The main access to the summit of Mount Royal, the Camillien Houde route, will be closed to vehicles in 2027, Valérie Plante confirmed on Wednesday. Remembrance Road will be the only way to reach the mountain by car or bus.
Published at 1:18 p.m. Updated at 1:29 p.m
The mayor confirmed the information published by La Presse and presented a project to completely rehabilitate this artery on which around 10,000 motorists travel every day.
In place of the current street, “we will create a large promenade for pedestrians with a parallel and separate path for cyclists,” said Ms. Plante, referring to “massive greening” of the artery. “We show courage. »
Emergency vehicles are allowed to operate, but cars are not. You must use Remembrance Road on the other side of the mountain in the Côte-des-Neiges–Notre-Dame-de-Grâce district. The same applies to the Société de transport de Montréal (STM) buses.
“We accept our responsibility and take the concrete and ambitious actions expected of us to respond to the challenges of our time and the needs of future generations,” said the mayor. The mountain will no longer be a shortcut, but it will remain a destination of international stature. »
PHOTO MARCO CAMPANOZZI, LA PRESSE ARCHIVE
Valerie Plante
“At the heart of the vision we present to you today is the safety of the most vulnerable: pedestrians and cyclists,” added Ms. Plante. “The mountain belongs to everyone. To all Montrealers. »
The decision comes after years of hesitation over the future of the main access to Mount Royal and concerns about ecology, safety and accessibility.
In the past, Valérie Plante has often shown herself open to the rehabilitation of the Camillien-Houde route, where the death of Clément Ouimet, a young 18-year-old cyclist, in a collision with a motorist in 2017 left its mark, and the cyclist died at the foot in 2021 of the hill.
Two years later, after a pilot project to close through traffic, the mayor argued that the status quo was “no longer possible.”
The fire department refused a complete closure
In late August, La Presse revealed that the Plante government had asked Montreal firefighters for their opinion on the possibility of completely closing the road to vehicles.
“A new option consisting of using Camillien Houde Street exclusively for pedestrians and cyclists” is being considered by the city, according to a statement from the Montreal Fire Safety Service (SIM). However, the service rejected the idea: “According to our investigations, there will be an extension of our travel times.” »
At the end of the document, the SIM stated that it supported the status quo. “In the event that a change occurs,” the expansion of a “6-meter-wide emergency road that is snow-free in winter” is “necessary,” the service said. This width would allow a vehicle to “pass pedestrians even in snowdrifts.”
Last spring, the council voted for a loan of 45 million to finance the design and construction of the rehabilitation works on Camillien-Houde Road and Remembrance Road, to be carried out by 2026.
However, the documents given to elected officials before the vote did not mention the possibility of completely closing the Camillien-Houde route to cars – the person in charge of mobility within the Plante government only mentioned a “very exciting proposal” .
The following month, Mayor Valérie Plante complained that the project was taking longer than expected to see the light of day. She spoke while a cousin of Clément Ouimet had just become the victim of a driver who lost control of his vehicle. He was not seriously injured.