Clearing congestion: Deerfoot Trail upgrades scheduled for the fall

The provincial government say upgrade work on Deerfoot Trail will begin the fall on a section of the highway between McKnight Boulevard and 64 Avenue N.E.

The provincial government has laid out a timeline for work to commence on Calgary's busiest route starting north of McKnight Boulevard.

Upgrade work for Deerfoot Trail is scheduled to begin this fall, with the first phase of the project expected to take about a year to complete, officials said in a release on Monday.

Alberta's Transportation Minister Prasad Panda says the work aims to "improve the most congested areas" of the highway.

"Upgrades at 64 Avenue and McKnight Boulevard will be the first in a series of projects to address the most critical areas for improvement on the Deerfoot," he said.

The work will include an auxiliary lane between McKnight Boulevard and 64 Avenue N.E. and interchange improvements at the 64 Avenue interchange.

The province says this is the first phase of the project to improve the flow of the highway through Calgary.

A study of possible improvements to Deerfoot Trail was released to the public in early 2021. That document included a number of possibilities to improve traffic on the route that has served commuters for approximately 50 years.

Some of those include improvements at interchanges, carpool lanes and a collector distribution system.

The Alberta government initially announced a public-private partnership (P3) funding model for the work, but announced last month that it was deciding against that concept due to costs.

It has pledged $210 million to upgrade Deerfoot Trail's "priority areas."

Future work will include reconfiguring interchange ramps, widening and adding lanes of traffic and "improving crossroad connections."

Officials say the highway handles approximately 180,000 vehicles per day.