Bradford Bypass (MTO, Hwy 400 - Hwy 404)

[innsertnamehere]

I'm still trying to decide which highway is more useless for solving the GTA traffic problems. This one or the 413.

Could have saved billions and just connected Queensville side road to Bradford.

Yea funnelling traffic through Downtown Bradford is a wonderful idea.

This highway absolutely solves a key connection problem in the area, which does not have a decent quality road link between the 404 and 400 north of Highway 7. Downtown Bradford specifically is the key issue and needs to be resolved. The Bypass redistributes traffic off local streets and really improves mobility in this area. could the highway have been designed to be cheaper? probably, but it's not an inherently baseless idea.

 

[narduch]

I know this will be a big help for cottage country traffic. Having an alternate route to move between 400 and 404 north of the city will be very helpful if there are accidents or other traffic tie ups on either the 400 or 404.

That's a poor use of valuable funding though.

 

[narduch]

Yea funnelling traffic through Downtown Bradford is a wonderful idea.

This highway absolutely solves a key connection problem in the area, which does not have a decent quality road link between the 404 and 400 north of Highway 7. Downtown Bradford specifically is the key issue and needs to be resolved. The Bypass redistributes traffic off local streets and really improves mobility in this area. could the highway have been designed to be cheaper? probably, but it's not an inherently baseless idea.

Ok. Then just build a road that connects Queensville Side Road with Line 9. That would be way more cost effective than this over designed highway.

It doesn't need to be a 400 series highway. A regional road like 88 or 89 is good enough for this area.

This highway absolutely solves a key connection problem in the area, which does not have a decent quality road link between the 404 and 400 north of Highway 7.

This is actually not true and makes me question if you are familiar with the area or have a pro highway agenda.

If you had said Green Lane or Davis that would be a truer statement.

 

[innsertnamehere]

Ok. Then just build a road that connects Queensville Side Road with Line 9. That would be way more cost effective than this over designed highway.

It doesn't need to be a 400 series highway. A regional road like 88 or 89 is good enough for this area.

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This is actually not true and makes me question if you are familiar with the area or have a pro highway agenda.

If you had said Green Lane or Davis that would be a truer statement.

I know the area - I grew up in Uxbridge and have family that live in Newmarket. I've driven on Green Lane and Davis probably a hundred times. Yes, the other option is Green Lane > Bathurst > Davis/Highway 9, but that is slow too, especially in rush hour. In fact, that you think that the Bypass won't pull a ton of traffic out of Downtown Bradford tells me you don't know the area. A lot of people in Bradford right now drive down 11 into Newmarket to shop or use Green Lane to get over to the 404 and will instead use the Bypass to get down there when this is done.

I don't think you are accounting for the expected growth in the area either. Queensville Side Road will be a suburban road in 20 years as Queensville gets built out and won't be any better than existing routes.

What infrastructure is really "needed"? I could say the same thing about the Ontario Line - "well, the 501 and 504 already serves the east end. Why do we need to drop tens of billions building this subway? People can just take the 501 or 504 if they want to avoid Bloor-Yonge. At most we should just give the 504 dedicated lanes."

Technically correct - but you know there are differences in infrastructure quality and what you are proposing is minimally less impactfully environmentally than the Bypass while delivering a far inferior product that will do little to improve actual transportation in the area. Part of what doing this as a freeway is it unlocks more than just local travel, it allows for a high speed transfer between the 404 and 400 that will reroute traffic off the 401 and 407 further south. A Queensville sideroad bypass with a new interchange on the 400 wouldn't do that and would honestly probably just result in the same travel times that the existing Davis/Green Lane connection has.

 

[narduch]

I know the area - I grew up in Uxbridge and have family that live in Newmarket. I've driven on Green Lane and Davis probably a hundred times. Yes, the other option is Green Lane > Bathurst > Davis/Highway 9, but that is slow too, especially in rush hour. In fact, that you think that the Bypass won't pull a ton of traffic out of Downtown Bradford tells me you don't know the area. A lot of people in Bradford right now drive down 11 into Newmarket to shop or use Green Lane to get over to the 404 and will instead use the Bypass to get down there when this is done.

I don't think you are accounting for the expected growth in the area either. Queensville Side Road will be a suburban road in 20 years as Queensville gets built out and won't be any better than existing routes.

What infrastructure is really "needed"? I could say the same thing about the Ontario Line - "well, the 501 and 504 already serves the east end. Why do we need to drop tens of billions building this subway? People can just take the 501 or 504 if they want to avoid Bloor-Yonge. At most we should just give the 504 dedicated lanes."

Technically correct - but you know there are differences in infrastructure quality and what you are proposing is minimally less impactfully environmentally than the Bypass while delivering a far inferior product that will do little to improve actual transportation in the area. Part of what doing this as a freeway is it unlocks more than just local travel, it allows for a high speed transfer between the 404 and 400 that will reroute traffic off the 401 and 407 further south. A Queensville sideroad bypass with a new interchange on the 400 wouldn't do that and would honestly probably just result in the same travel times that the existing Davis/Green Lane connection has.

I live in Vaughan and had a work project in Kawartha Lakes.

Taking the 407 to get there vs. going up the 400 and using Davis/Green Lane saves all of 4 minutes. This highway would have similar time savings.

That is not worth it for such a destructive highway.

And besides even if the development does happen, it does not need to be serviced by a 400 series highway. A regional road is more than sufficient.

 

[innsertnamehere]

I live in Vaughan and had a work project in Kawartha Lakes.

Taking the 407 to get there vs. going up the 400 and using Davis/Green Lane saves all of 4 minutes. This highway would have similar time savings.

That is not worth it for such a destructive highway.

And besides even if the development does happen, it does not need to be serviced by a 400 series highway. A regional road is more than sufficient.

29km at 115km/h (freeway speeds) would be ~15 minutes of travel time.

That's a lot faster than 27 minutes. in fact, it's almost cutting the travel time in half, and that is measuring the travel time in the middle of the day on a monday in the lowest traffic period of the year.

Your Queensville Sideroad proposal would also be fairly destructive, still requiring new bridges across the Holland Marsh, requiring demolition in historic villages to fit a proper 4-lane arterial, and reconstruction of 16km of existing rural roads.

 

[narduch]

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29km at 115km/h (freeway speeds) would be ~15 minutes of travel time.

That's a lot faster than 27 minutes. in fact, it's almost cutting the travel time in half, and that is measuring the travel time in the middle of the day on a monday in the lowest traffic period of the year.

Your Queensville Sideroad proposal would also be fairly destructive, still requiring new bridges across the Holland Marsh, requiring demolition in historic villages to fit a proper 4-lane arterial, and reconstruction of 16km of existing rural roads.

This math is disingenuous as you are including the portion on the 400 that is already fast.

Connecting existing roads will still be destructive but less destructive than the actual 400 series highway.

I would prefer no highway at all. And keep the land as farm land. That would be even less destructive.

The arguments in favour of this highway are still all bullshit.

 

[innsertnamehere]

This math is disingenuous as you are including the portion on the 400 that is already fast.

Connecting existing roads will still be destructive but less destructive than the actual 400 series highway.

I would prefer no highway at all. And keep the land as farm land. That would be even less destructive.

The arguments in favour of this highway are still all bullshit.

huh? No, I'm measuring from the point where the Bypass starts and end where the existing route rejoins the 404 - i.e. the portion of the travel route the highway will improve. Right now if you are coming from north of Bradford and want to go to the 404 south of Mulock, it takes 27 minutes to go from where the bypass starts to Mulock on the 404.

After the Bypass, it will take 15 minutes.

 

[2323]

Listen, it's pointless to argue this now. That ship sailed long ago. It's happening.

 

[Dreambig1]

To add to the whole conversation on the 400 series designation for the Bradford bypass, I personally think the MTO needs to fill in the missing 400 numbers that currently exist between 400 and at least 420. Like someone mentioned above, apply the 408 spot to the current Highway 8/ 7/8 highway from an extension of the freeway portion to Highway 7 in Stratford to the 401 interchange in Cambridge/Kitchener. The 411 would likely be applied to an upgraded Highway 11 running from Barrie to North Bay. The 413, well, we all know where that is going. The 414 designation, I think, is up for grabs as a serious designation for the Bradford bypass. The 415 designation I can see being applied to a future upgrade of Highway 115 between the 401 in Bowmanville and Highway 7 in Peterborough. Like 414 a 419 designation is also another one that could be floated for the Bradford bypass as well.

 

[narduch]

huh? No, I'm measuring from the point where the Bypass starts and end where the existing route rejoins the 404 - i.e. the portion of the travel route the highway will improve. Right now if you are coming from north of Bradford and want to go to the 404 south of Mulock, it takes 27 minutes to go from where the bypass starts to Mulock on the 404.

After the Bypass, it will take 15 minutes.

Ok. But most trips don't end in Newmarket.

Most drivers are trying to get downtown. So the actual time saving won't be the same because there are other routes more south that might be better.

So it's stupid to spend billions on a route like this.

 

[innsertnamehere]

Ok. But most trips don't end in Newmarket.

Most drivers are trying to get downtown. So the actual time saving won't be the same because there are other routes more south that might be better.

So it's stupid to spend billions on a route like this.

I mean I'm clearly not getting anywhere with you, but you could measure the trip from anywhere to anywhere, provided it needed to make the switch from the 404 to the 400, and the travel time savings would be the same...

And No, most drivers are not trying to get downtown. At all.

 

[north-of-anything]

I know the area - I grew up in Uxbridge and have family that live in Newmarket. I've driven on Green Lane and Davis probably a hundred times. Yes, the other option is Green Lane > Bathurst > Davis/Highway 9, but that is slow too, especially in rush hour. In fact, that you think that the Bypass won't pull a ton of traffic out of Downtown Bradford tells me you don't know the area. A lot of people in Bradford right now drive down 11 into Newmarket to shop or use Green Lane to get over to the 404 and will instead use the Bypass to get down there when this is done.

I don't think you are accounting for the expected growth in the area either. Queensville Side Road will be a suburban road in 20 years as Queensville gets built out and won't be any better than existing routes.

What infrastructure is really "needed"? I could say the same thing about the Ontario Line - "well, the 501 and 504 already serves the east end. Why do we need to drop tens of billions building this subway? People can just take the 501 or 504 if they want to avoid Bloor-Yonge. At most we should just give the 504 dedicated lanes."

Technically correct - but you know there are differences in infrastructure quality and what you are proposing is minimally less impactfully environmentally than the Bypass while delivering a far inferior product that will do little to improve actual transportation in the area. Part of what doing this as a freeway is it unlocks more than just local travel, it allows for a high speed transfer between the 404 and 400 that will reroute traffic off the 401 and 407 further south. A Queensville sideroad bypass with a new interchange on the 400 wouldn't do that and would honestly probably just result in the same travel times that the existing Davis/Green Lane connection has.

One thousand percent agreed. I was born and raised in Bradford, I'm intimately familiar with the area, and a new route that diverts traffic out of Bradford's core would both solve a major congestion issue and enable the town to more properly urbanize, densify, and become pedestrian- and transit-friendly. When something is not available in Bradford, the next place people go is down Highway 11 to Green Lane or northern Newmarket, and the default route to the 404 is via Highway 11/Green Lane. When Highway 11 is congested or at a lower capacity (like it was all this summer for road works, thanks York Region!) everyone scrambles onto the 400.

Not to mention that to get downtown, an increasing number of Bradford residents headed to downtown Toronto are choosing to drive to the East Gwillimbury GO station, which requires - you guessed it - fighting through the congestion along Highway 11 and Green Lane.

I personally don't believe a full freeway is the only option we could have gone with, but I will begrudgingly take the freeway overbuilding if the other option is kicking the can down the road forever.

 

[nfitz]

It used to be a standard that provincial highways began and ended at other provincial highways, and all of former Hwy 27 has been downloaded.

That's true - but it's not like the old highway has just vanished. When the provincial road numbering ends, there's still a road.

We even have Ontario freeways that turn into a municipal freeway. We see this with Highway 404 and the QEW in Toronto. Highway 85 in Waterloo.

Whether highway 27 west of Highway 400 is a municipal road or provincial road isn't the primary issue, as it doesn't impact traffic flow.

Mind you, highway tunnels apparently aren't as absurd as they used to be.

You frequently see highway tunnels in various countries under environmental features especially hills - and have for a half-century. It's not a new concept.

 

[lenaitch]

I know this will be a big help for cottage country traffic. Having an alternate route to move between 400 and 404 north of the city will be very helpful if there are accidents or other traffic tie ups on either the 400 or 404.

I'm not so sure. Unless people check that there is an existing situation before leaving home (assuming central Toronto) before committing to go 400 or 404, it seems most regular weekend travellers have their route and seldom deviate from it. I used to run from Barrie to Pearson and on weekends would go nowhere near Hwy 400 but instead use a route of Sideroad 15 (CR 53) through the marsh to Weston Rd. Never stopped (well, except for stop signs). In a few places you could see Hwy 400 and it would invariably be stopped.

If it is to be a bypass, be a bypass. If it were just an upgrade or linking of existing municipal roads, there would still be the issue of private driveways, cyclists (don't know if they will be prohibited from the bypass), etc. Besides, if that's all they were wanting to do, the Region could have done it years ago.

To add to the whole conversation on the 400 series designation for the Bradford bypass, I personally think the MTO needs to fill in the missing 400 numbers that currently exist between 400 and at least 420. Like someone mentioned above, apply the 408 spot to the current Highway 8/ 7/8 highway from an extension of the freeway portion to Highway 7 in Stratford to the 401 interchange in Cambridge/Kitchener. The 411 would likely be applied to an upgraded Highway 11 running from Barrie to North Bay. The 413, well, we all know where that is going. The 414 designation, I think, is up for grabs as a serious designation for the Bradford bypass. The 415 designation I can see being applied to a future upgrade of Highway 115 between the 401 in Bowmanville and Highway 7 in Peterborough. Like 414 a 419 designation is also another one that could be floated for the Bradford bypass as well.

I'm not convinced the MTO sees filling in the numbers as a pressing problem.