09-05-2016, 08:59 PM
(09-05-2016, 08:46 PM)Canard Wrote: Isn't that just "Highway 8"? Or are you talking about the 50 km/h stoplight road with all the big-box stores? I can see how that's a bypass, but where is the "7" coming into play here?
From Wikipedia
At New Hamburg, the combined Highway 7/8 becomes a 4-lane controlled-access highway, becoming a freeway just west of Baden, and continues into Kitchener (where the 7/8 freeway is known as the Conestoga Parkway).
As the Conestoga Parkway runs through Kitchener as a 6-lane freeway, Highway 8 splits off from the Conestoga Parkway and Highway 7 by turning southeastward via an interchange, which was opened in 1970. Mainline traffic on Highway 8 heading northwest could continue under the Conestoga, where the route defaults to King Street, to enter downtown Kitchener. The 8-lane Conestoga Parkway east/north of this junction serves as a bypass of King Street through central Kitchener and Waterloo as in the north end of Waterloo, the Conestoga Parkway and King Street intersect again.
Highway 8 continues along as eight-lane freeway, which is also known as the Freeport Diversion or King Street Bypass, but is often referred to by area residents as the "Highway 8 Expressway", until another junction with King Street East after which it becomes six and then four lanes. Originally, the Highway 8 Expressway ended at an at-grade Y-junction with King Street East, with traffic from Highway 8 treated as the mainline traffic at that intersection. Highway 8 and King Street then continued as a 4-lane divided highway with access to adjacent commercial properties (60 km/hr speed limit) to Highway 401. In 1987, the Highway 8 Expressway was extended to provide a direct freeway link to Highway 401 eastbound with the non-public designation Highway 7187, and the Highway 8 designation continuing along King Street East; the Highway 8 designation was later transferred to the Freeport Diversion. The existing cloverleaf interchange between Highway 401 and King Street East had several ramps realigned to allow connections with the Freeport Diversion, and it continues to serve traffic from eastbound Highway 401