Only eight years after it opened, the city is already looking at widening the Red Hill Valley Parkway.

The good news is the eight-kilometre four-lane highway is built to be seamlessly expanded to six lanes of traffic.

The bad news for Coun. Doug Conley — who argues the road is already too packed at rush hour — is the report won't be ready for a year.

"To have a plan a year from now is fine, but that means it's another four or five years before we do it.

"Maybe I'm a little anxious, but I can see gridlock all over the place."

The Ward 9 councillor first raised the issue of enlarging both the Red Hill and Lincoln Alexander parkways to handle growing traffic volumes at a recent committee meeting.

Conley says the residential development boom in the upper Stoney Creek portion of his ward and neighbouring Binbrook is only going to make a bad situation worse.

"With all this construction going on, I don't know where we're going to put all the cars."

According to city manager Chris Murray, widening the sister highways, which connect the QEW to the 403 across the Mountain, is part of the ongoing review of the city's transportation master plan, which is expected to be finished in the next 12 months.

The report will provide recommendations on the time frame for expansion.

City engineering director Gary Moore figures widening both highways would cost $80-$100 million, a significant challenge given that the city is currently spending about $48 million a year on road work when it should be spending $180 million to meet its needs.

Still, there's no question the $245 million Red Hill expressway, built under a cloud of environmental and fiscal criticisms, has proven a roaring success.

When the highway opened in 2007, the city expected it to be used by 40,000 to 45,000 vehicles a day.

Shortly after the opening, those numbers were closer to 65,000 vehicles. It now handles about 80,000 vehicles day.

Meanwhile, the Linc, which opened in 1997, is handling about 90,000 vehicles a day.

Given rush hour slowdowns, Conley is concerned both roads are rapidly approaching capacity. He thinks it's time to have a serious discussion about it.

"Let's get it out in the open," he says. "If I had my druthers, I'd say let's have a plan now for the Red Hill and Linc to do six lanes."

Moore acknowledges rush hour congestion presents some capacity challenges. But he notes what may seem slow is still "relatively good" movement compared to roads with traffic lights such as Rymal and Concession.

"You don't rebuild roads until they become saturated for long periods — like all day long — with that volume of traffic."

When widening is needed, Moore notes all the storm water runoffs, overhead sign structures and bridges on Red Hill are designed for six lanes. The grass median would be taken out and the two new lanes would be placed in the middle with a concrete barrier separating the north-south lanes.

The Linc is similarly capable of being expanded with the exception of the overhead signs, which would have to be replaced.

As far as a time frame, Moore points out that the Linc was resurfaced last year, while Red Hill will probably need resurfacing by 2022 or 2025, which would be a good opportunity for widening.

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The question is, will that be too late to get ahead of growing traffic volumes?

Again, the revamped transportation master plan should provide answers. Besides looking at travel patterns and trends, the $500,000 review is studying changing demographics, complete street polices, parking and public transit strategies.

The latter in particular could have a significant impact on reducing vehicle trips across the board.