Ontario added 134 km of lanes to Highway 401. Its key bottleneck didnt get better [Video]

Over the past decade, successive provincial governments have announced major expansion projects for Ontario’s largest and most congested highway, promising that new lanes will alleviate worsening traffic.

Between 2016 and 2024, Ontario began and completed 134 km of new lanes along Highway 401, which stretches from the U.S. border in the west through the gridlocked Toronto area and out into Quebec.

The new expansions were built along the length of the highway and, as each was unveiled, the province trumpeted the traffic improvements it would bring.

“It is great to see investments to help relieve congestion completed, and we will continue to make investments to improve transportation,” Mike Harris, a PC MPP, said after one project was finished near Cambridge, Ont.

The government’s own data, however, shows that even as new lanes were added along the highway, a crippling bottleneck at its centre didn’t improve.

Internal modelling shows the trend will …