Quebec City–Windsor Corridor

The Quebec City–Windsor Corridor (French: Corridor Québec-Windsor) is the most densely populated and heavily industrialized region of Canada. As its name suggests, the 1,150 km-long (710 mi) region extends from Quebec City in the northeast to Windsor, Ontario in the southwest. With more than 18 million people, it contains about half of the country's population and seven of Canada's 12 largest metropolitan areas, 3 of which are in the top 4 (based on the 2021 census). The name was first popularized by Via Rail, which runs frequent passenger rail service in the region in its service area known as "The Corridor".

Geography

The corridor extends from Quebec City, Quebec, in the northeast to Windsor, Ontario, in the southwest, running north of the Saint Lawrence River, Lake Ontario and Lake Erie. For most of its length, the corridor runs through a narrow strip of farmland with the Canadian Shield to the north and the Appalachian Mountains or the Great Lakes to the south. A drive of only a few minutes north from cities or towns along the eastern two-thirds of the corridor will show an abrupt change from flat farmland and limestone bedrock to the granite hills of the shield. The highways in this part of the corridor often run right on the boundary of the shield, and it is possible to observe the frequent change from limestone to granite in rockcuts along the way. There are, however, several wider areas of flat farmland, including the southwestern Ontario Peninsula between Lake Huron and Lake Erie (which makes up the western third of the corridor), the eastern Ontario delta from Ottawa to the junction of the Ottawa and St. Lawrence Rivers at Montreal, and the Eastern Townships southeast of Montreal.