'Absolutely absurd': Highway 20 closure leads to missed flights, hours stuck in traffic for Montreal commuters

If you were on the Hwy. 20 West, your long weekend probably felt a lot longer.

The shutdown of a section of the highway led to major traffic heading west this holiday weekend, with some even missing their flights at the Montreal-Trudeau airport.

"It’s horrible. It’s horrible what can I say," one traveller on the 20 told CTV News.

It was bumper-to-bumper with crawling cars, impatient drivers and one very anxious group of CEGEP students.

On Saturday, Anais Yaghmour was in a car with her fellow college students from Sherbrooke. They left Montreal at 2 p.m. for a 6 p.m. flight to Greece but traffic wasn’t moving.

"People started getting out of the car because they had to go to the toilet so badly," Yaghmour said.

What should have been a 20-minute drive to the airport took four hours.

"It was 9.5 kilometres in 4 hours. To me, that was absolutely absurd," Yaghmour said, calling the commute "very stressful."

They ended up missing their flight but luckily got on another flight and eventually made it to Greece.

Anyone who needed to take this route was badly delayed, with some calling it a "nightmare." Some drivers told CTV News they were stuck in traffic for nearly three hours.

Quebec's transport ministry says it was replacing old concrete — necessary work that left them no choice but to close the westbound lanes in the area.

"It’s major reparations that are done, and we need to close Highway 20 because of safety reasons. We don’t want the concrete during the work fall," said Martin Girard, a spokesperson for the Ministry of Transport.

Transport Quebec says it will look if there are ways to mitigate congestion but warned there’s a lot more work coming this summer

"People in the Montreal area are used to [roadwork]. There’s work every weekend on the St-Pierre interchange and in other places, so we invite people to check on [Quebec 511]," Girard said.

None of it is very comforting to long-suffering Montreal drivers, who are now entering another chaotic construction season.