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presents

The Highways of Hamilton /

Ontario 97 and Hamilton Regional Road 97

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Highway	Duration	Start	Terminus	Length (km)
ON 97	1938-1973	Waterloo County line west of Clyde	ON 6, Freelton	19
ON 97	1973-1975	Waterloo Region line east of Clyde	ON 6, Freelton	14
RR 97	1975-	Waterloo Region line east of Clyde	ON 6, Freelton	14

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Overview

Highway 97 is an east-west road traversing greater Hamilton's northern edge. It originally served as an inter-regional road connecting Hamilton via Freelton to Galt (Cambridge) and Oxford County to the west. It's diminished in importance since, and some portions of the road outside Hamilton have been renumbered.

If the province of Ontario isn't playing games with highways, then they're playing games with municipal boundaries. As such, a 5-km portion of Highway 97 falls within a section of Wentworth County that was ceded to the Waterloo Region in 1973.

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History

Hamilton RR 97 originated in 1938 as an Ontario provincial highway, part of a "second wave" of numbered roads taken on by the province to help flesh out the map. It was routed upon pre-existing infrastructure, following the concession lines of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century.

The only significant city ever served by the road was Galt in Waterloo County. Since Highway 8 already provided Hamilton and Dundas with a direct link to Galt, Highway 97 was at most an alternate route and collector road for rural traffic.

Given its minimal significance, it probably came as little surprise that Highway 97 was the very first of Hamilton-Wentworth's provincial highways to fall prey to the Ontario government's "downloading" scalpel of the late twentieth century. In 1975, the route was demoted to a Regional Road immediately west of the new Waterloo Region line. In 1984 the other shoe dropped, and Hamilton-Wentworth's portion of Ontario 97 also assumed the status of a Regional Road.

The highway has seen the following adjustments:

• A,B: By 1960, two sharp turns adjacent to the Beverly Swamp were straightened, leaving behind Hoods Road and the scenes photographed below.
• C: In 1973 the northwest portion of Wentworth County was annexed by the Waterloo Region, resulting in Wentworth's portion of ON 97 becoming 5 kilometres shorter.
• D: In 1975, the annexed portion of ON 97 was reclassified as a Regional Road.
• E: By 1984, a jog on the former county line was straightened.
• F: In 1984, the entire remaining length of ON 97 was reclassified as a Regional Road.

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Gallery

All photos are by the author, 2022-2025:

Hamilton Regional Road 97. (Why is the "East" plaque bigger than the actual route marker?)

Two artifacts from ON 97's earliest alignment adjustments (A) survive in plain sight: A stretch of pre-1960s pavement on the west end of Hoods Road, and a disused bridge over Fletcher Creek.

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Links

• Ontario Highway 97 History - The King's Highways of Ontario

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