Ontario Highway 14

King's Highway 14, commonly referred to as Highway 14, was a provincially maintained highway in the Canadian province of Ontario. At its peak length, the route connected Highway 33 in Bloomfield with Highway 7 in Marmora. The route was decommissioned entirely on April 1, 1997.

History

Highway 14 was one of the original 17 provincial highways formed in the early 1920s. The predecessor of the Ministry of Transportation, the Department of Public Highways in Ontario (DPHO) had assumed control of two roads in Eastern Ontario, the Picton-Belleville road, and the Foxboro-Belleville Road. Its routing led from the town of Foxboro, to the town of Picton. At first, the road was not given a route number, and was simply referred to as the Foxboro-Picton Highway. In 1925, the Provincial Government and Department of Highways had decided to number the provincially-controlled highways, and the road was given the designation of Highway 14. Most of the road had been paved by 1925, and the last gravel sections (south of Belleville, and north of Bloomfield) were paved in 1927. This road was the second provincial highway to be fully paved, with Highway 5 being the first. At this point, the road had become 47.6 km (29.6 mi) in length.

In 1928, the Department of Highways gained control of more roads that led from Foxboro to Marmora, and applied the Highway 14 designation on them, too. This brought Highway 14's length to 83 km (52 mi). By 1941, the remainder of the road had been paved, anda bypass was built around Foxboro in 1964. By 1982, the Norris Whitney Bridge was opened, replacing the old Belleville Bay Bridge, and the road was terminated at Foxboro. Its southern extensions would be assumed by fellow north-south road, Highway 62 in 1983. At this point, the road's length was at 36.1 km (22.4 mi).

After the road was truncated at Foxboro, its purpose became to link the generally parallel roads of Highway 2 and Highway 7 together, to improve access between Kingston and Peterborough, similar to Highway 15 is used to link Toronto with Ottawa.

The road was eliminated from the provincial network on April 1, 1995 amongst the downloading of Highway 33 and the portion of Highway 2 within Hastings County.^[2] The road became "Hastings County Road 14", but the County of Hastings then downloaded the county road (and the responsibilities of its maintenance) to its constituent towns and townships on January 1, 1998.^[3][4][5] Although the road has such varied names as "Stirling-Rawdon Road 14", and "Marmora & Lake Road 14", it has the same numerical designation throughout.

Major intersections

The following table lists the major junctions along Highway 14.^[1] The entire route was located in Hastings County.

References