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Montreal officials are expressing confidence there could be skating on the Lachine Canal and year-long cycling along its bike paths as soon as next winter due to a newly supportive federal government.

Federal Environment Minister Catherine McKenna was in Montreal Tuesday to announce her government would invest $132 million over the next four years to repair the aging walls and locks of the 14-kilometre Lachine Canal. The work, to be done mostly in the autumn to avoid interfering with boating season, involves reinforcing the concrete and stone retaining walls of the canal, as well as repair work on its locks, spillways and the Gauron and Lafleur bridges. They are the first major upgrades to be carried out on the canal, built in 1825 to give boats a way to bypass the Lachine Rapids, since 2002. Another $10 million is going to repair the Sainte-Anne-de-Bellevue Canal.

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But of more interest to most users, McKenna said the government is studying proposals to open sections of the canal to skating and keeping the bike paths open 12 months of the year.