Québec Roads - A-640, 640/13

Autoroute 640 and 640/13



A couple of westbound signs from the western reaches of the northern Montréal bypass. A-640 is as close as Canada gets to a beltway like so many U.S. cities have.


All the way over to the other side of the bypass and eastbound. QC 344 used to follow Rue Gagnon, now a dead-end, and crossed railroad tracks at what looks to have been an at-grade intersection. Now, it borrows the alignment of A-640 on the west side of Charlemagne.
A-13/640 ghost interchange

Autoroute 13 was originally planned as the northwest freeway for Montréal, but the portion north of A-640 was never built. The result is a half-used cloverleaf - except the entire arrangement uses C-D (collector-distributor) lanes for the exits. Thus you would exit from NB 13 onto the C-D lanes for the EB 640 exit, but not for the WB exit; you're carried onto that one directly (the unused C-D lanes that bridge over A-640 "merge" into your loop). Or you exit A-640 and are forced onto A-13 (in fact, the WB-NB direct ramp was converted into the outside of a trumpet ramp), whereas if the entire interchange were open you would be able to merge back onto 640.


Approaching the interchange in 2008 (the other photos here date to 2005), after the NB-EB ramp has been rebuilt to two lanes and the ghost connection to the C-D road has been torn up. The first photo is the SB side, where you see the outer unused lanes "merge" into the freeway, and the second is the NB side showing what I just described.


The unused NB C-D road. The inner loop of the trumpet to A-640 WB (would have been a cloverleaf ramp) takes over the C-D road in the bottom picture.


This picture is from the NB-WB ramp. Behind the red chevron is what would have been the WB-NB ramp, but this picture was taken to showcase the fact that Québec uses white-on-red chevrons instead of black-on-yellow.


WB 640, showing the gore point for the never-paved SB-WB ramp.


Now on A-640 EB up to the A-13 SB offramp, showing the unused but paved C-D road for the EB-NB movement continuing past the exit gore.


Continuing on that eastbound ramp, you merge with the also paved and also unused southbound C-D road. It was meant to handle the WB-SB cloverleaf weave, but now the outside of the trumpet (which would have been the WB-NB ramp but was modified) takes you directly onto the main freeway.


Back down to A-640 EB, past the unused EB-NB loop ramp. In fact, as you saw above, there is no traffic on the C-D road beneath that BGS, since neither loop ramp is open on the south side of the interchange.


Right before the A-13 ramp (the open one) merges into A-640 EB, this RIDOT-esque construction sign looms. It will only be there until March 2008, though.
Onto A-13 alone

Onto QC 344
A-640 on Steve Anderson's montrealroads.com
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