Waive Hwy 407 tolls, says Clarington Mayor, who wants gravel trucks off rural roads

Adrian Foster wants the provincial government to make Hwy 407 toll-free for heavy trucks carrying aggregate to get gravel trucks off Clarington’s rural roads.

“Let’s get these heavy trucks off our rural roads. The disruption they cause to our residents and, quite frankly, the destruction of our local roads is unreasonable,” said the Clarington Mayor. “These big, heavy trucks want to get from point A to point B as quickly as possible, so Highway 407 makes all the sense in the world.”

Foster and his colleagues on Clarington Council say the noise from gravel trucks early in the morning and on the weekends is “disturbing” and residents in the municipality’s small northern hamlets deserve some peace.

The Municipality does not wish to restrict commercial traffic to specific roads or times, Foster said, “but we need to protect the safety of local residents in these neighbourhoods.”

The heavy truck traffic is passing through Clarington to deliver construction materials to support housing being built west of the municipality and the provincial government is prioritizing new housing development, making the call to waive toll fees on Highway 407 for heavy trucks carrying construction materials an easy one, he added.

Foster proposes the waiving of fees be for a one-year trial run.