Green watchdog calls on province to relax highway expansion

NIAGARA FALLS, Ont. — Ontario green activists are applauding the provincial Environmental Commissioner’s recommendation to curb highway and infrastructure expansion in southern Ontario.

In his annual report, titled Reconciling Our Priorities, Gordon Miller called for measures to slow down urban sprawl in southern Ontario, the Toronto Star reports. He said that a growth strategy should “avert any further plans for new highways and-or highway expansion projects.”

But he added that expressways already proposed in the Greenbelt, including a much-hyped proposal to build a Niagara-GTA highway corridor, should go ahead.

“They are all too far down the pipe to be stopped,” Miller told a Queen’s Park news conference.

Extending Highway 427 beyond Highway 7; taking Highway 407 east to highways 135/115; the corridor from Niagara to the GTA; and the GTA West route, roughly from Guelph to the 400, are at various planning stages.

Premier Dalton McGuinty welcomed Miller’s report and said the province would look at it closely, reports the Star.


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