Anti-restrictions convoy heading to Edmonton Saturday
CBC
A convoy protesting COVID-19 pandemic restrictions is inbound for Edmonton Saturday for a fourth consecutive weekend.
The Edmonton Police Service issued a statement Friday, saying the convoy will be converging on the province's capital city.
Police say traffic jams may occur between 10:30 a.m. and 6 p.m., particularly along Anthony Henday Drive, Yellowhead Trail, Victoria Trail, Whitemud Drive, Gateway Boulevard, Walterdale Hill, Queen Elizabeth Park Road and throughout downtown Edmonton.
Broadmoor Boulevard in Sherwood Park may also experience some congestion, police added.
Saturday's convoy will be the fourth in as many weekends. It will meet at the Alberta Legislature Grounds, then participants will march.
The first convoy that rode through Edmonton was to show local support for a larger national trucker convoy — what organizers call the Freedom Convoy — that, originally, was in Ottawa to protest a federal vaccine policy.
In mid-January, a new policy took effect for truckers crossing the Canada-U.S. border — a group previously exempt from pandemic entry requirements.
It stated that Canadian truck drivers who are not fully vaccinated against COVID-19 must get a PCR test outside Canada within 72 hours of re-entry; get tested when they arrive; then self-test on Day 8 of a mandatory two-week quarantine period.
The United States government, however, also implemented a similar policy in January that stopped all unvaccinated and partially vaccinated non-U.S. travellers, including essential workers, from entering the country.
Together, the policies stopped Canadian truckers who had not received two doses of a COVID-19 vaccine from leaving the country. Although, they can move freely interprovincially.
Participants of the Freedom Convoy have occupied Ottawa for weeks, but police are now slowly pushing them out.
The convoys — in Ottawa, as well as Alberta — have expanded from supporting truckers to focusing more on overall pandemic restrictions.
Last weekend, the City of Edmonton received a court injunction against honking in the downtown area, as the convoys have been disrupting businesses and the lives of residents.
But police have since said the injunction did not have the desired effect, because the force can issue stiffer fines through regular by-laws.
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