A major construction project along the Expressway in Windsor is now underway.
As part of the Banwell Road and E.C. Row Expressway overpass interchange and corridor improvements, there will be major lane restrictions along the Expressway.
The Expressway from east of Lauzon Parkway and County Road 22 west of Lesperance Road to Banwell will experience lane restrictions. There will also be lane restrictions from the roundabout at Mulberry Drive/Wildwood Drive to south of the Expressway.
These lane closures are required as work gets underway including culvert and ditch re-alignments, removal of old traffic signals, shoulder widening along the Expressway, road widening on Banwell Road, line painting and bridge abutment and center pier works.
This is the first of many phases to come with this project with construction expected to last for the rest of 2025, throughout 2026, with final road paving in 2027.
Stacey McGuire, the city's executive director of engineering, says commuters will notice a range of work being completed.
"We're going to be taking out the signals that are there at Banwell and E.C. Row right now, and we're going to be installing some temporary traffic signals. We'll have to do some culvert and ditch re-alignments, shoulder and median widening, they're going to get started on the bridge abutments for the overpass, line painting, all of those things that are going to be necessary to in order to set us up for the work as they move along into the future."
She says the detours will vary quite a bit over the next couple of years.
"We're definitely going to try to limit as much as possible those detours so that we can minimize the impact to the commuting public," McGuire says. "But, due to the scope and the length of this project it's not really feasible at this stage for this initial work that we're doing to set the detours up say just outside of rush hour, so you will see those lane restrictions in place for the majority of everyday."
McGuire says give yourself extra time to travel through this area, and be cautious.
"This is a very heavily travelled corridor here, and so expect bigger delays than you might have seen on previous detours. This is very heavily travelled so give yourself extra time. Be mindful of safety, be mindful that there's workers here, they have families as well, so keep yourself safe, keep those people that are working safe."
This first phase is expected to be completed by mid-October.
The nearly $100-million upgrades are needed to help accommodate traffic flow due to the NextStar Energy electric vehicle battery plant.
The city currently sees between 10,000 and 14,000 vehicles a day travelling through this corridor.