About 15 km of the Trans-Canada Highway will be expanded to four lanes in the Thunder Bay area, beginning next year.
Thunder Bay-Superior North MPP Michael Gravelle announced last month that two sections of Highway 11/17 east of Thunder Bay will be turned into four lanes, with one containing a multimillion-dollar overpass.
“There has been a lot of work over the years to move forward on the project of four laning between Thunder Bay and Nipigon,” said Gravelle, who is also the Minister of Northern Development and Mines.
Tenders have not been taken yet because the design work on an overpass around Hodder Avenue area isn’t complete.
The construction is on a key stretch of Trans-Canada Highway between Thunder Bay and Nipigon.
“There is no alternate root between Thunder Bay and Nipigon,” said Gravelle, whose riding includes covers the construction area. “If that highway shuts down, there is no way to get across Canada.”
No estimates have been released for the cost of the project.
“This is a significant, big highway infrastructure project and there will be substantial dollars attached to it,” said Gravelle.
Five of the 15 km of four-lane divided highway will stretch from Hodder Avenue to Highway 527. An interchange will be built at Hodder Avenue and Copenhagen Road and smaller intersections will be located at the Terry Fox Scenic Lookout and Highway 527.
The remaining 10-km stretch will be built farther east between Mackenzie Station Road to east of Birch Beach Road. Access to this section of the four-lane highway will be available at Mackenzie Station Road and Mackenzie Heights Road. It will include the construction of two bridges that will be built over the Mackenzie River.
“This is the beginning of a project that obviously still has another 80 km to do (to four-lane the Thunder Bay to Nipigon stretch), so I’m very positive about how it will move forward,” said Gravelle.
