You can even speed on it now.
Hwy. 368 has come a long way from where it was in 2006, with pot holes you could lose your car in and long sections of mud and rock cars had to fight to get through.
Today, thanks to a $25-million upgrade to the highway, it's smooth sailing all the way from the Muenster corner off Hwy. 5 all the way to St. Brieux and beyond.
It was a 35-kilometre stretch of road from grid road 756 just south of Lake Lenore to the Pleasantdale grid road just south of St. Brieux that was in terrible condition six years ago. The Thin Membrane Surface (TMS) road's poor state - broken and full of holes - led to collisions, damaged vehicles, and stress for workers and travellers trying to take it on a regular basis.
Fed up, locals placed signs along its length at one point, demanding that it be fixed.
Eventually, it was.
This portion of highway was under construction for the past four years, as it was not only rebuilt , but upgraded.
The upgrade to the highway means that it can carry greater payloads, making shipping more efficient, especially for manufacturers in the area like Bourgault Industries in St. Brieux.
The newly rebuilt highway fully opened to traffic in July, and allows nine-month primary truck traffic to travel on all 90 kilometres of paved Hwy. 368, stretching from its junction of Hwy. 5 east of Humboldt to junctions with Hwy. 41 and Hwy. 3 near Melfort.
A three-month road ban will still be in effect for the highway each spring.
On August 17, a ceremony was held on the side of this highway at the Pleasantdale grid road intersection, to celebrate the end of the upgrade work.
MLAs Delbert Kirsch of Batoche and Kevin Phillips of Melfort - Hwy. 368 is the dividing line between the two constituencies - and representatives from local RMs and town and village councils were there to watch as a highways crew installed a new highway sign for Hwy. 368.
For many of those gathered on the side of the road, seeing that sign go up was the culmination of years of lobbying to fix the road, the condition of which cut St. Brieux off from the rest of the trading area to the south.
"It's a pleasure to drive to Humboldt again," Pauline Boyer, mayor of St. Brieux, told the Journal.
"It used to be, you would say, 'Do I have to go to Humboldt? Can I get everything I need in Melfort or P.A.?'," she continued. Then you would have to decide on a route to get to Humboldt - taking the highway or a series of grid roads.
"I felt sorry for the people who had to work here," Boyer said.
Actually fixing the road was the result of a partnership formed between the Ministry of Highways and Infrastructure, Bourgault Industries, the Lake Lenore Agro Co-op and local municipalities, including the Village of Lake Lenore, the Town of St. Brieux, the RMs of St. Peter, Humboldt, Lake Lenore and Three Lakes.
"This is a momentous occasion," Kirsch said to the crowd of media and dignitaries gathered along the side of the highway on a sunny Friday morning.
There are approximately 1,000 jobs located along the Hwy. 368 corridor, he noted.
This road was one the Saskatchewan Party government made a priority right away, Kirsch said, when they won control in 2007. It took a little longer to complete, he noted, because of the weather and other complications, but "it's a thrill to see Hwy. 368 open to what it should be," he said.
Phillips recognized Kirsch for the effort he and former Melfort MLA Rod Gantefoer put in to getting this gap in primary weight closed.
"This gap in the provincial highway network's primary weight system has now been closed for shippers, thanks to this work," said Phillips. "Primary weight is the highest legal weight shippers can haul on a provincial highway. If a truck can haul a larger payload, it means fewer trips are needed, which contributes to greater transportation efficiency and gives the province a competitive edge."
For Gerry Bourgault, president of Bourgault Industries, this day was a long time coming.
"I didn't think it'd ever get here," he laughed.
"Our farm equipment manufacturing business is very pleased about the work to rebuild Hwy. 368, which will allow the commerce of the area to return to normal," he said. "It will provide better and more direct access for trucks hauling steel, components and supplies to our plants and assembled equipment from them. This upgrade to Hwy. 368 will also allow us to attract more employees from south of St. Brieux to help us meet the demand for farm equipment that we are currently unable to fill."
Moving their equipment down the highway in the condition that it was, was very hazardous, Bourgault indicated.
"We did the best we could," he said, which included sometimes using grid roads in the area.
Now being able to move their equipment down paved roads ensures it gets to their customers in the best possible condition, he said.
And that newly paved road should help in their recruitment efforts to the south.
"As the road got worse and worse, we lost more employees from the south," Bourgault said.
It was downright dangerous to drive on Hwy. 368 as it was six years ago.
It wasn't cost efficient for people to drive to St. Brieux to work, he said, because of the damage that the road did to their vehicles.
There were also collisions that occurred along the road, because of its condition.
Because of the danger posed by the road, Bourgault Industries was down to two per cent of their 500-person workforce coming from over 10 kilometres south of St. Brieux.
Over time, Bourgault hopes to be able to attract workers from the south back to his company in St. Brieux.
"Those who did hang in with us, finally have a good road," he grinned. "We thank the government for their investment."
Boyer agreed that the new highway will be appreciated by workers travelling to St. Brieux. But it will also benefit those who live in the town.
"We no longer feel trapped from the south," she said. They can freely visit communities like Lake Lenore and Humboldt without risking their vehicles or their lives.
"This is just a plus for everything, for our recreation, our economy.... It's been a long time coming," she noted.
The new highway is going to contribute a lot to the economy of the region, noted Beryl Bauer, who represented the Village of Lake Lenore and the Lake Lenore Co-op at the ceremony.
"It's going to make a significant difference in the viability of the community," he said of Lake Lenore, noting that housing in Lake Lenore has become more in demand since the new road opened.
"The people have been asking for this for a long time," said Kirsch after the sign-planting ceremony.
"Seeing it come to completion is pretty darn exciting," he added. "It's a good day."
Kirsch had been fighting for a new Hwy. 368 since being elected to office in 2003, even taking Brad Wall down it in 2007 so he could see what the issues were. Wall later referred to the road as "a goat trail" and promised to fix it if the Sask. Party was elected as the government that November.
It was one of the first highways the newly-elected government committed to fix, and it was one of the first to get under construction.
"It was a deterrent to growth. It had to be looked after," Kirsch said.
