A total of 45 cyclists have died on Montreal roads from 2006 to 2017 according to the Société de l’assurance automobile du Québec.
Ten of those deaths were located in the Rosemont-La Petite-Patrie borough — making it the deadliest in the Montreal area.
Those figures do not include the recent deaths that happened in 2018.
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Ghost Bike Montreal, the memorial volunteer group, has laid several of the painted white bikes in the neighbourhood in memory of those lost.
“Since we started Ghost bike in 2013, we have installed at lease one bike in Rosemont each year,” said spokesperson Laurent Deslauriers.
The double digit number does not alarm Vélo Quebec.
“Its not surprising,” said spokesperson Magali Bebronne.
“Most collisions involving cyclists happen in the central boroughs because that is where we have the most critical mass of cyclists.”
Bebronne says the numbers are somewhat encouraging considering the growth in numbers of cyclists in Montreal.
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“The number of crashes is going down and is actually encouraging because the practice of cycling has increased hugely,” Bebonne said.
In Montreal, the number of trips taken by bicycle have increased by 57 per cent over the past five years, according to Vélo Quebec.
In Quebec, the number of cyclists deaths in 2017 rose to 11 deaths in the province. In 2016, eight cyclists were killed across Quebec. SAAQ spokesperson Mario Valliancourt said on average the numbers have been on the decline since 2013.
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In Rosemont, Bebonne says the popular biking borough’s infrastructure is “maybe lagging behind.”
The heavily traveled bike lane on St-Zotique Street in Rosemont has many bike safety elements in place such as a 30 kilometer speed limit, uni-directional bike paths on both sides of the street and anti-dooring buffer.
Vélo Quebec said it would like to see concrete medians between the roads and the bike path. They would also like better designed intersections where cyclist are more visible.
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