High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Highway 19, known locally as the Island Highway, is the main north-south thoroughfare on Vancouver Island north of Nanaimo. A highway has existed on the Island since about 1912. Originally, gravel and rough, the highway was an essential link together with the E and N Railway. The paved highway first opened in 1953, replacing a stretch of Highway 1 between Nanaimo and Campbell River, finally being extended to the northern tip of the island in the late 1970s. The total length of the highway is 406 km (252 mi).