HALIFAX – A feasibility study will look at a total of 301 kilometres of Nova Scotia highways to see whether tolling will work for twinning the eight sections of the 100 series highways.
The study, granted to Atlantic Canada engineering and environmental design company CBCL Limited, is expected to be finished by the end of April.
The following sections of highway will be included in the study:
- Highway 101, Three Mile Plains to Falmouth – 9.5 km
- Highway 101, Hortonville to Coldbrook – 24.7 km
- Highway 103, Exit 5 at Tantallon to Exit 12 Bridgewater – 71 km
- Highway 104, Sutherlands River to Antigonish – 37.8 km
- Highway 104, Taylors Road to Aulds Cove – 38.4 km
- Highway 104, Port Hastings to Port Hawkesbury – 6.75 km
- Highway 104, St. Peter’s to Sydney – 80 km
- Highway 107, Porter’s Lake to Duke Street, Bedford – 33 km
Information that comes out of the study will be brought to the public through both in-person and online consultations, giving all Nova Scotians a chance to provide feedback before a final decision is made.
The government’s decision to look at tolling as a way to twin the 100 series highways came after the release of the 101, 103 and 104 highway safety studies in April.
Highway 103 has been called the second-deadliest highways in Canada, with 890 collisions occurring in a 274-kilometre stretch, with 22 resulting in deaths between the years of 2007-2012.
“It’s long overdue,” Halifax councillor Matt Whitman said in April. “It’s expensive, but it’s definitely long overdue. We’ve lost too many lives on this highway.”
After the studies came out in April, it was determined that twinning would be the best solution to the safety issues on the highways, but that tax dollars wouldn’t be enough to cover the cost of twinning, and that tolling would be the best way to make those major changes.
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