Should I anticipate bad traffic in Ontario on the day of the eclipse?

February 14, 2024 3:32 PM

I live in Toronto. We are not quite in the path of the April 8 full eclipse. I'd like to drive somewhere to see the full eclipse. Is traffic likely to be very intense in/out of the city that day around that time? (ie - substantially more than normal because of other eclipse-seekers?)

Bonus - any great ideas on where to see the eclipse near here?

posted by ManInSuit to Grab Bag (14 answers total)

I am planning on driving down to Fort Erie, probably pretty early in the morning. The eclipse won't be until the afternoon but with traffic I figure it makes more sense to get there and then enjoy the rest of the day. And try not to think about the drive back home. I'm taking the day off and my kids have a PA day so there's no reason for us not to go early. I was even thinking about going Sunday night and staying at a friend's house in Niagara but that might be going overboard.
posted by any portmanteau in a storm at 3:44 PM on February 14

In 2017 we went to Douglas WY to view the eclipse. We had other relatives go to like Ririe ID. These are very rural areas but just a few hours north of Denver, Salt Lake City etc. and easily accessible by freeway.

Our observation was, traffic was heavier than normal the night before the eclipse - given that these are rural areas in the middle of nowhere! - but not really a big deal. Very early in the morning of the eclipse, still OK maybe. But roughly 5-6 hours right before the eclipse, very very heavy traffic and even traffic jams and such.

Similarly, people who just had to leave immediately after the eclipse - which TONS of people did, even just a couple minutes after totality ended - were really stuck in traffic. Relatives reported spending hours and hours in traffic jams. Though they did complete maybe a 4 hour journey in about 8 hours or similar. So slow going but not actually stuck and stopped indefinitely.

Flip side - if you could have waited until say 6pm that day you would be right back to pretty normal traffic. Somewhat heavier than normal for these rural areas, yes. But nothing that was really even going to slow you down.

So I don't know how to really generalize that answer, except that there is slightly heavy traffic if you can get there early at all (arrive the night before and leave the evening after, say) but REALLY heavy traffic for the people who were trying to arrive just in time, and then leave immediately after.

And yes, tons of people are going to be flocking to see it. It really is an amazing and rare site. Lots of people do plan ahead, but even more are going to hear about it the week before or even just the day before on the news etc, and decide to go & see it at the last minute.

Also: We went to see the annular eclipse last October in Utah. We never saw anything like the crowds we saw for the total eclipse in 2017. But still, I was surprised how many people were willing to travel to see an annular eclipse. We had trouble finding camp sites, hotels, etc etc etc, that entire weekend. And an annular eclipse is like orders of magnitude less cool than a total eclipse - though still well worth seeing if you get the chance. Regardless - more traffic than I would have anticipated, though nothing like hours-long traffic jams that I personally observed. Again we were maybe 3 hours away from a major metro area with millions of people.
posted by flug at 3:45 PM on February 14 [1 favorite]

Response by poster: (should clarify - the constraint is: I need to be back in toronto by 6:30 or so. The eclipse in hamilton, say, maxes at 3:20...)
posted by ManInSuit at 4:28 PM on February 14

I can't comment on the local traffic but I will say that it's worth driving further to get closer to the centreline. Hamilton will get a total eclipse but only quite briefly - less than a minute. If you can get to the southern end of Fort Erie it will last about four times as long.
posted by automatronic at 4:48 PM on February 14 [2 favorites]

Getting back to Toronto for 6:30 sounds really, really unlikely to me. The section of Lake Erie shore towards Long Point is nearly as close as Fort Erie to the centre line and that might give you a better chance of getting back BUT…I drive from Toronto to the Lake Erie shore every few weeks and it only takes an accident or two on the QEW to stretch what should be a 1.75 hr ride to nearly 3 hours…and that's just on an TYPICAL summer weekend. Also, it's not like this eclipse is in the middle of some open plain, like Utah with multiple approaches. It's on a peninsula, just south of the 4th largest population concentration in NA. The Skyway and its approaches are really awful bottlenecks that I would recommend giving a wide berth.
posted by brachiopod at 4:59 PM on February 14 [5 favorites]

#1. You want to be more towards the center of the path of totality than the edge. More towards the center gives you longer totality - say 3 mins or even 3:30 if you're near the center, versus just 15 or 30 seconds near the edge. The thing is short already, so even 30 seconds longer makes a big difference. And the experience of totality is much deeper near the center of the path.

I don't think you need to be in the EXACT center but personally I would be shooting for at least 1/3 of the way in and no less. But that's just me.

Nevertheless, 1 inch inside the band of totality is like 1000000000X better than 1 inch outside. People literally don't realize. "I just watched it from where I was, we got 82% of it!" No, you got 0.000000000001% of it, because you didn't want to drive 20 miles or whatever. Totality vs non-totality is the whole shooting match. Everything from there in towards the center of the path is icing on the cake, in relative terms.

But just for example in your case, something like Port Dover or Port Rowan or Port Colborne is going to be a LOT better view than Hamilton for just 30 mins more driving.

Flip side if you have to be back on a deadline, that 30 mins could balloon to an hour or more on busy roads. True.

#2. I would expect traffic to be something like a busy rush hour immediately after the eclipse. You might be able to beat it somewhat by leaving immediately after totality. A good number of people will be doing what you are - trying to be back home by some deadline. But I would say that most people are going to stay to watch pretty much the whole event, which really doesn't end until the moon moves completely off the face of the sun. Which is going to be more like 1 hour 15 minutes after totality? But it's true that once totality is over, that's the main event and people in a hurry to get home may not wait all the way until 4th contact. Everything from 3rd contact to 4th contact is very similar to what happened between 1st contact and 2nd contact. Which we have just experienced, and which is (literally!) eclipsed by the wow factor of totality.

What we noticed in 2017 was a first rush fairly small rush of people jumping in their cars literally the minute totality was over. Then over the next 1 to 1.5 hours as the eclipse wound down, quite a lot of people were still watching but also packing up and getting ready to go. By the time the eclipse was officially over (4th contact) the freeway was pretty much jam packed at. Not at an actual standstill but creeping along slowly, maybe 20mph. It stayed that way for maybe 3-4-5 hours afterward.

As a guess, if you leave immediately after totality you could probably plan on a 2X longer trip than normal. If you wait say 1 hour after totality, it might be significantly more traffic. But it is hard to predict, no question.

#3. Yeah if you absolutely must be back by 6:30 and that absolutely can't be changed or moved, then maybe going just barely inside the path of totality (i.e., Hamilton) and leaving immediately after totality is indeed your best bet. That is going to reduce miles traveled for you and also, way more people will be flocking towards the center of the path of totality rather than just edge, because the center is so much better. So I would imagine you could save a lot of travel time by going just inside the edge - the combination of shorter distance plus a lot less traffic.

If you are driving home by say 5 mins after totality, you beat most traffic leaving from the Hamilton area and also all the traffic leaving from further south - even if they also leave 5 mins after totality ends.

Personally if it were me I would cancel everything the day before and the day of and the day after and just not miss it or rush my way through it, period. But that is just me. And also it is what I'm actually going to do in real life because it's going to take the better part of a day to travel from where I am to where totality will be. But even if the eclipse were perchance happening very close to me I would still consider it an event of such rarity and interest that I would treat it as something worth dedicating several days to travel to and from. Everyone around us at the 2017 eclipse was talking in those terms. Maybe not before, but definitely afterwards. It's hard to explain until you experience it in person.

So that's my $.02.

Flip side, if that 6:30pm thing can't be changed or moved at all, I'm pretty sure you can figure out a way to get at least some look at the eclipse and still get there by 6:30, if it's not more than 1:00 or 1:30 away under normal travel conditions and if you stick more in the populated area where there are several possible routes. (In Douglas there was literally one freeway in and out of the area. Everyone was on it. In Idaho there was generally the freeway plus one possible "backroad route". Our relatives tried to "beat traffic" by taking the backroad route and were kind of sorry.)
posted by flug at 5:19 PM on February 14 [1 favorite]

As someone who lives near Cleveland, also on the totality path, you're well aware of the weather in early April around the lakes. I wonder if the clouds will break at all, let's hope so. I'm just saying don't get too worked up about something that might not happen.
posted by greatalleycat at 5:48 PM on February 14 [4 favorites]

I need to be back in toronto by 6:30 or so

I mean... it's Toronto. The QEW from Oakville to Yonge St might take you around half an hour, or might take you four hours! Only the traffic gods know!

My honest expectation is that if it's predicted to be clear and sunny that day, you should expect utterly catastrophic traffic towards Hamilton and Buffalo starting before sunrise. I'd just check google traffic maps early that morning and be open to heading towards Kingston or vaguely south of London if that traffic is better.

If, as is more probable, it's solid overcast, then it doesn't matter where you are.
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 5:58 PM on February 14 [2 favorites]

There a metro area of 6 million people a couple of hours outside the totality and a tiny little sliver of land within the totality if you don't want the hassle and delay of crossing the border. Given this I booked a hotel room in Niagara Falls for Sunday night and I'm not buying tickets to the Jays home opener, even though my son has attended every home opener since he was a fetus. We'll go to the game on Tuesday. I assume the trip there or back will take 3 times as long as usual if done any time in the neighbourhood of eclipse time.

If you really want in and out check the go train schedules view the eclipse from a go train station parking lot and then get on the next train back. And hey if the home opener is your planned event that night you'll be pretty nearby when you get off the train.
posted by If only I had a penguin... at 6:31 PM on February 14 [2 favorites]

If you have to be back at 6:30, I think the GO to Aldershot is your best bet. If you could take the whole day and get back at night, there’s a morning train to Niagara Falls and a train back at night.
posted by warriorqueen at 7:12 PM on February 14

I had a great experience in 2017, although in different geography, and I did see the annular eclipse last fall as well.

Your time constraint adds another variable. Rural areas are your best bet. You just need an open area where you can pull over and park, really. (And, cross your fingers for decent weather.) As others have said, the closer you can get to the center of the band, the better the experience you'll have.

If I were in your spot, I'd consider the general Lake Erie north coast area from about Long Point/Port Rowan over to Fort Erie.

Local science museums or other organizations might have events planned, those are good to consider, although they can also attract crowds and traffic of their own. In 2017, I saw this in Grand Island, Nebraska, where the local museum was generating monster traffic jams a few hours before the event. A lot of that traffic had Colorado or Minnesota plates (including me, when I was stuck in it). But, driving away from that and out into the countryside was relatively normal and uncomplicated.

Other than the big crunch around specific eclipse events, bad traffic never materialized where I was. On the way there, on the way back, I-80 was normal. That situation might have been a bit different, since many people (in Omaha, for example) may have expected to watch the eclipse where they were, without driving, population is less dense, and there's more open country to soak up extra side traffic. (And no big lakes in the way.)
posted by gimonca at 4:01 AM on February 15

Kingston is in the path of totality as well. But there is no fast way to get here from the GTA, not unless you wanted to make a full day of it and are able to catch VIA back home in time.
posted by Kitteh at 5:21 AM on February 15 [1 favorite]

It felt like the whole city of Chicago was trying to meander its way back north from Carbondale in 2017. I've never seen traffic like that. Even the unnamed county roads were jammed as people keep veering further out to find something open, and their GPSes kept turning them all onto the same "optimized" route.

Whatever time it normally takes you to get back from where you end up, doubling the normal travel time might not even be enough of a cushion.
posted by Huggiesbear at 11:05 AM on February 15

I saw the 2017 eclipse in Molalla, Oregon, a smallish city that was in the path of totality. Traffic going to was maybe a bit heavier but not bad, but traffic on the way out was the worst I'd ever seen. I'd triple the estimate for the amount of time you'll need to leave; the usually less-than-30-minute drive back home (north, towards Portland) took us something like an hour or so as I recall.
posted by Aleyn at 1:41 PM on February 15