Opinion: Canada's national highway in BC is an embarrassment

Opinion: Canada's national highway in the BC interior is an embarrassment

The narrow, undivided, two-lane state of Canada's national highway through the interior of British Columbia. (Google Maps)

Imagine two undivided lanes meandering through steep mountain terrain with sharp curves and limited wildlife protection.

This is the current state of Canada’s primary national highway through much of the interior of British Columbia.

It is somehow the main link between millions of British Columbians and the remainder of the country.

The key road corridor for cross-country trade and relations is a severely outdated goat path riddled with vehicular accidents, wildlife collisions, traffic lights, and road closures.

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When living in British Columbia, a common staple to any summer trip is spending hours in the middle of the wilderness… sitting in one’s car waiting for Highway 1 to reopen after yet another truck rollover or fatal head-on collision.

In fact, the Trans-Canada Highway is so under-built that many prefer to dip south and use the American interstate system for cross-country travel instead. It is a safer, often faster and more reliable alternative.

At its minimum, the United States has five divided, free-flowing, grade-separated, high-capacity routes crossing the nation. While legitimate criticism is given to its urban interactions, the trans-regional aspects of the interstate system are a major benefit to our southern neighbour.

Map of the US interstate highway system. (GIS Geography)

Beyond the United States, nearly all other developed nations and many developing nations — such as Japan, Germany, China, Spain, France, United Kingdom, and Sweden — are internally linked with similar high-capacity, free-flowing highway systems.

Now, Canada is a large country with a relatively small population, so do we also require five or more transcontinental high-capacity road corridors?

No.

But, is it reasonable and beneficial for us as a unified country to have one national route meeting modern highway standards, especially given our relatively linear population distribution?

Yes, and the fact that we don’t is rather embarrassing for an economy of our size.

The completion of the Coquihalla Highway in the 1980s is direct evidence of the benefits of upgrading our primary highways to more modern design standards.

Prior to its opening, many travellers relied on Highway 1 between Hope and Kamloops for access between coastal BC and the rest of the province and indeed the nation. A slow winding two-lane journey through the heart of both the Fraser and Thompson canyons, now bypassed by a modern four-lane divided freeway.

While it is not perfect and suffers from severe winter weather conditions, this greatly opened up social and economic activities between coastal BC and the interior of the province.

To think of BC not having the Coquihalla is now unfathomable by most. A small taste of an interstate system.

Typical trans-regional highway in Japan. (Ian Ius/Daily Hive)

Coquihalla Highway: A modern four-lane (twinned) trans-regional calibre highway. (Ian Ius/Daily Hive)

Unfortunately, it appears that an equally ambitious project east of Kamloops to the Albertan border is unlikely to ever materialize in our current socioeconomic climate.

That said, spearheaded by the province of BC, there is a current Highway One twinning project slowly underway.

In the early 2000s, save for a few short urban portions and a short rural stretch near Malakwa, the entirety of Highway 1 from the Highway 97 junction, 25 km east of downtown Kamloops to the Albertan border, was an undivided two-lane road.

Out of a total of 399 km, 296 km are within the provincial government’s jurisdiction for operations and maintenance. The remaining 103 km are located in three national parks and therefore, are a direct federal responsibility.

Over the last 24 years, through numerous projects of various scales, the largest of which being the recently completed Kicking Horse Canyon upgrade, the province has completed about 72 km of highway twinning.

A further 25 km is in various stages of construction or procurement, including the 4 km-long Ford Road to Tappen Road — the project and the RW Bruhn Bridge replacement. Together, this equals 97 km or roughly 33% of the highway under BC’s jurisdiction.

These projects have already greatly increased safety and have cut down on travel times, but it only averages 4 km of completed highway twinning a year.

A construction rate of at least 10 to 15 completed km a year would be much more adequate for the situation at hand. Despite this lacklustre pace, at the very least it is encouraging to see continual progress occurring.

Current Highway 1 twinning programme under provincial jurisdiction. (Government of BC)

Recently completed Highway 1 twinning upgrades through the Kicking Horse Canyon. (Government of BC)

Conceptual rendering of proposed upgraded RW Bruhn Bridge project in Sicamous. (Government of BC)

However, the same cannot be said for the remaining 103 km under the thumb of the federal government, where only six km have been upgraded to the same modern twinned highway standards.

This was a single project in Yoho National Park, stretching six km west from the Albertan border into the park. It was completed six years ago in 2018.

This works out to a paltry average of 0.25 km per year over the same 24-year-long time frame or a grand total of 6% of the highway under the federal government’s responsibility.

Now, during this time, the federal government has supplied some funding for the previously mentioned provincial Highway 1 projects, usually equating to around 33% of the budgeted cost. However, this just highlights how folly it is that Canada has no true federal highway program akin to those found in many other developed nations.

While a conceptual plan for twinning the remaining 40 km through Yoho National Park has been public since 2016, a stretch of highway that has had little improvement since its initial construction in the 1950s, currently no funding has been allocated for the project.

Yoho Park Highway One phase one under construction, 2017. (Ian Ius/Daily Hive)

The current state of Highway 1 through Yoho National Park. (Ian Ius/Daily Hive)

To make matters worse, in February 2024, Steven Guilbeault, the federal minister of environment and climate change, announced that the ruling federal Liberal Party will no longer make major investments in highway expansion projects.

Of course, this announcement was made in Montreal, a city with a large and robust freeway system.

In fact, the entirety of Eastern Canada, from Halifax to Windsor, Ontario, is soon to have a completed freeway network akin to the interstate system in the United States.

So once again, it appears that Canada stops at the Canadian Shield, and since Eastern Canada has an adequate freeway system in place, the entire country can now stop highway improvements.

After some pushback from several provincial leaders, this comment by Guilbeault was only partially retracted.

If the federal government really wanted to prove its retraction to the residents of BC, and indeed all of Western Canada, then commencing with the Yoho Park Highway 1 twinning project would be the best way of demonstrating this. A project that not only includes improved safety for motorists, park guests, and active transport users, but also wildlife through planned grade-separated animal crossings.

Currently, a formal online petition in the House of Commons, demanding movement on this project from the federal government, is open for signatures until November 18, 2024.

The people of BC and indeed all of Canada deserve better; we deserve a safe highway built to modern international standards linking our nation together.

Even after the 40 km of Highway 1 through Yoho Park is upgraded, the federal government will still have a further 57 km to upgrade through the Glacier and Mount Revelstoke national parks.

The current underbuilt state of Highway One through Yoho Park (Google Earth 2024) and federal Minister of Environment and Climate Change Steven Guilbeault (Steven Guilbeault/Facebook).

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