Roads: Highway 401 Widening - Highway 8 to Highway 410 (MTO, U/C, Planned)

[Marko]

Spoken like someone who has dealt with that traffic...but I completely agree.

I used to live near Mavis and Bristol - sucked the life out of me. My office is close to the airport, NE of Dixie and 401 so I am intimately familiar with the traffic around here, living in the Applewood area now. Still not the greatest area, but 8km to/from work is convenient. I read somewhere that Dixie between the 401 and Derry is the heaviest street of truck traffic in North America. Definitely not at area to show off to visitors, but it's a great location for business and as a base to frequently ship and travel from.

I think that not only does the Dixie/401 interchange need upgrading, but another N/S road needs to either cross over or go under the 401, east of Dixie and slicing through part of the airport lands to connect to Bramalea at the north end (by Fedex). At 5pm, Dixie northbound can take 45 minutes between the 401 and Derry, primarily because the airport cuts off several N/S avenues and forces traffic onto either side. 2 lanes each way, partly on surface and partly dug under runways would do wonders for traffic in the area. 410 and 427 are pretty brutal too, but Dixie is more specifically local traffic from the immediate industrial/employment area, which has almost the ame land mass as the City of Toronto.

What about all those heading east on Britannia, turning right (you mean left?) on Hurontario, and then onto the ramp to the 401 eastbound. Do they get a new entrance direct from Britannia? Or is it going to get even worse for them, as the fairly quiet intersection at Whittle would now have a significant north-south phase.

I think the idea is that with fewer vehicles making lefts from Hurontario and into Britannia, they'll be able to shorten that advance green a little and probably allocate that same amount of time to eastbound vehicles on Britannia turning north on Hurontario. It's a double lane advance signal as it is and still gets backed up. I agree that it would be really nice if there was some alternate way onto 401E from that area, but with the 410 ramps so close, I don't know where you do it. Even if you make an eastbound on-ramp from McLaughlin, t would interfere with the existing offramps for 10 and 410N, as well the 410S they seem to be adding. Merging along there is already tricky and would only get better if the 410N ramp exited from the Express lanes on the 401, leaving Collectors to receive more entries from this part of Mississauga.

 

[Ravager]

Britannia really should be continued under the 403 and joined to the other side.

 

[Dan416]

I used to live near Mavis and Bristol - sucked the life out of me. My office is close to the airport, NE of Dixie and 401 so I am intimately familiar with the traffic around here, living in the Applewood area now. Still not the greatest area, but 8km to/from work is convenient. I read somewhere that Dixie between the 401 and Derry is the heaviest street of truck traffic in North America. Definitely not at area to show off to visitors, but it's a great location for business and as a base to frequently ship and travel from.

I think that not only does the Dixie/401 interchange need upgrading, but another N/S road needs to either cross over or go under the 401, east of Dixie and slicing through part of the airport lands to connect to Bramalea at the north end (by Fedex). At 5pm, Dixie northbound can take 45 minutes between the 401 and Derry, primarily because the airport cuts off several N/S avenues and forces traffic onto either side. 2 lanes each way, partly on surface and partly dug under runways would do wonders for traffic in the area. 410 and 427 are pretty brutal too, but Dixie is more specifically local traffic from the immediate industrial/employment area, which has almost the ame land mass as the City of Toronto.

I believe the city is already planning a second arterial across the 401 east of Dixie, linking up Eastgate Pkwy from the south with Netherhart Rd to the north, with certain specific ramps (I can't remember which ramps in particular they think they can fit, I think it was just off-ramps from the 401 exiting onto Eastgate/Netherhart--though I could be wrong).

 

[ShonTron]

I noticed that they have installed the overhead signage gantries (and signs, although covered) on the future WB collector, east of Hurontario. I guess they will move traffic onto that within the next few months.

I wonder if these new signs will be FHWA "Highway Gothic", or Clearview. MTO seems to be a very slow adapter of Clearview. There's a number of new Clearview signs on the QEW in Hamilton and Niagara, and the big roadside advance sign for the collector/express split on the 401 EB after the 427 is also Clearview. Yet other new MTO signage is FHWA. A minor thing, but something that has piqued my interest.

Michigan went Clearview at least a decade ago, it is all over the place there. It is also surprising how much signage on MTQ's autoroutes are Clearview as well.

 

[Marko]

Britannia really should be continued under the 403 and joined to the other side.

I've long thought so as well, but I don't think it's possible at this point considering the current roads, highways and multiple levels of overpasses in place. If they had done it from the beggining maybe, but at this point that tunneling would probably cost as much as this whole 401/Hurontario interchange upgrade will.

I believe the city is already planning a second arterial across the 401 east of Dixie, linking up Eastgate Pkwy from the south with Netherhart Rd to the north, with certain specific ramps (I can't remember which ramps in particular they think they can fit, I think it was just off-ramps from the 401 exiting onto Eastgate/Netherhart--though I could be wrong).

Yeah. I've heard for years that they want to connect Creekbank to Netherhart, which will ease the load on the Dixie bridge over the 401 a little, but then feed the same number of cars back onto Dixie at Courtneypark, Meyerside or Britannia, back onto the worst stretch of all between there and Derry.

What is needed is a real arterial road, which Netherhart is not and cannot be made to be. If they connect Eastgate right thru and across the 401, connecting it to anything other than Bramalea will be a mistake IMO.

I'm not sure if you're familiar, but there are roads along the ravine west of the airport. I understand they want to protect the ravine as much as possible, but being wedged between the busiest airport and busiest industrial park in the country, I think a 4 lane road could be placed in such a way to cause little or no impact at all environmentally. Creekbank needs to connect to that N/S stretch at the end of Courtneypark and then connect under/through the airport property to Bramalea.

 

[nfitz]

I think the idea is that with fewer vehicles making lefts from Hurontario and into Britannia

Actually I meant those heading west on Britannia and turning right. Might be a problem with those heading east and turning left ... but I seldom do except way-offpeak, so I couldn't comment on it.

Those heading east on Britannia will have to cross all traffic coming off the 401 at Whittle.

 

[Marko]

Actually I meant those heading west on Britannia and turning right. Might be a problem with those heading east and turning left ... but I seldom do except way-offpeak, so I couldn't comment on it.

Those heading east on Britannia will have to cross all traffic coming off the 401 at Whittle.

Ahh. Your east/west left/right got mixed up - easy to do. I understand what you mean and agree that a different way onto the 401 would have been nice - kind of like what they did at Hespeler Rd in Cambridge - but the distance between the Hurontario on ramps and the 410 off ramps is so short that I don't think there was a way to work that into the design. I guess if they decided to try to connect Britannia that a ramp could feed onto the collectors beyond the 410 ramps, but the problem again is that you're right where the Dixie exit is.

I've never really liked the Dixie exit. As it stands, as soon as you are under the 410 exit ramp you have to make a fairly hard right exit considering that traffic is flowing at 100+ km/h. If the new collector lanes are added to the right of the exiting lanes, this bend in the highway will be even sharper as it has to connect with the collector lanes that currently begin at that point. The existing bridges and support columns don't allow for any realignment.

I think an improvement would have been to make the Hurontario on-ramps connect to the collector after the 410 ramp and feed into where the Dixie exit currenty branches off. It would probably have to pass under the new 401E to 410S ramp, but there's room to make that happen. This is long overdue and alone will remove a decent amount of traffic from the Hurontario and Dixie exits - myself included. I would then move exit for Dixie to beyond where the 410N to 401E ramps merge, and since the current Dixie exit is 2 lanes and about 2km long it would accommodate this without much trouble. It would also allow for a 401E on ramp to from Whittle to feed into the HurontarioN to 401E on ramp, as you suggest. It would relieve a fair number of vehicles from having to go thru the Hurontario/Britannia intersection at all, and might pull more vehicles from the area that currently go over to Dixie instead.

 

[salmonz]

Oct 18 update

Starting at 10:00 p.m. Saturday October 22, 2011 the ramps at Hurontario Street to and from Highway 401 will be closed successively (except Hurontario Street North Bound to Highway 401 East Bound and Highway 401 West Bound to Hurontario Street North Bound which will remain open for detour purposes) as well as the two right lanes in each direction of Highway 401 from Mavis Road to Hurontario Street.

The ramp from Highway 410 South Bound to Highway 401 West Bound will close at 11:00 p.m. on Saturday October 22, 2011.

The FULL CLOSURE of Highway 401 East Bound and West Bound between Hurontario Street and Mavis Road commences at 11:30 p.m. Saturday October 22, 2011 and ends at 7:00 a.m. Sunday October 23, 2011.

Lanes and ramps will be reopened successively between 7:00 a.m. and 10:00 a.m. on Sunday October 23, 2011.

All lanes and ramps will reopen on Sunday October 23, 2011 by 10:00 a.m.

Highway 401 eastbound traffic will be detoured on to Mavis Road south to Britannia Road, east to Hurontario Street and north to Highway 401 eastbound.

Highway 401 westbound traffic will be detoured on to Hurontario Street north to Courtney Park Drive west to Mavis Road and south to Highway 401 westbound.

Highway 410 southbound to 401 westbound traffic will be detoured off of Highway 410 to Derry Road, west to Mavis Road and south to Highway 401 west.

ref: http://www.mto.gov.on.ca/english/traveller/trip/construction_reports-central.shtml#Contract2009-2031

 

[vistaway]

To raise the over-the-401 sections of steel into place for the second bridge span, I assume?

 

[Dan416]

To raise the over-the-401 sections of steel into place for the second bridge span, I assume?

It looks like most of those are up already though? Do they really need to close the highway to finish? I was really hoping they'd finally open the collectors and close off the express lanes at this point.

 

[vistaway]

The spans over the highway itself are still missing (the ones that are up cantilever over a part of the road, but the last section doesn't appear to have any supports.

 

[Dan416]

Oh okay. Well hopefully they finish this bridge soon.

 

[airplane-dude]

Pardon my ignorance, but what is the second bridge for?? Where the old Hurontario overpass was, they seem to be adding a second overpass?

 

[drum118]

Pardon my ignorance, but what is the second bridge for?? Where the old Hurontario overpass was, they seem to be adding a second overpass?

The bridge will be 10 lanes wide with turning lanes onto the 401, 6 though lanes and 2 centre lanes for the LRT.

The 2nd bridge is the northbound lanes.

 

[drum118]

Nov 06
Took a look at the interchange and surprise how far off centre the new bridge is as well the original footing of the northbound bridge are still in place, other than the south one.

The new southbound ramp is open to the westbound lanes.

The new northbound lane to the eastbound lane has hydro poles in the way of all things.

The bath tub steel framing for the northbound lanes are all in place and waiting form work for the deck.