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Alberta fact of the day
Edmonton and Calgary are among the few metropolitan areas in the developed world that are not connected to comprehensive motorway systems.
Here is much more, on highways in Canada or rather the relative lack thereof. I am not convinced by his argument that a "bigger and better" highway system is what Canada needs, but I found this interesting reading nonetheless, mostly because it shows how few highways Canada has.
Posted by Tyler Cowen on November 16, 2009 at 04:40 PM in Data Source | Permalink
Comments
This is largely because the Canadian economy is largely focussed on trade with the US. It's worth keeping in mind that the 401 through Ontario is the busiest highway in North-America.
Posted by: Bryce at Nov 16, 2009 5:00:47 PM
I would also add to Bryce's comment: our country (Canada) has a fixation on railways with generous subsidies and support for moving things by rail. I dunno if that's a good or bad thing, but it does reduce the incentive to improve the cross-Canada highway system.
Posted by: Travers at Nov 16, 2009 5:17:56 PM
Interesting... Keep in mind that the highway that connects Edmonton/Calgary to points east and west is the Trans Canada Highway, and while that is only 2 lanes in many places, when you consider the population density and distances covered it is all the highway that is needed in those places most of the time. Distribution in the US and Europe is akin to casting a net - density in all directions. In Canada, the analogy would be akin to casting a single fishing line - a loooong line - over 5000 miles. The majority of the population is concentrated along the southern border and to put four-lane highways when there is almost no-one to pass would be a real waste of money. To compensate, there are passing lanes at regular intervals. Now, the question of how aged these highways are and what could be done in a refit/upgrade is worth discussing, but when people discuss the taxes paid by most Canadians, they don't seem to consider how we have first-world infrastructure with a small population spread out over vast spaces. The cost has to be borne somewhere. To compare our situation with the US or Europe is very much apples and oranges and this is totally lost in most discussions.
Posted by: Mark at Nov 16, 2009 5:19:32 PM
Canada needs more high speed rail!
Posted by: Ezra's sock puppet at Nov 16, 2009 5:28:52 PM
The United States is two-dimensional and needs an extensive grid of interstate highways. Canada is mostly one-dimensional: the overwhelming majority of Canadians live within a hundred miles of the US border. Edmonton is one of the rare large Canadian cities that is relatively far from that border.
Posted by: anonymous at Nov 16, 2009 5:30:30 PM
Calgary is on the Trans-Canada Highway and (relatively remote) Edmonton is connected to Calgary and the Trans-Canada by (mostly) six-lane motorways. The Trans-Canada doesn't count as a "motorway" to the to the authors because in places it is only two lanes, and there are some traffic stops. Those are mostly in places where it is very costly to widen the road, such as through parts of the Rockies, and where the highway passes through urban centers (I suspect it would be cost-effective to reroute it around Calgary, but the owners of the pawn shops, shady hotels, and porn stores which line the highway as it passes through Calgary apparently have a lot of political pull).
It is true that it's faster to drive to Toronto via the U.S., but that's largely because of geography---it's faster to dodge under the lakes than drive around top. If you ask Google Maps to plot the fastest route, it will have you drive East in Canada until you're basically above Chicago, and then down and around. If routing through the U.S. was important because of the modestly higher speed limits on U.S. freeways, it would be critical to drive south from Calgary through the border and then across the prairies.
The "study" is heavy on colour photos and fancy graphics, but light on any economic analysis, even of the back of the envelope variety, showing that the benefits of building new and improved highways exceed the costs.
Posted by: Chris Auld at Nov 16, 2009 5:36:18 PM
A small coincidence, I was just discussing and comparing the main highway systems in Australia and Canada over a cup of coffee in Brisbane. While Canada's Trans Canada operates East to West basically just north of the US border, the Australian equivalent circumnavigates their country. Of course, Rick Mercer has the best commentary on Canada's highway system when he received congratulations from Harvard faculty and students on "Canada's first paved highway".
Posted by: David Rotor at Nov 16, 2009 5:37:20 PM
The guy is proposing expenditures of $28 billion plus another $33.5 billion. Bearing in mind that Canada's population is a bit more than one tenth that of the United States, this is the equivalent of America spending $600 billion. Even in these, uh, "overstimulated" times that is a breathtaking sum to spend for unclear benefit.
Posted by: anonymous at Nov 16, 2009 5:48:14 PM
Most of those routes have been subject to pretty steady improvements over the past 20 years. Certainly driving from Winnipeg to Toronto is faster then it was 20 years ago. That said, there are a lot of places it would really be quite expensive to build a proper highway - and for a relatively small payoff. It's a long way, through very sparsely populated areas, and the major urban centers at both ends are much more easily connected to the US Interstate system. Winnipeg to Calgary is a much easier build out because of geography - but there the map in the article is misleading. A lot of that highway is already up to the standard he suggests.
Posted by: MichaelB at Nov 16, 2009 5:53:53 PM
Marginally related:
I once went to Iquitos, in Northeastern Peru, and it was described as the largest land-locked city in the world, with only plane & boat connections to the outside world. Pretty fascinating place.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iquitos
Posted by: Ben at Nov 16, 2009 6:39:36 PM
I think most people miss out on the key point that the lack of highways is for one reason only: It's a reeeeaaaaaally long way between major cities. To compare this to the autobahn is ridiculous. You can get from Frankfurt to Berlin in an afternoon, not because it's a fast highway, but because they're only 500km apart. As a bonus, you hit several major metropolitan areas on the way. We've got something like that too, Toronto to Montreal (between which there is a very good highway). But even on that stretch between two "neighbouring" cities, there are almost no other major population centres along the way. Toronto to it's nearest Western neighbour, Winnipeg, is just insane, it's something like 24 hrs of driving. A quick check of google maps shows that it only takes 16 hrs to drive through almost every major city in Germany.
The German public uses their highways, because it's reasonable to go from city to city by car. In Canada it's just plain impossible to do regularly, so most of the, albeit narrow, roads across the country are left to truckers and college road trips.
Posted by: K. at Nov 16, 2009 7:26:37 PM
I don't buy his argument, either - but it has nothing to do with anything he's talking about. It's because Wendell Cox is nuts.
Posted by: Sean at Nov 16, 2009 8:17:19 PM
Hmmmm. I drove between Edmonton and Calgary dozens of times when I lived in Edmonton. I also drove from Calgary to Vancouver (the Coquihalla is beautiful!). I wonder what I was on at the time if it wasn't a motorway. Or I would take the Yellowhead out to Jasper, and then drop down to Banff through Jasper and Banff National Parks and pick up the highway to Vancouver there. I did that too. Awesome views. I could not for the life of me tell you what I was driving on if it was not a motorway.
Posted by: GaryD at Nov 16, 2009 9:07:59 PM
GaryD, Highway 2 in Alberta is certainly not interstate-standard motorway, given that it still has lots of at-grade intersections outside of Edmonton, Red Deer and Calgary. Still basically good enough for the traffic load, though. Folks back in Alberta like to think there's lots of traffic, I used to, until I saw I-95 south of DC, or the Jersey Turnpike. Ugh.
Chris Auld: they are, slowly, building a northern by-pass loop for Highway 1 around Calgary, so no more trips across town along 16th St. NW.
Driving the Trans-Canada through the mountains can be a total hell if you end up getting stuck behind an RV doing 25 mph for an hour. It's one of those times whn I'm glad I don't have a gun.
Posted by: Bartman at Nov 16, 2009 10:41:17 PM
I think most people miss out on the key point that the lack of highways is for one reason only: It's a reeeeaaaaaally long way between major cities.
That would be true for Australia also -- most of the population is concentrated in five or six metro areas on different parts of the coast. How is the highway system in Australia compared to Canada?
Posted by: Ricardo at Nov 17, 2009 1:07:15 AM
I was going to say something along the lines of "I don't see the need to spend billions on highways where I live" (which is Northern B.C. and Alberta), but I think people here have got it all covered. Alberta highways that I've been on seem quite sufficient for speedy travel. Northern B.C. highways are sometimes a pain (b/c they are often only two lanes), but they're often through mountains (so it costs a ton), and relatively few people live up there anyway. Gotta look at basic cost-benefit analysis.
Posted by: Peter at Nov 17, 2009 1:12:33 AM
Alberta’s relative isolation in North America has directed its growth in many ways, though some of it is coincidence. Most of Alberta’s exports are more efficiently transported by pipeline (oil & natural gas) or train (beef, grain) rather than by truck. Road connections were therefore a less important factor in the success of its overall economic growth. Alberta is a young province, and consequently both Calgary and Edmonton are both young cities, having only recently hit population and wealth levels that would truly need a strong highway system. Flying always been the preferable way for travel. Calgary’s air passenger traffic is higher than Montreal’s, despite having 1/3 the population. If you combined Calgary & Edmonton’s air passenger traffic, it would be comparable to San Francisco’s, despite the combined cities having a population approximately half that of San Fran’s.
That said, Edmonton & Calgary are connected by a 4 lane divided highway with a ~70mph speed limit. Calgary will soon open the first section of its highway grade ring road. Edmonton's ring road is currently being upgraded to highway standards throughout. There is also an upgrade now underway of the Trans-Canada near the Alberta/ B.C border to 4-lane divided highway, which will be much appreciated for thus of us who have gotten stuck behind a truck or RV.
Posted by: Shaun M. at Nov 17, 2009 2:59:34 AM
As to Canada in general, there are several major impediments to it happening.
1: Roadways in Canada fall under the jurisdiction of the provinces. The provinces’ (particularly Quebec) longstanding opposition to federal government intervention in areas of provincial jurisdiction makes it difficult to build a political consensus on the need to build a national highway system, particularly when there is a separatist party in power in Quebec.
2: Money – The size of the tax pie is much smaller for Canada’s federal government vis-à-vis other countries' federal systems. Given Canada’s vast size and relatively small population, it is therefore not possible for the federal government to pay the full cost without major cuts elsewhere.
3: Quebec – In addition to its opposition to federal interference, its highway system is mess. Montreal has no bypass and no true highway in the actual city, at least not to the capacity/build quality that is needed. When the current system was built, Montreal had much lower per capita car ownership levels (owing to its relative lack of wealth). It’s main artery is now the extremely busy 6-lane A40 (Metropolitan), which has a maximum of 70kph (43mph) through the main part of the city. It’s also impossible to expand or upgrade, thanks to the idiot engineers that thought it would be a good idea to build an elevated highway immediately adjacent to high rises, apartments, and industrial complexes. The main North-South A15 (Decarie) isn’t much better. Yes, I’ve driven many times in Northern Virginia/Washington D.C. and Montreal traffic is worse.
4: As other have pointed out, Canada's population is largely distributed along the U.S border. >42% of Canada's population is located between Montreal and Windsor, Ontario, a roughly 9.5 hour drive. That’s comparable to taking the population of Los Angeles and stretching it to Tucson, Arizona. Given that information, as well as an export oriented economy that has always been more of a North-South axis rather than East-West, it shouldn’t be that surprising that interprovincial road links are relatively weak.
5: The Canadian prairies didn’t experience large scale settlement until well into the 20th century. It would have been economically impossible in the 1950’s-1970’s to justify building a 2,500 mile highway from Toronto to Vancouver, particularly when you have a railway system in place and air travel was far quicker and more convenient (and Canada's population was even more concentrated along that Montreal-Windsor corridor).
6: A huge cost would be upgrading the highway in Western Ontario. It's anything but flat, passing numerous lakes/escarpments along hilly & rocky terrain, and almost completely devoid of people, which means setting up worker camps. For Americans, it's probably easiest to think of in terms of driving from Detroit, Michigan to Grand Forks, North Dakota. But instead of passing through Chicago, Milwaukee, Madison, Minneapolis, or the dozens of other small to medium sized cities, the largest population of any note you will see along the is a single isolated city of 100k.
Posted by: Shaun M. at Nov 17, 2009 3:14:43 AM
Bartman says "Highway 2 ... still has lots of at-grade intersections outside of Edmonton, Red Deer and Calgary."
The are absolutely NO at-grade intersections in between Edmonton and Calgary on Highway 2 (i.e. once you get outside of Edmonton). Thus there are no intersection traffic controls anywhere on this stretch of highway, not at Red Dear and not anywhere else. The highway is four lanes and 110 km/hr and I have no idea what Bartman is talking about.
Posted by: aaron_m at Nov 17, 2009 4:38:14 AM
An insane proposal. massive spending when hiways are available a little to the south basically for free. and if such roads made sense, wouldn't someone have built a toll road? no, they have the railroad and a map to find the US. and a good idea of how much the US is in debt building roads to subsidize suburbanization.
Posted by: Al Brown at Nov 17, 2009 5:41:10 AM
Well, we're probably not calling Russia "developed" but we might note that there is no (yes, that is as in none) paved road across the country.
Posted by: Tim Worstall at Nov 17, 2009 5:45:26 AM
this is sort of like the argument that somehow the US is backwards because we don't have high speed internet access as fast or as cheap as Korea or Japan. The geography is completely different and if people want whatever is available in a high density area, they can move there. either way, they are perfectly capable of balancing all of the considerations that matter to them
Posted by: Al Brown at Nov 17, 2009 5:46:23 AM
Canada needs 3-lane freeways and higher speed limits. The road system itself is fine, it just needs to be brought into the 21st Century.
Posted by: Ryan at Nov 17, 2009 8:35:13 AM
We economists generally reckon that waste of resources (as in bridges to nowhere, or highways where there is scarcely traffic for a two lane road) is something to be discouraged. We have a wierd idea that the resources might have been used for something people will want and use.
Many economists also have a crackpot notion that if you are going to subsidise a transport system, there is something to be said for concentrating the subsidies on forms of transport which tend to create less undesirable side effects. (Railways are polluting, as many people noted when they were first built, but a good deal less so than road transport.)
The question is 'Do Canadians receive a hidden injection of economics as babies in ther socialised health care? Do they learn it at school? Or does it just soak in out of the Northern air?'
Posted by: David Heigham at Nov 17, 2009 8:59:17 AM
It's been beat up already, but I wanted to chime in too. The authors seem to propose a solution without identifying a problem. The reason there is no national "motorway" is obvious -- it is not necessary. The question should be whether Canada's highway system is adequate, not whether it has this particular form or institution of road transportation. It's like asking me why I drive a Honda instead of a dump truck. I would like the authors to stick around Parliament on the day government tables a bill to spend 35 billion dollars on a 4 lane highway stretching 5000 miles.
Posted by: eh at Nov 17, 2009 11:01:23 AM
