In a plan for the progress of work on its Vélocité corridors published on Friday, the City of Quebec calculates that it has developed 18.7 km of sections since 2023.
The cycling facilities completed this year total 12.7 km, which are in addition to the 6 km completed last year. A target right on the objectives set, according to the Marchand administration.
The fact remains that there are many interventions to be made over the coming years.
The Vélocité corridors completed to date represent only a small proportion of the cycling network which must extend throughout the territory.
By 2034, Quebec has in its plans to develop 150 km of wide lanes reserved for cyclists on the city’s main axes, 60% of which must be built in the first five years of the plan.
“Popular”
“I am already seeing the popularity of our new cycling links on the ground, it is very promising for the future,” said the vice-president of the executive committee responsible for transport and mobility, Pierre-Luc Lachance, on Friday.
A map of the Vélocité corridors created in 2024 (Quebec City)
Ultimately, with this expansion, the City calculates that 85% of the 35 neighborhoods will be served by Vélocité corridors, “thus strengthening connectivity between the various districts.”
Since this summer, cyclists have had access to six new “safe” sections, while three others started last year have been improved (Laurier Boulevard, Sainte-Foy Road and 4e Avenue).
“The work for these new links has been finalized or is about to be finalized,” specifies the municipal administration.
The municipal councilors of Louis-XIV, Marie-Pierre Boucher, and of Saint-Rodrigue, Claude Lavoie, cycle on the Vélo Cité corridor of 3rd Avenue West.
(Quebec City)
At the time of writing these lines, Quebec had not specified the cost of these developments.
An expansion that makes people talk
The start of the deployment of this “structuring network”, in 2023, caused much discussion, with the rapid and controversial commissioning of the corridor on Chemin Sainte-Foy. Traders were particularly concerned about the loss of parking spaces along the route.
For its upcoming projects in 2025 and 2026, the City launched a public consultation process at the beginning of September in order to “feed into the design and ensure an implementation that responds to the realities of the population”.
One of them, which is to be built on the commercial part of 3rd Avenue, has already sparked an outcry from merchants and citizens in Limoilou, enough for the Marchand administration to agree to postpone until 2026 the development of the contested section.
The six new Vélocité corridors developed in 2024
– CVC Pente-Douce (rue Marie-de-l’Incarnation to chemin Sainte-Foy)
– CVC Marie-de-l’Incarnation (rue Guyart next to Pente-Douce)
– CVC Neilson (rue de Marly to rue André-Giroux)
– HVAC 3rd Avenue West and 52nd Street (76th Street West to 4th Avenue East)
– CVC du Pont (rue du Prince-Édouard to rue Saint-Vallier Est)
– HVAC Quai Saint-André (rue Saint-Pierre in Dalhousie).
