JOHN JANTAK
The 1510 West

With the President’s Cup golf tournament expected to attract 30,000 visitors a day to the Royal Montreal Golf Club in Île Bizard later this month, the mayor of the borough says he will do his best to minimize the inconvenience to the island’s residents during the six-day event.

“I will make this promise to my citizens – I will guarantee that I will be surveilling how this will be implemented – the filtration process to allow people onto the island and the access for our citizens,” Mayor Doug Hurley told The 1510 West.

Set to run from Sept. 24 to Sept. 29, the golf tournament is one of the biggest events organized by the PGA Tour and attracts some of the world’s top golfers. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has been named the honorary chairman of this year’s event. In 2022, U.S. President Joe Biden was the honorary chair of the tournament, which was held in Charlotte, North Carolina.

With ongoing work on the Jacques Bizard Bridge, the biggest challenge will be getting the crowds of spectators on and off Île Bizard, Hurley said.

“I will do my best to ensure that our businesspeople, who are already suffering because of the bridge since 2022, don’t suffer more losses because of the lack of pedestrian traffic to their businesses,” Hurley said.

Restrictions on access to the island will be put in place, including banning Uber drivers and certain delivery people from getting onto the island, the mayor explained.

“The new bridge was supposed to be completed in the spring of 2024, but they ran into construction problems, which now brings us to 2025,” he said, referring to when the new span is expected to be completed. “The organizers aren’t crazy about the situation too,” Hurley added, referring to tournament officials.

All three lanes on the old bridge are now open, which will channel traffic on and off the island. No construction is currently taking place.

Traffic onto Île Bizard during the tournament will be subject to a filtering system, Hurley said, to make sure everyone coming onto the island are residents or have business there.

“To verify that, we will provide a vignette for vehicles so they can enter the island between 7 a.m. and 7 p.m. After that, anyone can get on the island,” he said.

The Royal Montreal Golf Club last hosted the President’s Cup in 2007.