'Like a parking lot': Toronto's Gardiner Expressway now down to 2 lanes in each direction for 3 years

A 700-metre stretch of the Gardiner Expressway in downtown Toronto is now running on two lanes in each direction for the foreseeable future and some drivers are already expecting traffic to get worse

A 700-metre stretch of the Gardiner Expressway in downtown Toronto is now running on two lanes in each direction for the foreseeable future and some drivers are already expecting traffic to get worse.

“It's going to be chaos,” Nellie Carol, who lives at the Harbourfront, told CTV News Toronto.

One westbound lane from Dufferin Street and Strachan Avenue was closed on Sunday in addition to the one eastbound lane that was closed last week. The closures are part of a rehabilitation project for the 60-year-old highway, which is expected to last until mid-2027.

Even before Sunday’s closure, Carol said traffic in the area was bad due to the lane reduction in the eastbound lanes.

“When I was traveling westbound…I could see the traffic [eastbound] was backed up all the way from Yonge Street all the way back to the [Highway] 427. It was like a parking lot,” she said.

Mary Ann Torres says her commute from Park Lawn Road in Etobicoke to Strachan Avenue more than doubled to 45 minutes last week and says she may need to get a new job if the traffic continues.

“Public transportation or alternative routes (Lakeshore, Queensway) are also affected,” she told CTV News Toronto. “I wish the city had a better plan that comprehensively addresses the need to fix the infrastructure and mitigates the impact.”