A couple of thousand Brantford-Brant residents attended the fifth annual Wheels on the Pavement event at the Brantford and District Civic Centre on Sunday, May 25, 2025.
Hosted in partnership between the Downtown Central, East Ward Echo Place, Holmedale and Eagle Place Neighbourhood Associations, as well as the City of Brantford, the event was held in celebration of National Public Works Week. The event featured an assortment of around 50 city vehicles, big rigs, emergency response vehicles and jeeps from the Brantford Area Jeep and Off Road Club (BAJC) for parents and children alike to explore.
“We have a lot of Public Works employees and their vehicles here today, as well as several other vehicles from the City and local businesses too,” said Sylvia Collins, Chair of the Neighbourhood Alliance for the City of Brantford. “It’s just a great chance for everyone who sees these vehicles on a daily basis and who may be curious about what they look like inside, to see how they work.”
Collins explained that the event was originally the brainchild of Jayme Wilson-Belore, and has been evolving ever since.
“Back then, she gathered the fellow neighbourhood hub chairs and said, ‘what do you think of this idea?’ and so at the time, they came together to get the first one off the ground and then we eventually partnered with the City,” she said. “That’s been a great partnership, because we’ve been able to be here at the Civic Centre, and we were able to get Public Works involved with all their vehicles so it’s been really nice.”
As the event got underway, it didn’t take long for the youngsters and their parents to start lining up for a chance to explore the various vehicles, honk a few horns and pose for photos.
Carolyn Dares, an arborist with the City’s forestry department, said the event was a fantastic chance for children to interact with Public Works employees.
“This is a great, interactive opportunity for the kids to check out the vehicles but to also get introduced to different types of careers too,” she said. “Of course, big trucks attract little children, so it’s an amazing event for them; a lot of them just want to climb in and honk the horns, but a lot of them have come up and asked questions about the chainsaws and such too so that’s been fun.”
Throughout the event, families connected with the many different community partner booths to play games, pick up some goodies or acquire temporary tattoos. Many were sure to also get a balloon animal from Marco the Clown, and stop to watch the Just Dance Line Dancing Community entertain the crowd.
A fan-favourite of the day was watching the Alpha Power Lifters pull a Ken’s Towing 72,000-pound rotator truck.
Organizers were also collecting non-perishables and school-safe snacks on behalf of Gifts of the Heart, a local not-for-profit organization dedicated to addressing the issues of food and clothing insecurity that faces young school-age children.
Joe Doolittle and Kat Hill said it was their first time visiting the event.
“There’s a lot of stuff going on here for sure, so that’s nice,” said Doolittle. “It’s kind of cool too, because it gives them a safe way to come up and approach these vehicles and check them out. The kids particularly liked checking out the fire truck, so that was really fun to see.”
Kimberly De Jong’s reporting is funded by the Canadian government through its Local Journalism Initiative.The funding allows her to report rural and agricultural stories from Blandford-Blenheim and Brant County. Reach her at kimberly.dejong@brantbeacon.ca.
