Editor's note: This story was originally published in the Belleville News-Democrat.
One magical night each summer, people took to the streets of Belleville by the thousands, pedaling cruisers and racing bikes, tandems and hybrids, recumbents and tricycles.
Some decorated bicycles with American flags or neon lights. Others dressed like cowboys, space aliens or movie characters. A few carried boomboxes. People who lived along the route sat in lawn chairs, rang cowbells and cheered from yards lit by tiki torches and fire pits.
The spectacle was known as Tour de Belleville, and it’s ending after 19 years. The city’s Parks and Recreation District will hold one more ride this summer.
“Safety is always a concern,” said Jason Poole, director of Public Works, which includes Parks and Recreation. “Putting people on the streets of Belleville on a Friday night is not the safest thing to do anymore.
“We’ve never had a major issue. We’ve had quite a few accidents but nothing major, and we were concerned that something could happen.”
Helmets are required on the ride, but some bicyclists don’t wear them. Participants sign liability waivers, but if someone got hit by a car, the city could be named in a lawsuit, Poole said.
Officials made Tour de Belleville a daytime ride in 2021. The following year, they moved it to a rural bike trail and subdivision in the vicinity of Eckert’s Orchard. Participation plummeted.
“It just didn’t have the feel of Tour de Belleville,” Poole said.
“It was a great family event. The people who participated really liked it. But the feedback was, ‘It’s not Tour de Belleville, and if you’re not going to have it in downtown Belleville, you shouldn’t call it Tour de Belleville.’”
The last ride
Other factors in the decision to end Tour de Belleville were costs and manpower, according to Poole.
If the city went back to nighttime rides on city streets, he said, it would have to spend an estimated $10,000 a year in overtime wages for more than 20 police officers to stand patrol at intersections and six Street Department employees to block off and reopen streets.
The ride has always been a fundraiser. Money from registration fees, sponsors and raffles have paid for more than $260,000 in police safety equipment and parks and recreation improvements in the past 18 years.
When asked why proceeds aren’t used to pay overtime wages, Poole said officials also have to consider the time of city employees.
“We have a lot of other events going on downtown, and it taxes our city employees when they’re forced to work event after event after event,” he said. “It wears on the them. It’s a challenge.”
The Parks and Recreation Department has scheduled the last ride, dubbed the Sunset Tour de Belleville, for Friday, July 12.
It will go back to being a nighttime ride on city streets, although the location is different. Bicyclists will start and finish at the Southwestern Illinois Justice & Workforce Development Campus, formerly Lindenwood University-Belleville, on West Main.
Poole foresees the the city continuing to sponsor a daytime bike ride each summer but under a different name.
Founded in 2006
Phil Elmore, who founded Tour de Belleville in 2006 with his wife, Barb Elmore, described news of its demise as “heartbreaking.” But he accepts the decision. He noted that the city no longer has auxiliary police officers, and it’s harder to recruit volunteers than it used to be.
“It’s gotten very expensive,” said Elmore, who now serves as a Ward 7 alderman. “I think it may have just run its course.”
Ward I Alderwoman Lillian Schneider seemed similarly resigned.
“I’m glad it was started because of the money raised,” she said. “But it takes a lot of volunteers, and it’s gotten to the point that there’s hardly any volunteers in the city of Belleville.”
The Elmores planned the first ride to help Schneider, who had been holding bake sales and otherwise trying to raise $13,000 to buy the city a portable electronic speed monitor to slow down traffic in neighborhoods.
Tour de Belleville was billed as a non-competitive, family-friendly ride patterned off the popular Moonlight Ramble in St. Louis. The name was adapted from the Tour de France.
“We were just trying to do something fun for our neighborhood, and (more than 500) people showed up,” Elmore said last week.
The first ride on Friday, July 14, 2006, consisted of one 7-mile route on city streets in east Belleville. Bicyclists started at 9 p.m. at Union United Methodist Church on East Main Street.
“I really enjoyed riding down Garden Boulevard,” participant Debbie Kruep told the BND that year. “My husband, my nephew and my dad, who is 69, rode along with me. We had a really good time.”
The ride’s first sponsor was Hal Leventhal, owner of the Bicycle World bike shop, which closed last year. Artist Gary McCoy designed the first logo for T-shirts, featuring Otto, the city’s German mascot, riding a bike. Beatnik’s in Belleville printed them.
Hit from the starting line
Tour de Belleville participation nearly doubled the second year. Organizers created two different routes, one 7 miles and one 14 miles. They also sold tickets for a bicycle raffle, offered picnic meals at Nichols Community Center and distributed blinking safety lights to all.
Afterward, Elmore rode his bicycle into Belleville City Council chambers to deliver a check for $23,000. That allowed the city to buy two emergency-call-button towers for bike trails and a bike rack for police.
“I couldn’t have been prouder to see 1,038 people riding the streets of Belleville,” said former Mayor Mark Eckert, now deceased. “I think this is a tremendous family event. ... It was a great evening in Belleville.”
The Elmores chaired the ride for two more years, although it officially became a Parks and Recreation Department event. Participation continued to grow with 1,362 bicyclists the third year and 1,609 the fourth. East Main Street became part of the route in 2009.
“It couldn’t have been better,” Elmore said after that ride. “Belleville never ceases to amaze me. The economy is down this year, but people still came out. The Tour de Belleville is going to live forever. I have no doubt in my mind.”
In later years, annual themes such as “Three-Hour Tour” from the TV show “Gilligan’s Island” and the 100th anniversary of Scott Air Force Base prompted people to decorate bikes and dress in costume. Pre-ride parties in the Union United parking lot featured bands, raffles, photos and repairs.
Beatnik’s owner John Bigalke remembers people who lived along the route throwing parties in their front yards, grilling brats and watching bicyclists pass by from lawn chairs.
“They were cheering us on like we were heroes,” he said.
Diane Ely, of Belleville, was part of a group of 22 family members and friends who wore pirate costumes for the 2009 ride. They returned the following year with bikes decorated like cows.
“We just enjoyed bike rides, and I think the idea of riding around downtown Belleville at night sounded fun,” Ely said last week. “It was a great activity. But it just got so big so fast.”
COVID-19 woes
Tour de Belleville had more than 2,300 bicyclists and 200 volunteers for the 2014 ride. Its theme, “No Place Like Home,” prompted people to dress like Dorothy, the Wicked Witch and other characters from “The Wizard of Oz.”
About 1,500 people participated in 2019, the last year before the COVID-19 pandemic hit and canceled the 2020 ride.
“It was kind of like a mountain,” Poole said. “It climbed and climbed, and it peaked around 2,300 participants, and then it was declining every year after that, and then COVID hit.”
About 650 bicyclists showed up for the 2021 daytime ride on city streets that was held in October instead of July due to the pandemic.
Participation dropped to about 400 bicyclists in 2022, when the pre-ride party took place at Eckert’s Orchard. Routes included St. Clair County Transit District’s Orchard Loop Trail and streets in The Orchards subdivision.
“There’s only one Tour de Belleville, and it’s sad to see it go,” Elmore said last week. “I would have loved to see a solution to keep it going, but I couldn’t come up with one.”
This year’s pre-ride party will begin at 6 p.m. July 12 with food trucks, a bike raffle and music by the Righteous 5 band at Southwestern Illinois Justice & Workforce Development Campus at 2300 W. Main St.
Bicyclists will have the option of covering a 6-mile or 11-mile route, beginning at 8 p.m. Registration costs $25 in advance (6 and under free) or $35 at the event. Participants will receive complimentary T-shirts. The city is bringing back Gary McCoy to design the logo.
Teri Maddox is a reporter with the Belleville News-Democrat, a news partner of St. Louis Public Radio.
