Highway 416 North

Highway 417 to Century Road

The construction cost to build the new four-lane section of Highway 416 from Century Road to Highway 417 (the Queensway) was estimated at $196 million. This portion of Highway 416 came in $14 million dollars under the original budget of $ 210 million dollars.

• The province has completed the entire route from Highway 417 in Ottawa to Highway 401. The highway was officially opened on September 23, 1999, $14 million under budget and one year ahead of schedule.
  
  
• Highway 416 north involves approximately 21 km of freeway, five interchanges, 27 bridges and about 6.9 km of service roads.
  
  
• The 18 km section from Century Road to Hunt Club Road opened on July 16, 1996. It included interchanges at Bankfield, Fallowfield and Hunt Club Roads, as well as 10 bridges, at a cost of approximately $120 million. This section was delivered by three major freeway contracts starting in 1991.
  
  
• The remaining 3 km from Hunt Club Road to Highway 47 was opened July 31, 1997. It included two interchanges and 17 bridges at a cost of approximately $76 million.
  
  
• The Strandherd Drive / CNR structure located in this section is the longest structure on Highway 416 measuring 384 m or 1260 ft. in length. It carries Highway 416 over a local road and the CNR tracks as well as an area of very poor, soft sensitive clay known locally as "Leda" clay.
  
  
• A landscape master plan developed in co-operation with the National Capital Commission provided the guiding principles for the landscape development of the northern portion of this stretch of Highway 416.
  
  
• Most of the bridges are the "cast-in-place, post-tensioned concrete" type. What is unique about these bridges is that they are hollow inside (to reduce weight) and are self-supporting on 12 to 18 steel cables running through the deck (tensioned to 1 million pounds each).
  
  
• West Hunt Club Road interchange has a unique design. The ramps on the east side are not the normal cloverleaf design but what we call a "Hockey Stick" design. This is done to minimize property requirements and the impact on the Bruce Pit recreation area.
  
  
• Cedarview Road was relocated to the east side of Highway 416 to minimize the impact on the "Stony Swamp" a Class 1 wetland.
  
  
• The Log Farm Access Road Underpass provides access to the Log Farm (a working heritage farm depicting life at the turn of the century) in the Stony Swamp. The structure type was chosen to provide a "gateway to the Nation's Capital" and to ensure a significant landmark.
  
  
• The single span arch structure has no centre pier in the median. It has a 59 metre (194 ft.) clear span, the longest span on Highway 416 and the longest rigid frame bridge in Ontario. This bridge was selected for an Award of Excellence in 1996 by the Portland Cement Association (PCA) from amongst 56 entries, throughout the United States and Canada.
  
  
• Fallowfield Road interchange was re-aligned at the request of the City of Nepean to facilitate future development in the Southeast quadrant and provide a more direct connection to the new Strandherd Drive, just built by the City.
  
  
• Lightweight fill (90,000 tonnes of blast furnace slag) was shipped in from Hamilton to provide much of the bridge embankments. The fill weighs about ½ as much as normal earth and the "Leda" clay can support a depth of fill up to 4.5 m.
  
  
• Four CFRA radio towers (46 m or 150 ft high) were relocated to a piece of vacant land so that a curve was not required in Highway 416 alignment. The final alignment prevented the need to expropriate at least 10 homes along Second Line. Also, the Bankfield Road interchange is now much safer on a straight road than it would have been on a curve.