Users of the Réseau express métropolitain (REM) are mobilizing to demand the creation of a shuttle between Brossard and Montreal’s Robert-Bourassa station amid delays related to Griffintown station. A petition sponsored by a Liberal MP has just been submitted to the National Assembly.
Posted at 3:28 p.m.
Pierre-Luc Sarault lives on the south coast and works in the southern part of the Cité du Multimédia in Griffintown. Before the REM’s arrival, he usually left his car in the Chevrier incentive parking lot before taking bus 90 from the Réseau de transport de Longueuil (RTL), which took him to the other side of the Samuel De Champlain Bridge .
The bus then dropped him off a five-minute walk from his work. But since the REM’s arrival, “dropping off at the main station and waiting for a bus or a 20-25 minute walk has been the weak link in my itinerary, not to mention connecting to that station.”
“It used to take me 40 minutes, now it takes about 1:05 to 1:10 hours door-to-door. Once the Griffintown station is there it will be better, but that won’t be the case for another three or four years,” says Mr Sarault.
He is one of the citizens supporting the initiative of the Association for Collective Transport of the South Shore (ATCRS), which this week launched a petition on the National Assembly website sponsored by the Liberal MP for La Pinière, Linda Caron .
A “very used” stop
In this petition, we recall that the Line 90 stop at the corner of Robert-Bourassa and William in Montreal was “extensively used by workers from the Cité du Multimédia and Old Montreal.”
Since the introduction of the REM last July, RTL and Exo buses can no longer use the Samuel De Champlain Bridge, as the REM law stipulates that no form of public transport can compete with light rail. Therefore, a major restructuring of the bus network was launched, to the great dismay of some users, both on exo and on RTL and even on L’Île-des-Sœurs.
However, the REM is not yet a reality in Griffintown: the future station will ultimately not be built until 2027, while CDPQ Infra had previously given a deadline of 2024. Meanwhile, “the sector’s sponsors are already paying a fee to finance the REM,” the signatories note.
“For many users, the lack of a train station in Griffintown means a doubling of travel time compared to the situation that existed with buses,” said ATCRS spokesman Axel Fournier. “The return of a bus service is essential at this location to avoid inconvenience to users while they wait for CDPQ Infra to complete its project,” he added.
According to him, “CDPQ Infra need not fear the introduction of such a service as it will strengthen customer loyalty while waiting for the arrival of a REM station in Griffintown.”
According to MP Linda Caron, the project would, above all, “make life easier for families by not excessively increasing the journey time of workers and motivate them to continue using public transport”. “The provision of a shuttle […] “seems to me to be a sensible solution while I wait for the future Griffintown – Bernard-Landry REM station to become operational,” the provincial elected official added.
Not in the ARTM plans
The Regional Metropolitan Transport Authority (ARTM) is called upon to respond, arguing, as we explained above, that the law requires “that no collective transportation service may be provided using one or other of the non-competitive basins for the Deux-Montagnes, Ste .” connects branches in Anne-de-Bellevue and Rive-Sud, including downtown Montreal.
“Such a service would require a specific agreement with CDPQ Infra,” says ARTM spokeswoman Isabella Brisson.
She also argues that “public transport faces a very constrained financial situation”. “We want to address a significant deficit in the 2024 budget so that there is no impact on existing services. In this context, there are no plans to add such a service, especially since the Cité du Multimedia is already served by buses from Île-des-Sœur and Gare-Centrale station,” claims ARTM.
The organization explains that the services that serve the Cité du Multimédia from Highway 10 “are carried out from the Île-des-Sœurs station, where line 168 allows you to continue towards the Henri-Bourassa corridor”, with stops at the Wellington, William and Notre Dame Axes stops, among others.
According to several experts, the Griffintown – Bernard-Landry station poses particular challenges because CDPQ Infra has decided to build it once the REM is operational. Maintaining service 20 hours a day promises to cause headaches for construction managers.