Almost all around the bridges

 MBC November 2019 Minute Book

Members Albert Thomas Lane and George Trenholme Bishop met at the Shaika Cafe on a chilly November morning for a short fixture ride of the bridge connections between Montreal and the South shore.

The day started out sunny but then soon clouded over as the members headed across the Lachine Canal, requiring a detour as refacing work continues on the canal and one of the bridges was closed.

View of Missing Link in north path to the west of Atwater Market

The members carried on to Nun's Island to traverse the river via the Estacade but were unable to refrain from investigating the progress of the bike path work on the new Champlain bridge.

Under the new bridge section between Montreal and Nun's Island

Opposite view looking towards Pointe Nord area

Tunnel under access ramp of Bonaventure expressway looking east

Work on bike path north of Condos on Pointe Nord

Existing path approximately 300 metres from work on access ramp to new bridge bike lane

A. T. Lane was sorely tempted to breech the fence and venture further towards the bridge but, as the members had already been pushed back on another approach route, they returned to their original route towards the Estacade.

Accessing the ramp to the new bridge will be a circuitous route from Verdun to Nun's Island and over to Pointe Nord but it is quite impressive the amount of work that has gone into working around the bridge infrastructure.

Pointe Nord

The brisk breeze lost a couple more degrees as it passed over the cool waters of the St. Lawrence as the members speeded across the Estacade and along the dyke towards the lift bridge at St. Lambert. Spying a downbound vessel heading towards the lock, they continued at pace to reach the bridge before the vessel. Unfortunately, with the bridge down and even with the vessel a good number of kilometers away, the security guard cozy in his shack, the powers that be decided to play it safe.

An antiquated system on the 'modern' Seaway

It not being worth an hour's waiting and the guard not offering to share his abode, the members chose an alternate route across Ile Notre Dame and Ile Ste Helene to the Jacques Cartier Bridge.

With precipation starting to fall, the members decided to forego actually getting to the South Shore and turned north on the bridge to head back to Montreal.

Just below the bridge was a factory that seemed to harken back to the original era of the MBC.

And so it does!

Ad from 'Our City Our Sports' 1899

While not achieving all their goals, it was an interesting and invigorating ride, and their lunch at the end was well earned.

A la Maison Cycliste

Below is the route taken by G. T. Bishop for a total of 40 kilometers for the day. A. T. Lane would be a similar distance though from a different starting point.