Even if traffic will be closed for motorists on René-Lévesque Boulevard in Montreal, the cycle path will remain open.
• Also read: Geyser in Montreal: a portion of René-Lévesque Boulevard closed for at least a month
• Also read: Geyser in Montreal: flooded entrepreneurs still waiting for help from the City
• Also read: Geyser in Montreal: victims have still not been able to return home
This was confirmed by City of Montreal spokesperson Philippe Sabourin on Sunday on LCN.
“We don’t have so many plan Bs anymore” for cyclists, he emphasizes.
It is for this reason that the City made the decision to maintain access for Montreal cyclists.
“We are going to keep it in place as much as we can,” says the spokesperson.
Motorists will have to be patient for an estimated period of one month.
In fact, the work, which began on Sunday, means that René-Lévesque Boulevard is closed between Rue Notre-Dame Est and Avenue De Lorimier to repair the 84-inch pipe which burst on August 16.
“The damage is enormous, so we are going to excavate the ground to find the pipe. We’re going to cut it and replace a six-meter segment that we had custom-made. We deploy it, we bring it to the field, we put it back down and then we backfill. We finish with a layer of concrete and asphalt. All this takes about four weeks,” specifies Philippe Sabourin.
The fact that the part had to be custom built explains the weeks of waiting before work began, according to the spokesperson.
“We want to carry out the work before winter,” he said.
The exact cause of the geyser is unknown. However, accessing the broken piece risks lighting up the city. Corrosion is a plausible hypothesis, according to Mr. Sabourin.
