Route Description
Highway 2 is currently a stub of its former self. At just over 1 kilometre (0.62 mi) in length, it is one of the shortest provincial highways in Ontario. Its primary purpose is to provide a provincial route between westbound Thousand Islands Parkway and eastbound Highway 401. Highway 2 begins unsigned at the eastern town limits of Gananoque, and travels east a short distance before gently curving northward. It interchanges with the Thousand Islands Parkway, once referred to as "Highway 2S" prior to becoming a temporary part of the 401 in 1952, and continues forward. The highway passes through the rural-urban fringe of Gananoque, with several country homes to the east and a car pool parking lot to the west. Approaching Highway 401, the road bends to the right and passes over the superhighway. A small lake is nestled at the northeast corner of the interchange. Highway 2 ends at the westbound 401 offramp (interchange 648), while the roadway continues as County Road 2 along the former provincial route.
Numerous connecting links exist along urban sections of the former route of Highway 2. These sections were downloaded to the municipalities in which they reside before 1998. As such, when the Ministry of Transportation shortened Highway 2 on January 1, 1998, many signs along these connecting routes were not removed except in places where 2 was renumbered as a county road. These signs are still posted in places such as Windsor, London, and Toronto. In parts of Toronto, markers direct drivers along Lake Shore Boulevard west of downtown, and Lake Shore Boulevard, Coxwell Avenue (changed from the old route on Woodbine Avenue), and Kingston Road east of downtown.
Before the deletion of Highway 2, most of which took place on January 1, 1998, it was a continuous road from Highway 3 in Windsor to the Quebec border. It now has the following designations:
- Essex County: E.C. Row Expressway, County Road 22 and part of County Road 42 (the rest was Highway 2 before the E.C. Row was built)
- Chatham-Kent: Chatham-Kent Road 2
- Middlesex County: Longwoods Road except in London
- Oxford County: County Road 2 except in Woodstock
- Brant: Brant Highway 2 except in Brantford
- Hamilton: Wilson Street, Main Street, Paradise Rd., King Street, Dundurn Street, York Boulevard
- Halton Region: Plains Road, King Road, North Shore Boulevard, Lakeshore Road
- Peel Region: Southdown Road, Lakeshore Road
- Toronto: Lake Shore Boulevard, Gardiner Expressway, Woodbine Avenue and Kingston Road
- Durham Region: Kingston Road (Ajax and Pickering), Dundas Street (Whitby), King Street (Oshawa), Durham Highway 2 (not to be confused with Durham Road 2 (Simcoe Street)
- Northumberland County: County Road 2
- Hastings County: County Road 2 except in Belleville (where 2 / Dundas Street is concurrent with Ontario Highway 62 or is unnumbered)
- Lennox and Addington County: County Road 2
- Frontenac County: Kingston Road 2 (former Frontenac County municipalities Kingston Township and Pittsburgh Township are now entirely within Kingston)
- Leeds and Grenville United Counties: County Road 2
- United Counties of Stormont, Dundas and Glengarry: County Road 2 except in Cornwall
Read more about this topic: Ontario Highway 2
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