Montreal's first bike-centric 'velorue' coming to St-Andr

The Plateau-Mont-Royal borough finally moving forward with long-planned transformation ofa portion of St-Andr Street to create abike-prioritized"velorue."

It would essentially allowcyclists to ride in the middle of the street rather than clinging to the curb and encourages bike through-traffic while directing cars onto a different route.

The new bike-friendly street will occupySt-AndrbetweenCherrierStreet andLaurierAvenue.

The concept will a first inMontreal, but it has been implemented in Europe.

With major infrastructure work planned for the street, the borough is using the opportunity to update the road.

No change to parking

"It's not that cars won't have access, cars can pass through," said Plateau-Mont-Royal Mayor Luc Ferrandez.

"However, it ensures there aren't a large number of cars and it ensures that bikes can pass in the middle of the road and not just on the edges."

The official plan will be announced in May, he said.

Residents will still be able to park on the street.

Manyhave been waiting years for these improvements, which were initially promised under former mayor Gerald Tremblay's administration,city councillor Alex Norris, who represents the Jeanne-Mancedistrict of the borough, told CBC Montreal's Daybreak.

He said the plans were halted under Denis Coderre's administration because the bids on the contract came back too high.

Now with repairs to the water works going ahead, it's the right time to make the changes and enhance the streetscape, which was stripped down to accommodate cars decades ago during the Drapeau-era.

"We systematically narrowed sidewalks, cut down trees and made streets wider," he said. "This project will allow us to repair that historic error and re-widen thesidewalks and replant trees... it will really improve the quality of life for residents of this street."

The city is also launching a pilot project on the mountain aimed at protecting cyclists and reducing through traffic.

The controversialclosure of a stretch of Camillien-HoudeWay near the summit of Mount Royal to vehicle trafficis slated to start June 1.