Northwestern Ontario pleads for federal funding as highway fatalities mount

Northern Ontario politicians are urgently appealing to the federal government for help during one of the deadliest winters on record along 2,000 kilometres of highway between Nipigon, Sudbury and North Bay.

In a letter to Prime Minister Mark Carney, the Northwestern Ontario Municipalities Association (NOMA) is urging the government to designate the stretch of the Trans-Canada Highway — both Highway 11 and Highway 17 — as dual-use national infrastructure.

That would tap into the federal government's plan to spend more on defence-related infrastructure while fulfilling a years-old request from northwestern Ontarians to shore up the sole land connector between Eastern and Western Canada.

"We need to get the attention of the federal government to say: listen, we need you to invest," said Rick Dumas, the mayor of Marathon, Ont., and president of the Northwestern Ontario Municipalities Association (NOMA).He said investing in the corridor would improve the movement of both civilians and troops and "connect Canada in a safe and modern way."

All ground cross-Canada transportation and trade has to travel along Highway 11 or 17 and pass over the Nipigon River Bridge, northeast of Thunder Bay. When that bridge last failed, it severed the country for 18 hours.

"The reality is that the bridge is the only connecting point of Canada," Dumas said.

"So when you talk about national defence and security of our country, there's a link that if anything happens … we're literally split in half."

Highways 11 and 17 merge just east of the bridge. That stretch of highway, between Nipigon and Thunder Bay, has recently undergone a massive twinning project.

The highway is now divided, with two lanes on each side.

"I'm not 100 per cent sure if, when we talk to the MPs in Ottawa, if they all realize the importance of that critical link in Northwestern Ontario," Dumas said.

He said NOMA is calling for Highway 11 from Nipigon to North Bay and Highway 17 from Nipigon to Sault Ste. Marie to either be twinned or given a two-plus-one system — a three-lane highway configuration where the middle lane changes direction every two to five kilometres for passing.

Designating the corridor as critical dual-use infrastructure would allow the federal government to tap into the newly announced $82-billion defence industrial strategy and and count toward Canada's NATO defence spending target.

"The idea is … if you've got forest fires, if you're doing a military defence exercise — then instead of regular civilians maybe you've got trucks, tanks, etc. using that facility," said Charles Cirtwill, president and CEO of the Northern Policy Institute.

Recently, the federal government announced planned upgrades to roads and airports in the North by designating them as dual-use infrastructure — serving both the military and civilians.