Mid-Peninsula Highway/Niagara-GTA Corridor

[unimaginative2]

Niagara-Toronto highway expected to create jobs

The Canadian Press

September 26, 2007

American consultants say a new highway from Fort Erie through Hamilton to Toronto would create tens of thousands of jobs and generate billions in added income.

If it's built, they say, Hamilton and Niagara would see their projected average annual growth rate of 1.03 per cent almost triple to 2.73 per cent.

That would bringing 130,000 to 170,000 jobs and $7-billion to $9-billion in new income.

On the other hand, they say, doing nothing to ease road and rail congestion could mean loss of existing business, costing the area more than $2.4-billion and 30,000 jobs over the next quarter-century.

 

[Hipster Duck]

In Europe, freeways crisscross the landscape every which way, but the tight land-use policies, high price of gas, convenient public transit systems and restraining the number of entrances and exits a freeway can have has not turned western Europe into one giant sprawl.

Sometimes it's almost surreal how two major autobahns can meet in a giant cloverleaf in the middle of a cornfield - in NA they would surely be at ground zero for a big box mall invasion.

Greater Toronto is particularly bad at planning freeways, seeking to widen them until they are monstrous and adding entrances and exits every two kilometers to ensure that sprawl and congestion are a certainty for future generations to enjoy. It's as if we forgot that a long-distance freeway is supposed to be a transportation link between two cities, and not an agent for runaway development in between.

 

[Kiwi]

New highway could bring 170,000 jobs: study

September 26, 2007
Eric McGuinness
The Hamilton Spectator

American consultants say a new highway from Fort Erie through Hamilton to Toronto would create tens of thousands of jobs and generate billions in added income.

If it's built, they say, Hamilton and Niagara would see their projected average annual growth rate of 1.03 per cent almost triple to 2.73 per cent, bringing 130,000 to 170,000 jobs and $7 billion to $9 billion in new income.

On the other hand, they say, doing nothing to ease road and rail congestion could mean the loss of existing business, costing the area more than $2.4 billion and 30,000 jobs over the next quarter-century.

Those forecasts will be presented to Hamilton city council this morning by Wilbur Smith Associates of South Carolina, hired by Niagara Economic Development Corp., Niagara Region and the City of Hamilton to study the economic impact of the province's proposed Niagara-to-GTA Corridor, once known as the Mid-Peninsula Highway.

The agenda also includes a request from Citizens Opposed to Paving the Escarpment (COPE) to speak about damage to the Niagara Escarpment, loss of farmland and other harm the group says would come from pushing a new expressway across Ancaster, Flamborough and Burlington.

The meeting is scheduled to start at 10 a.m. in the Albion Room of the Hamilton Convention Centre because City Hall is now closed for renovations.

The 72-page report, which can be found under minutes and agendas for committee of the whole at www.hamilton.ca, projects an average annual benefit of 7,700 jobs, $400 million in income and $195 million in tax revenue.

An environmental assessment on the highway is expected to last until August 2009. More information can be found at www.niagara-gta.com.

 

[Kiwi]

Here's a link to the report if anyone is interested......

Niagara to GTA Corridor Opening New Economic Opportunities
http://www.myhamilton.ca/NR/rdonlyres/A97B2C49-D095-4737-BE1A-69C3416DDE90/0/Sep26Item61.pdf

 

[doady]

Regular GO Train service to Niagara Falls would be better... cheaper, more efficient, no paving over greenspace, usable by people without a car, etc.

 

[RedRocket191]

Regular GO Train service to Niagara Falls would be better... cheaper, more efficient, no paving over greenspace, usable by people without a car, etc.

I agree. Not only is it useable by people without a car, it encourages those with a car to leave them at home.

Although, I would prefer to see VIA Rail service subsidized by the GTTA to bring fares down. I rode the Maple Leaf to St. Catharines last year, and I don't think I would have made it in a GO train seat.

 

[Jayomatic]

I would love to see a special GO express train which runs from St Catherines, to Hamilton, to Toronto.

 

[junctionist]

An electrified high speed rail line would be great, as long as the fares were reasonable. I doubt the rail line would spur the same amount of growth as the highway because the growth will be sprawl.

 

[cacruden]

Although I am very interested in rail services, it would not (by itself) be a replacement for this project. The fact is that the Windsor Area corridors are overloaded, and eventually they will open up another border route there. It only makes sence to open as many trade transit corridors to our largest trading partner - so that the current ones do not become a hinderance to our economic growth.

 

[cacruden]

An electrified high speed rail line would be great, as long as the fares were reasonable. I doubt the rail line would spur the same amount of growth as the highway because the growth will be sprawl.

One of the first things they have to do is get control of rail corridors (passenger rail) in the this region. Reliability and future expansion of the system will need a rail system where freight trains will not hinder the express trains.

 

[Mike in TO]

I haven't read the report - but my impression is that the mid-pen is geared towards trucking traffic and the movement of goods with the U.S. and less so towards auto traffic and suburban growth.

I would love to see expanded GO service to Niagara - but that doesn't do a whole lot to help with the efficient movement of goods.

I would anticipate that the province will look at both GO and the mid-pen as future projects to be built over the next decade.

 

[CDL.TO]

I haven't read the report - but my impression is that the mid-pen is geared towards trucking traffic and the movement of goods with the U.S. and less so towards auto traffic and suburban growth.

I've always heard that the Mid-Pen is intended to be a toll highway. That won't be any help to trucking traffic.

The QEW between Hamilton and Niagara really isn't that busy. Certainly far from capacity. I still don't see any need for the highway.

 

[unimaginative2]

I believe that a benefit of it was supposed to be the diversion of growth away from the tender fruitlands below the escarpment and on to the less desirable farmland above. For example, to places like Welland.

 

[CDL.TO]

I've heard that argument as well. It's pretty silly. You're not going to reduce development desirability for a location by changing it from having easy access to ONE expressway to having easy access to TWO expressways. If they want to stop development on the locationally advantageous tender fruit lands, the ONLY way it could happen is by zoning. Isn't it protected as part of the Greenbelt anyway?

 

[Dan416]

"Zoning" seems to be complete joke in this part of the world. Endless sprawl is the reality.