Article content

The city’s efforts to squelch protests over its unsafe bridge across the Rideau River have turned a small memorial on the bridge into a petty war zone.

Fifty-five-year-old Meg Dussault was killed there, at the south end of Billings Bridge, when she was “right-hooked” by a cement truck that turned across her path. Three years ago this past weekend.

We apologize, but this video has failed to load.

tap here to see other videos from our team. Try refreshing your browser, or Reevely: Battle escalates over 'ghost bike' at Bank and Riverside — and the city deserves it Back to video

Since then, someone put up a white “ghost bike” as a reminder of what happened there. Dussault’s family adopted it and turned the spot into a bit of a shrine, with flowers and decorations that changed with the seasons. After a while, and a couple of complaints, the city adopted a citywide policy limiting such memorials to six months and took everything away.

Then, more recently, someone drew a bike on the concrete end of the bridge in chalk.

“I had talked about wanting to do it, because chalk is totally legal, there’s nothing wrong with it, you can just do it,” said Kathryn Hunt, who rides through that spot every day on her commute between her Herongate home and her job downtown. She wasn’t the first, she said, but when this year’s rare rains washed the chalk away, she started drawing new bikes with chalk of her own.