Highway 7 - Kitchener to Guelph

[danbrotherston]

I sometimes feel like the existing highway 7 being described on this forum is the highway from 20 years ago and not the highway that exists now and definitely not the highway that will exist in 20 years. 

It is the site of a lot of development.  And much more to come - all of it coming with traffic.  I drove down it middle of the afternoon one day and there was traffic backed up from shantz station west all the way to where the two lanes merge down to one (and I’ll note the KW-Hamilton GO bus was sitting in this line of traffic).  It’s a death trap at certain times of days if you’re trying to turn left at a place that doesn’t have lights.

It’s basically the only road connecting the 3 major subdivisions of Breslau.  So, sure, we could turn it into a semi-divided highway with 4 lanes and turns only allowed at designated spots to maintain reasonable traffic flow to Guelph and make the whole thing safer.  But that has a lot of other social costs too. 

Breslau, particularly the newest subdivision where the GO station is proposed, seems like it could have potential to actually be higher density than a standard subdivision.  And it might be nice to eventually bring that density all along Victoria from King to that GO station with things like transit and pedestrian/bike friend infrastructure.  And trails. Etc.  But I don’t see how any of that is possible when we’re trying to have that road also be the main route between two places with a combined population of half a million people.

I’m not totally sold the highway is the best option. It IS expensive.  It only helps transit tangentially and inefficiently.  It may not actually help make Breslau denser and more sustainable.  And so on.  But I definitely don’t see how the status quo or only minor tweaks to the road are going to be a good option either.

Leaving aside the highway, I'm curious what development and density you see coming? As far as I know the Ontario plans for Breslau station a platform surrounded by miles and miles of parking...which won't generate any density (and will only generate a small increase in traffic volumes because cars take up so much space to store, that such a parking lot will only generate 2-3 thousand new vehicle trips over the entire day).

And the suburb is exactly that...a suburban area designed for people who want to not live in the city. Density is exactly what it advertises avoiding, despite it's firmly suburban character. Although I'll admit it had been a few years since I looked at a home there.

FWIW...I developed another one of my "ideas" for bringing bike and walking infra out to the area: https://www.google.com/maps/d/edit?mid=1...Ij6Jl7etJS&usp=sharing

And that would be made more difficult if the highway was improved, but I think the cost in induced traffic of building a whole other highway is probably worse, and for much less than the cost of the highway, we could also build real bike infra to the area.