is the federal and national police service of Canada. As poli ...

and immigrants arrived to the area. During

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

, the village was renamed to

. Along the highway is the village of

Sceptre A sceptre is a staff or wand held in the hand by a ruling monarch as an item of royal or imperial insignia. Figuratively, it means royal or imperial authority or sovereignty. Antiquity Ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia The ''Was'' and other ...

, which hosts The Great Sandhills Museum, metal wheat sculpture, and is the gateway to the great sandhills of Saskatchewan.

Lemsford Lemsford is a village and parish in Hertfordshire, England. It is near Welwyn Garden City and Hatfield, Hertfordshire, Hatfield and is in the Hatfield Villages Ward of the Welwyn Hatfield, Borough of Welwyn/Hatfield. Lemsford Springs is a small ...

Portreeve A portreeve ( ang, hæfenrēfa, sometimes spelled Port-reeve) or port warden is the title of a historical official in England and Wales possessing authority (political, administrative, or fiscal) over a town. The details of the office have fluctu ...

and Battrum are now considered ghost towns of Saskatchewan. The

village A village is a clustered human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town (although the word is often used to describe both hamlets and smaller towns), with a population typically ranging from a few hundred to ...

features the Lancer museum which hosts the history of the area, homestead artifacts and a couple of models of the Lancer. George Jaegli was the sculptor who built the Chokecherry Cluster at Lancer.

is a

of 130 residents. The

town A town is a human settlement. Towns are generally larger than villages and smaller than cities, though the criteria to distinguish between them vary considerably in different parts of the world. Origin and use The word "town" shares an ori ...

of Cabri is located at the junction of Highway 32 and Highway 37 and features oversized goose, antelope and wheat sculptures. To the south on the

South Saskatchewan River The South Saskatchewan River is a major river in Canada that flows through the provinces of Alberta and Saskatchewan. For the first half of the 20th century, the South Saskatchewan would completely freeze over during winter, creating spectacular ...

is the Cabri Regional Park. Southwest Saskatchewan is home to Saskatchewan's first oil fields, and the Fosterton Oilfield Museum at Cabri commemorates this history of the area. The

is home to 40 residents along Highway 32. In 2006, a gas storage facility was constructed at Cantuar. The intersection of Highway 332 is to the south of Cantuar.

History

Maintenance

Communities

Major intersections

See also

References

External links