Montreal Island Tour | “The opportunity to ride together, safely”

Thousands of cyclists invaded the streets of Montreal on Sunday, on the occasion of the 37^e edition of the Tour de l’île, an event that each year allows several citizens to familiarize themselves with cycling in an urban context, on streets that are entirely reserved for them.

Henri Ouellette-Vezina
The Press

“It’s our first time as a family. We are really happy. It’s great to have the opportunity to ride together, in a safe way,” says François Trépanier, a father who came with his wife Isabelle Leduc and their two children, Rémy and Justin.

For him, cycling in Montreal still causes certain “security issues”. “We still don’t do it often on a daily basis. With the children, we go rather often to the mountain bike trails, where there is no traffic. Here, there is still a lot of work to be done. The ideal world really is roads for cyclists. Even cycle paths are not necessarily a guarantee of safety,” he says.

Beyond cycling, the Tour de l’île is also a matter of love, especially for Patrick de Rosa and Suzanne Gagnon, who met there ten years ago. “He had seen me from afar, he came to chat, we walked around together. And since then, we’ve been together. And we come back every year. It’s a passion for us, cycling, “smiles M^me Gagnon.

Lucie Des Parois is already on her tenth Island Tour with her partner Daniel Perreault. “With the music and the atmosphere, for us, it’s really folkloric,” she says. I think it really makes people aware of the importance of active transportation, and with the price of gas constantly rising, it’s all the more necessary. »

Towards a “cycling culture”

Vélo-Québec CEO Jean-François Rheault will have a busy day. “It’s really an important event for building a cycling culture. People tell us: it encourages them to cycle more afterwards. And it draws the attention of society in general to the importance of cycling for the city,” he says. “It really creates a community, a citizen movement to demand more safe trails. The political class takes note of it,” adds the spokesperson for the event, Émile Bilodeau.

According to Stein van Oosteren, author of the book Why not the bike? who is visiting Montreal these days, the Tour de l’île “has a very clear impact on mentalities, because it puts the bike in the public space”. Seeing the bike and how it can be a massive engine of transformation is already a lot to change mentalities, ”he says.

Further on, at the starting line, Bobby and Florence Chan are preparing for their second edition, with their son Nicolas. “I used to do a lot of cycling before, but when he was very young, we did less. There, he is interested, he is excited, so we are happy. We want to keep it active, ”says Mr. Chan.

Denis Hébert and Sylvain Pechard, long-time friends, are veterans of the Tour de l’île. “I think the third year it started, I was there, launches the first laughing. For us, it’s like the first start of the season. It’s safe and you can walk wherever you want. We love. »

“I come from Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu and I do a lot there. There are trails everywhere, it’s wonderful. With the pandemic, there are many more people. It’s nice to see that, especially young people with their parents. It’s the next generation, ”also slips Sylvain Pechard.

“We have to speed up”, says the City

The mayor of Plateau-Mont-Royal and responsible for economic development, Luc Rabouin, ensures that the City is aware of the progress to be made on the cycling network, which is often uneven from one borough to another. “With the pandemic, bicycle sales have exploded. Improvements must follow everywhere. We have to speed up, we know that. We saw it with the REV. When you do it, it works,” he says.

“They are right, the citizens. You have to secure the bike. Montreal is one of the biggest cycling cities in the world, and it will continue to be. We need to encourage people to use active transportation. This is the future of our planet,” added the Minister responsible for Greater Montréal, Chantal Rouleau. Not far from there, the federal Minister of the Environment, Steven Guilbeault, salutes the involvement of Vélo Québec. “Their awareness-raising mission is essential. For our part, we are the first government to have implemented a permanent active transportation infrastructure funding program since 2018 for municipalities. It’s up to 400 million a year. We can say that it is not much, but it is still 400 million more than before. And it is recurrent, ”he concludes.