Ontario Highway 101

King's Highway 101, commonly referred to as Highway 101, is a provincially maintained highway in the Canadian province of Ontario. It connects Highway 17 west of Wawa with Highway 11 in Matheson before continuing east to the Ontario–Quebec border where it becomes Route 388. The highway forms one of the only connections between the two routes of the Trans-Canada Highway between Nipigon and Temagami, and crosses some of the most remote regions of Northern Ontario.

Route description

Highway 101 connects Highway 17 at Wawa with the Quebec border near Rouyn-Noranda. It passes through Chapleau, Foleyet, Timmins, South Porcupine, Porcupine and Matheson along its 473.3 km (294.1 mi) course. With the exception of an undivided urban four-lane section through Timmins, from Government Road in Mountjoy to Porcupine, the entire highway is two lanes wide.

Just east of The Shoals Provincial Park, the highway crosses the Laurentian Divide, the boundary between the Great Lakes and Arctic Ocean watersheds. North of this point, all streams and rivers flow north into Hudson Bay, while south of it all streams and rivers flow south to the Great Lakes. A sign and a small picnic area mark the transition.

Within Timmins, the highway also has the street names Riverside Drive in the Mountjoy area, Algonquin Boulevard downtown, Schumacher Drive in Schumacher, Herald Avenue in South Porcupine and King Street in Porcupine. A new alignment is currently proposed but not yet under construction to bypass the urban core of Timmins.

At the Ontario-Quebec border, the roadway continues eastward as Quebec Route 388 into the Abitibi-Témiscamingue region.

History

Highway 67 was the first provincial highway to provide access to Timmins from the Ferguson Highway (Highway 11). When it was designated in mid-1937,^[4] shortly after the merging of the Department of Northern Development into the Department of Highway (DHO), several other roads had been "built" in the area, but hardly improved beyond the clearing of trees. The DHO set forth to construct several new highways in the north.^[5][6] A concession road between Hoyle and Matheson already existed at this point, and over the next several years it was reconstructed to provincial standards. On June 26, 1940, the route was designated as a provincial highway. However, it was not numbered on official maps.^[1][7]

During World War II, plans arose to connect Timmins with the Quebec border, and the route via Matheson was chosen as the most direct path. By the end of the war, the road between Hoyle and Matheson had been numbered as Highway 101 and extended eastward to Abitibi, ending at Garrison Creek.^[8] The route remained this way for several years.

The Trans-Canada Highway Act was passed in 1950 and provided the impetus to construct Highway 17 around Lake Superior, which was carried out over the course of the decade.^[9] This resulted in the planning of a new road to connect Highway 11 with Highway 17; it was decided that Highway 101 would be extended west as the new connector highway. In order to accommodate this future extension, the section of Highway 67 between Timmins and Hoyle was renumbered as Highway 101 in mid-1955.^[10][11] On September 1, 1955, the route was extended west of Timmins to Warren Lake.^[1] West of Warren Lake, Highway 616 and Highway 624 continued to the CNR stop in Foleyet; these would soon become part of Highway 101.^[12] Highway 101 was opened to the Quebec border in December 1958 with the completion of the final 11.6 km (7.2 mi) gap. In addition, work began on December 18 to clear the route of the Foleyet to Chapleau Resource Road, which would eventually become part of Highway 101.^[1] By the end of the decade, the highway was 247.2 km (153.6 mi) long, connecting the border to Foleyet.^[13]

In 1963, several new sections of Highway 101 were opened. On May 16, the majority of the new Chapleau–Foleyet road was designated as Highway 101, with the exception of a 13.4 km (8.3 mi) bypass of Foleyet and the old route of Highway 624 that opened on December 19.^[14] In addition, a new 40.2 km (25.0 mi) road west of Chapleau was assumed in December, terminating at the Grazing River near the present entrance to The Shoals Provincial Park.^[2]

Work also progressed from the west, near Wawa. Prior to the opening of Highway 17 and Highway 101, a road connected the port at Michipicoten with Wawa. Highway 101 follows a portion of this route, but south of the Highway 17 junction the old road is now known as Pinewood Drive. In October 1965, a 31.5 km (19.6 mi) road was designated as Highway 101, travelling as far east as the Michipicoten River,^[2] The final section, a gap between the Michipicoten River bridge and the Grazing River, opened to traffic on January 1, 1967, completing the link between Wawa and Timmins.^[2]

Major intersections

The following table lists the major junctions along Highway 101, as noted by the Ministry of Transportation of Ontario.^[3]

Images

References