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Quebec Autoroute 50

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Quebec Autoroute 50

Autoroute 50 (Autoroute Guy-Lafleur) is an Autoroute in western Quebec, Canada. It links Canada's National Capital Region (Gatineau) and the Greater Montreal area (Mirabel).

Until November 2012, there were two distinct sections of A-50: one section running eastward from Hull and the other westward from Mirabel. The gap in the highway was filled on November 26, 2012, and the two-lane freeway opened for traffic on the full 159 km (98.8 mi) length.

The route provides an east-west freeway alternative to Route 148 that does not require travelling in Ontario, unlike the main Trans-Canada Highway route (A-40 / Hwy 417).

Originally named Autoroute de l'Outaouais, it was announced on April 28, 2023, that A-50 would be renamed to Autoroute Guy-Lafleur in honor of the former Montreal Canadiens player who died of lung cancer a year earlier. The Quebec government officially announced the name change on May 4 in Thurso, Lafleur's birthplace.

Oswald Parent (a Liberal MP from Hull) originally proposed construction of the A-50 in 1962. Eight years later, Quebec Premier Jean-Jacques Bertrand announced plans for construction. It was originally envisioned that the A-50 would extend over 400 km from L'Isle-aux-Allumettes at the Ontario border through Saint-Jérôme and Joliette along the Route 148 and 158 corridors to Berthierville and a junction with the A-40. The primary purpose of the A-50 was to connect Ottawa and the Outaouais with Montréal–Mirabel International Airport.

At the time, the Ottawa Macdonald–Cartier International Airport was not yet built, and the national capital lacked highway access to an international air hub. Mirabel's rapid decline as an air hub as well as the Quebec government's decision in the 1970s to impose a moratorium on new autoroute construction resulted in a significantly truncated route for the A-50. Plans for extending the A-50 west of Hull and east of the A-15/TCH were abandoned. The exit numbers, however, are based on that original projected length of the autoroute.

Construction was completed in the fall of 2007 on the road that connects Highway 148 west of the Aylmer and Hull sectors to the A-50 at the Boulevard des Allumettières interchange.

One short section of Route 158 around Joliette was originally signed as A-50 as well until the project was abandoned. In addition, west of the current terminus, a four-lane at-grade expressway continues as Route 148 into the Aylmer section of Gatineau; it may become part of A-50 in the future.

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