The City of Laval plans to build tens of thousands of housing units in the next decade. But public transport remains a major challenge, according to the mayor, Stéphane Boyer, who believes that we must begin the extension of the orange line without delay, on the northern crown of the metropolis.
Posted at 4:39 p.m.
Tuesday, the City of Laval officially presented the model of its future city center, on the occasion of the Great IMPACT Real Estate Investments meeting, organized by the Laval economic expert group at the Le Château Royal convention center.
In interview with The Pressthe mayor of Laval, Stéphane Boyer, hoped that the public transport supply will follow the housing supply in the city, which is advancing at great speed at the moment.
“I believe we have a duty to plan immediately [le prolongement de la ligne orange du métro]because we must not wait until the 42,000 housing units have been built,” said Mr. Boyer.
SATURDAY, The Press revealed that Laval planned to welcome approximately 100,000 new residents within 10 years, in its plan, which currently includes the construction of 42,000 housing units. The various real estate projects, from developers Cadillac Fairview, Cominar, SmartCentres or Groupe Mach – all present at the meeting – will be based in downtown Laval. In total, the City has listed 138 housing projects being built throughout its territory, several of which will be located between the Montmorency metro station and Carrefour Laval.
IMAGE PROVIDED BY THE CITY OF LAVAL
Model of future developments
“It is certain that this year, the government announced 11 billion deficits, so we feel that there is not much appetite for major spending,” underlined Mr. Boyer.
In May 2022, Minister François Bonnardel, then responsible for Transport, moved forward with the creation of a project office for the extension of the metro line on the northern crown of Montreal. To date, the project office has still not been launched.
And the cars?
The tens of thousands of new residents will also mean additional cars on city roads.
“We experience congestion on Highway 15 and Highway 13 in the morning. We don’t see it so much on the boulevards,” assessed the mayor. “And the opportunity there is in Laval is that we have many large shopping centers which have very large parking lots. But this parking lot can be underground, then we can build housing on top,” he continued.
But Mr. Boyer reiterates: if an efficient public transport system is not put in place, there will be more cars. For this reason, it is not possible to assess, for the moment, what the size of the automobile fleet in Laval will be in 10 years.
The municipality does not want to repeat the mistakes made during the extension of the blue line, since there was “no collaboration with the land owners,” explained the mayor. “Here, we have owners who […] are ready to collaborate precisely to avoid this,” he added.
The real estate projects, currently dedicated to rental, will be built in particular in the Laval Quarter, near Place Bell, near Carrefour Laval, and in Centropolis.
The “capital of opportunities”
During the event, the mayor of Laval assured that the conditions are met so that, in the coming years, it will be in Laval that the majority of the housing needed in Greater Montreal will be built.
I think that the population will go where housing is built.
Stéphane Boyer, mayor of Laval
“This is what we saw in Vancouver and Toronto. The development, the development opportunities were more in the suburbs,” he mentioned.
In Surrey, a municipality in the suburbs of Vancouver, the number of residents increased from 468,000 to 568,000 between 2011 and 2021. During the same period, the suburb of Brampton, on the outskirts of Toronto, increased from 525,000 to 656,000 inhabitants. .
The Minister responsible for Housing, France-Élaine Duranceau, also took part in the event and stressed that the provincial government was working to relax regulations in the housing construction process. The City of Laval has also implemented an ambitious plan to reduce permit processing times by 50% since 2021, in order to achieve its objectives.
Each complex built will include 25% green spaces, it was specified during the presentation of the model. Many services, such as schools or pharmacies, are also in the plans to meet the needs of the new population.
