Quebec pedals slower than us

Something is happening in Quebec in terms of cycling. And we are not talking about the 36,000 cyclists who invade the streets of Montreal this weekend for the Tour de l’île.

More and more Quebecers see cycling not only as a pleasant sport, but also as an efficient means of transportation.

Do you want evidence ? Over the past year:

– Montreal has doubled its budget for cycle paths and multiplied its highways for bicycles (the REVs, for Réseau express vélo);

– the City of Quebec will inaugurate its version of the REV on Chemin Sainte-Foy in a few weeks, and this path will be open all year round;

– the mayor of Lévis insists that a wider bike path be built on the Quebec Bridge;

– Longueuil will quadruple its number of BIXI stations;

– BIXI will make its winter debut in Montreal.

The bicycle is taking up more and more space in our transport cocktail, and that’s good.

It is an excellent means of transportation for health, reducing the risk of cancer, diabetes and obesity¹.

It’s great for the environment. Replacing a daily round trip by car with a bicycle means a reduction of one tonne of CO₂/year. A Quebecer emits an average of 8.7 tonnes of CO₂/year².

It’s also excellent… for our public finances. Bike lanes cost taxpayers a fraction of the price of roads and public transport. According to a study cited by the City of Quebec, a kilometer by car costs society 4.9 times more than a kilometer by bus and 25 times more than a kilometer by bicycle.³.

Despite our enthusiasm, we are not pleading for all urban citizens of Quebec to travel 100% of the time by bicycle. It wouldn’t make sense. Neither in summer nor in winter.

But we must make the bicycle much more attractive as a means of transportation in the 25 Quebec cities where the population density is sufficient. After all, Rotterdam, a cycling paradise in the Netherlands, has a slightly lower population density than St. Therese…

In 2018, cycling accounted for 3.3% of trips on the island of Montreal (this figure is probably around 5.3% in 2022, according to our estimate⁴), 1.3% in Longueuil and 1.6% in Quebec. It’s not much. The City of Montreal aims to reach 15% in 2028. Nothing to do with Copenhagen (41%), Amsterdam (32%) or Rotterdam-The Hague (23%), but it is realistic and desirable.

The Danes and the Dutch have chosen to adequately finance their network of cycle paths. France, which has just announced an ambitious bicycle plan, will invest twice as much per citizen as Quebec.

Whether in Europe or in Quebec, if governments build safe bike paths in urban areas (eg the REV), cyclists will be there, and the investment will be very profitable. Especially with a self-service bicycle system (ex.: BIXI) which has electrically assisted bicycles allowing you to cover greater distances.

Of course, it will disturb at first. Remember the psychodrama around the REV Saint-Denis in 2020. Three years later, the REV is a huge success. Montreal is even being asked to develop its network of safe cycle paths more quickly.

If the REV Saint-Denis is a success, why is it not copied in 25 other cities in Quebec? Mainly because the government of Quebec pedals much slower than the citizens.

Quebec underinvests in bike paths. It was like that before the CAQ, and it remains so. Admittedly, we have just increased our active transportation budget by 10 million per year to reach 55 million per year. But this increase is largely insufficient. In 2023-2024, Quebec will invest approximately 1.6% of its total budget for roads and active transportation (pedestrians, bike paths) in active transportation. This is very little, considering that the bicycle already represented 1.6% of trips in Quebec in 2018 (with deficient infrastructures) and 3.3% of trips in Montreal in 2018 (without the REV).

At least, in Montreal, the Plante administration has just doubled the annual budget for cycle paths, from 17 million to 41 million per year. That’s excellent news.

Other good news: the Trudeau government launched in 2021 the first federal fund for active transportation. Except that Quebec has not received its share (about 18 million per year) for two years because of a Quebec-Ottawa dispute. An agreement has recently been reached, and the money will soon start to be spent. Finally !

The main cities of Quebec want to make more space for cycling, but they lack the money. Just in Quebec City, Mayor Bruno Marchand has a five-year, $100 million bike plan and would like the provincial government to pay half of it.

The solution to this problem lies in the coffers of the Legault government. Vélo Québec is asking the Government of Québec to double its funding for active transportation, which would increase from 55 to 100 million per year. If the Legault government wanted to pedal at the pace of Quebecers, it would accede to this request. At 100 million per year, Quebec would reserve about 3% of its roads/active transportation budget for active transportation. It would be fairer.

We would finally finance the bicycle as a real means of transport. And this investment would be very profitable from all points of view.

1. Source: brief from Vélo-Québec for the 2023-2024 pre-budget consultations.

2. Study by Christian Brand and a dozen other researchers: The climate change mitigation impacts of active travel: Evidence from a longitudinal panel study in seven European cities2021 Source for the annual carbon footprint of Quebecers: Institut de la statistique du Québec and The duty

3. Study available on the Ville de Québec website

4. 2018 figures are fromState of the Bike 2020 of Vélo-Québec. We updated the modal share of cycling in Montreal by increasing it by 66% (from 3.3% to 5.3% of trips) and based on the fact that the number of BIXI trips increased by 66% between 2018 and 2022. This estimate of 5.3% is not perfect. The next official figures will be for the year 2025.