It’s the return on Sunday of the Tour de l’île de Montréal, the annual high mass of cycling since 1985. And for its first edition at maximum capacity since the start of the pandemic, Vélo Québec is preparing to welcome more than 15 000 cyclists. Here’s how to plan your car trips accordingly.
Posted at 9:15 p.m.
Every year, it’s the meeting that heralds summer. The kick off of the 37e edition of the Tour de l’île will be given this Sunday at 9:30 a.m.
Cyclists will take to the streets of seven boroughs and towns: Plateau-Mont-Royal, Rosemont–La Petite-Patrie, Outremont, Côte-des-Neiges–Notre-Dame-de-Grâce, Sud-Ouest, Verdun, Ville-Marie and Westmount for a total route of 36 km.
For those interested, departures will be from La Fontaine, MacDonald and Angrignon parks. It costs $50 for an adult and $10 for a youth aged 13 to 17.
All the more reason to register and participate: it announces clear skies and a comfortable 22°C all day. A few gusts of 50 km / h should however add a small level of difficulty, says Environment Canada.
For this somewhat special edition, Vélo Québec is expecting more than 15,000 cyclists. The Tour de l’île did not take place in 2020 and had to limit the number of participants to 9,000 in 2021.
Car traffic disrupted
It will be better to plan your route by car on Sunday. The course will be completely closed to car traffic until the end of the afternoon.
To facilitate travel, Vélo Québec invites the public to use the application Waze or consult its infotraffic web page.
Throughout the route, volunteers, cadets and police will be present at the intersections of the blocked streets to direct motorists. They will be able to give, to those who wish, a map of the route and the bypasses.
With The Canadian Press