House District 95 representative Brad Tschida told KGVO News that all interested are invited to join in a caravan of vehicles through Missoula to celebrate Independence Day on Saturday.

“A group of us wanted to do something on Saturday to commemorate Independence Day,” said Tschida. “Too many people, I believe, get distracted by the fact that’s it’s the 4th of July and there’s a lot of fireworks, but it’s important have some commemoration of what the 4th of July is really all about, and that it is Independence Day for the U.S. and we are celebrating it’s 244th anniversary.”

Tschida said anyone in a vehicle is welcome to travel together in a display of patriotism and unity for the United States of America on its 244th birthday. He describes the route the caravan will take.

“We’re planning to meeting in front of the Field House parking lot for whoever wants to participate,” he said. “We’ll exit the Field House parking lot and go over the Madison Street Bridge and then going down Broadway past the County Courthouse, past Russell Street and going out to Reserve Street, then making a northern swing to the Interstate and then coming back down all the way south on Reserve Street to Brooks Street and then following Brooks Street back to the point of departure.”

Tschida emphasized that this is not an ‘official’ parade and that drivers must strictly obey all traffic laws and speed limits.

“People are going to have to abide by stop signs, traffic signals and traffic flow,” he said. “We want to make sure that people understand that we’re not going to have anything closed off, it’s just going to be people driving and we’ll do our best to keep the phalanx together so that we don’t get too separated. We can slow down as we get to the four-lane streets like Reserve and make sure that those who may be farther back can catch up and participate.”

Tschida hopes that participants will display patriotic symbols like the American Flag, and he hopes for some classic vehicles, as well to help celebrate the day.

Here’s Tschida’s timeline.

“We’re going to begin to line up at 10:30 a.m. on Saturday,” he said. “We’re hoping to depart from the Field House parking lot at around 11:00 a.m., and I would think that with traffic flow and the time it would take to drive the route that we should be done between noon and 12:30 p.m.

Tschida emphasized that the caravan is not meant to be political, but patriotic.

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