York Region council wants GTA West corridor environmental assessment

Yorkregion.com
April 3, 2016
By Lisa Queen

York Regional council is requesting the Ministry of Transportation resume the GTA West Transportation Corridor Environmental Assessment.

The corridor is a critical east-west link connecting highways 400 and 401.

It would reduce existing congestion on the regional road network and ensure lands designated for businesses are well connected to the provincial highway system, York Region officials said.

During the first stage of the environmental assessment study, a transportation network strategy was created.

It identified a need for a new four to six-lane freeway that would extend from Hwy. 400, between Kirby Road and King-Vaughan Road in the east, to the Hwy. 401/407 ETR interchange between Winston Churchill Boulevard and Trafalgar Road in the west.

The second stage of the study started in 2014, with a short list of options and interchange locations released in mid-2015.

But in December, Transportation Minister Steven Del Duca, MPP for Vaughan, announced the environmental assessment was being suspended pending a review, the region stated.

Continued delay of the GTA West Corridor Environmental Assessment impacts land use planning for employment and development in the Regional Municipalities of York, Peel and Halton, the region added.