Walker Road
| Essex County Road 11 | |
| Length |
40 km (20 mi) The southernmost 28 km (16 mi) are designated as County Road 11, the rest are unsigned, in the City of Windsor |
|---|---|
| Location | Windsor, Oldcastle, Tecumseh, Amherstburg, McGregor, Essex, Harrow |
| North end | Riverside Drive |
| South end | Essex County Road 20 |
Walker Road was one of the busiest roads in Windsor, Ontario before the road closure. It has an average annual daily traffic (AADT) level of 32,000 cars per day at the CP Rail crossing.
History
The road is named after Hiram Walker, distillery baron. The CP Rail crossing where Walker Road meets Grand Marais Road and the Chrysler Canada Windsor plant is the location where the Tornado of 1946 cut through and reached its peak intensity (an F4 in strength).
Today, the road is very busy, servicing mainly industries and businesses along the road, with an interchange with E.C. Row Expressway. It begins at the Hiram Walker distillery and continues southerly past the Chrysler Canada minivan plant and the Windsor Airport.
Outside the City of Windsor, Walker Road was designated as a "Windsor Suburban Road", with its shield remaining the same, but with Windsor Suburban replacing "Essex County". In 1998, the Windsor Suburban Roads Commission was disbanded and the road reverted to Essex County.
In the field
At the Highway 401 overpass (which is the city limits for Windsor), the road gains the designation of Essex County Road 11. It does not have direct access to Highway 401, but it does intersect with Provincial Road (County Road 46) which has an interchange with Highway 401 approximately 500 metres southeast of Walker Road.
The road is dead straight for 17 km, before swinging southeast (concurrent with County Road 18) towards Harrow, Ontario, its final terminus.
Upgrades
At 8 PM on October 31, 2008, the long-awaited underpass (grade separation) at the CP Rail tracks and Grand Marais Road East was opened.
Previously, Walker Road crossed the rail tracks at grade. Approximately seven trains would cross at Walker Road per day, halting traffic for up to 20 minutes each, causing long traffic jams and increased traffic on nearby north-south arteries.
The project began on August 7, 2007 and was slated to cost about $50 million with construction to last 16-18 months. The project involved lowering Walker Road below the rail tracks. The intersection of Walker and Grand Marais was also lowered and improved with additional turning lanes.