Almost half of the Montreal metro stations are now in poor condition

Near one in two station from the Montreal metro is in poor condition, and its users should expect more and more emergency closures if the necessary work is not done on the network.

“We do not want to collect ourselves in a situation where we will pay for a metro who will not drive,” worries Éric Alan Caldwell, Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Montreal Transport Company (STM), in an interview with The newspaper.

last year, the STM concluded that 9 of its 68 metro stations were in poor condition, obtaining the worst notes, “D” or “e”, according to the government state index.

However, a new method of analysis made him realize that the situation is much more serious than it believed, because today is 31 stations which obtain one of these notes, that is 46% of them.

Among these, five stations obtain the note of “E”, ie Saint-Michel, Peel, Champ-de-Mars, Fabre and the church.

The Henri-Bourassa, Côte-Vertu, Jean-Talon, Snowdon and Longueuil-University-de-Sherbrooke stations are among those with a “d”.

There are only two stations with the “A” rating, Cartier and Montmorency in Laval, two of the most recent on the network.

It is nothing very delightful for metro users, who learned last week that they will generally have to pay more next year for public transport in the metropolitan region, in particular for the subscription on the island of Montreal, which will go from $ 100 to $ 104.50 per 1^is July.

Many risky stations

To reach this conclusion, the STM is no longer based only on the sums of the required maintenance work. It also takes into account precise elements which, if they are not corrected, could be fraught with consequences. The portrait is thus much fairer, believes André Gamba, head of engineering and asset management division.

“There may be a beam to be redone which does not necessarily cost tens of millions, but if it continues to deteriorate, we will have to close the station or the edict,” he illustrates.

This poorly shiny assessment is explained by a lack of funding from the provincial and federal levels which are the main contributors allowing to maintain the metro, according to Mr. Caldwell.

Éric Alan Caldwell, Chairman of the Board of Directors of the STM. Photo taken from Eric Alan Caldwell’s LinkedIn Account

“What worried us in the last budget is that there was a reduction in the maintenance of assets for the metro for the next five years,” he said, while the STM estimates that it would take an additional $ 585 million over the next three years to give the necessary stroke.

The study of the credits of the Ministry of Transport and Sustainable Mobility, which will be held on Wednesday, must offer more details on the amounts that Quebec will allocate to the metro, specifies the president.

Other cases like Saint-Michel?

In October, Saint-Michel station had to close urgently for more than a month due to the significant deterioration of a beam.

This is the type of event which is called upon to multiply in the coming years given the decrepitude of the network, believe the STM and the expert in transport of transport Pierre Barrieau.

“It will be more stations closings that will be more unexpected, as long as we will not be able to fill the maintenance deficit. These will be important emergency closures that will last from a few days to a few weeks, ”says Barrieau.