Ring road redux? Council to consider an old fix to new traffic congestion

An old planning idea, once declared dead at city hall, is now back as council looks at ways to provide quick relief for fast-growing London's surging traffic congestion. 

The idea is a ring road, essentially a high-volume road that would connect the north and west ends of the city to Highway 401. 

It's been put forward in various forms since the 1960s, as a way to move traffic around the city, in part to relieve pressure on roads in the city's core. 

Councillors Corrine Rahman and Steve Lehman have a motion coming to council today, which asks that the mayor and staff begin talks with the province and neighbouring municipalities to "work collaboratively on a ring road and integrated transportation network." 

They're putting the concept forward as the city looks to put final approval on its Master Mobility Plan, a document intended to guide transit plans for the next 25 years. 

The idea of a ring road runs counter to much of London's recent planning principles: Namely to focus growth "inward and upward" and reach a goal of 32.5 per cent of all trips made by biking, walking or transit.  

Rahman said London has already grown past those planning ideals, and that a ring road is an idea worth studying. Her Ward 7 is located in the city's northwest where new subdivisions are overwhelming two-lane roads such as Sunningdale. 

"One of the main arguments I hear against ring roads is that it promotes development on the outer ends of the city limits," she said. "But the practicality is that that's already there, it's already happening."

Former city councillor Stephen Turner has pushed back at the ring road idea on social media. 

He agrees it doesn't fit with council-approved planning directives in the Master Mobility Plan, or with the city's Climate Emergency Action Plan, which has a built-in goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions.  

"You know how something checks all the boxes? This one crosses out all the boxes," said Turner. 

Citing examples in other cities, Turner said ring roads don't constrain growth to a city's core. Instead, he said they spur new growth at the outskirts, essentially leading to the kind of sprawl the London Plan, the city's guiding planning document, aims to avoid. 

"They become mass conduits that usher cars away from local commerce," he said. "The only one they serve is big-box commercial modes." 

Turner said while London doesn't have mountains or water bodies as obstacles to outward growth, the city is surrounded by valuable farmland and smaller communities outside London's city limits. A ring road would mean annexing parts of adjacent municipalities or moving into expensive land purchases and expropriations.