News   Apr 19, 2024
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Roads: Highway 7 North Kitchener-Guelph New Freeway Build

The Victoria street bridge is being rebuilt this year and clearing of vegetation along the route is occurring.
 
As a resident in the area, I wish they wouldn't, but it isn't surprising given local politics (and politicians) and the unwillingness of a lot of people to oppose highway development. The Region of Waterloo is putting in work to finally improve transit, walking and cycling on Victoria Street (which turns into the current 7), Breslau station on the Kitchener line might still happen... There's a lot that is happening or could be happening to properly connect Kitchener and Guelph, densify development, and keep it west of the Grand River. This will just create another sprawl corridor.
 
With the Hanlon Parkway in Guelph getting more interchanges, you could have an entire freeway bypass of the 401 between Highway 8 and 6 once this is done.

Say what you want about building more highways, it's good to have redundancy in the network. Ideally I'd like to see this highway extended to Brampton / GTA West highway to provide a complete alternative to the 401 between Waterloo Region and Greater Toronto.
 
With the Hanlon Parkway in Guelph getting more interchanges, you could have an entire freeway bypass of the 401 between Highway 8 and 6 once this is done.

Say what you want about building more highways, it's good to have redundancy in the network. Ideally I'd like to see this highway extended to Brampton / GTA West highway to provide a complete alternative to the 401 between Waterloo Region and Greater Toronto.

Do all the other non highway roads not provide network redundancy already?
 
Do all the other non highway roads not provide network redundancy already?
Highway 7 isn't too bad from guelph to brampton, but i sure do wish there was a freeway sometimes

Even having a highway like highway 10 in caledon could help improve traffic
 
I think the highway is really needed because of the amount of traffic between the two cities. Expanding the current two lane highway could only help so much in safety. Even with signalized intersection, a divided highway would greatly reduce head on collisions in these cases.
 
As a resident in the area, I wish they wouldn't, but it isn't surprising given local politics (and politicians) and the unwillingness of a lot of people to oppose highway development. The Region of Waterloo is putting in work to finally improve transit, walking and cycling on Victoria Street (which turns into the current 7), Breslau station on the Kitchener line might still happen... There's a lot that is happening or could be happening to properly connect Kitchener and Guelph, densify development, and keep it west of the Grand River. This will just create another sprawl corridor.
Waterloo region has a plan to combat sprawl, so that's not happening any time soon. Guelph will sprawl regardless of whether this freeway is built or not.
It's a connection. There is pretty much no redundancy along this corridor, and competitive GO improvements aren't coming any time soon. Also, not everyone lives in Downtown Kitchener. If we're going to be building any highway expansions, this is the one to do. I don't even care if it's tolled, the alternative is far worse.
Do all the other non highway roads not provide network redundancy already?
Pretty much all the roads are clogged along this corridor unless a 35-minute detour via the 401 is ideal.
 
They could have just upgraded the existing Highway 7 twenty years ago.

I like the treatment that Hwy 11 got between the 400 and Orillia with barriers to prevent left turns coupled with the turn back overpasses, and think that could have worked here.

With the connection this has to the upgraded 6 though it provides a nice bypass to the 401 through Cambridge for a good portion of KW, although now that that section has been upgraded to 12 lanes this bypass is less necessary that it was.
 
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