Long before sunrise, central Alberta trucker Keith Wolf starts his day the same way he has for more than 40 years — behind the wheel at 5 a.m. on an undivided stretch of Highway 11. 

From his home base near Rocky Mountain House, the owner and operator of Wolf Transport heads east through Sylvan Lake and Red Deer before heading north to Edmonton and coming back later in the day.  

“It’s changed a lot,” Wolf said about the highway’s transformation over the last four decades.

He remembers when the main approach took drivers along Sylvan Lake’s busy waterfront.  

“As a younger man, I didn’t mind driving Lakeshore [Drive] in the summertime with a lot of bikinis, but it was very slow moving at times,” he said with a chuckle.  

In the 1980s, Highway 11 was rerouted to the south to bypass the town, “so that made it a lot nicer,” Wolf said.

Now, as traffic volumes continue to climb, Wolf said he is watching another major change take shape.

Twinning efforts

The Alberta government said it plans to complete twinning of Highway 11 between Sylvan Lake and Rocky Mountain House, a project aimed at easing congestion along a key corridor linking west-central Alberta communities with Red Deer and beyond. 

About 30 kilometres of the highway is currently twinned, stretching from the QEII turnoff at Red Deer to just west of Sylvan Lake. 

Traffic volumes along this stretch range between 7,000 and 9,000 vehicles per day, according to a 2024 provincial public information session document. Highway twinning can begin when vehicles surpass 5,500 per day, it added. 

In an email to CBC, Alberta Transportation Minister Devin Dreeshen said the project was first announced in 2020. 

“[It] will improve safety and capacity along a route … and provides access to Alberta’s national parks,” he said. Highway 11, also called the David Thompson Highway, is an entry point to the Icefields Parkway, which connects Jasper and Banff national parks.

Of the approximately 50 kilometre stretch of undivided highway between Rocky Mountain House and Sylvan Lake, Dreeshan said work will be done this year on about 10 kilometres. 

This includes a section from Rocky Mountain House to Highway 22, and another section from the Medicine River bridge to the hamlet of Benalto.

Construction is expected to start in 2026.

For the remaining portion of the corridor, Dreeshan said that design work will continue, with land procurement remaining a key priority as the project moves forward.

Safety concerns  

Shane Boniface, mayor of Rocky Mountain House, said the project could significantly improve safety along what he described as a dangerous stretch of highway. 

“We’ve lost quite a few residents over the years, not only in our town of Rocky Mountain House, but [also] Clearwater County. It’s a very dangerous stretch of highway. There’s a lot of large truck traffic, a lot of large loads coming up that highway,” Boniface said.  

According to Alberta RCMP, nine fatal collisions occurred on the stretch between 2021 and 2025, resulting in 10 deaths. Alcohol was a factor in three of the collisions.  

Boniface said public reaction to the twinning has largely been positive, although some landowners along the corridor are concerned about losing farmland.  

“You have a farm that’s been several generations a farm, and now they’re about to lose a large chunk of their cropland,” he said. “They are not happy about it. But at the end of the day, it’s happening.”  

Commuting pressures  

Johnathan Thomas has travelled the 80-kilometre stretch between Rocky Mountain House and Red Deer for work for more than a decade. He said traffic congestion that happens at around 7 a.m. and again at 5 p.m. can make accessing Highway 11 difficult.  

“I’m looking forward to it,” he said, about the twinning plan. 

“Not only am I going to be travelling that way for work, occasionally we have doctor’s appointments. So it’ll just make it safer for everybody driving back and forth.”  

Boniface said the scale of morning traffic is striking. He recalled one early-morning drive toward Red Deer with his wife. 

“We stopped counting cars at 150 cars coming into Rocky,” he said, adding traffic was heavy in both directions.  

In addition to the farmer’s concerns, the project has also worried other people living in the area.

Clearwater County resident Marilyn Christiansen said she feels the project may encourage coal mining development in the region. “I’m very against that,” she said.

Clearwater County is part of the eastern slopes of the Rocky Mountains, and coal mining development in the region has long been contentious. In 2021, the municipal council in Rocky Mountain House formally registered its concerns about future development with the provincial government.

Back in his shop, Wolf is getting his truck ready for his next day on the road while recalling some of the most memorable milestones of the last 40-plus years — from working with his dad to seeing the first stoplight installed in town.

The twinning project, Wolf added, will likely create short-term headaches with slow-moving traffic, but said the long-term benefits are clear.

“It’ll be sure nice when it’s done,” he said.