Car-Free Montreal Street Hailed as Success

A pedestrianization project on Montreal’s Mont-Royal Avenue is proving to be a hit with local residents and businesses, writes Eric Andrew-Gee in The Globe and Mail. 

Born out of the pandemic, the Mont-Royal project, which has closed the street to cars for the last four summers, has gained support from two-thirds of local business owners and 90 percent of visitors questioned in a survey by a local business association.

Voting with their feet, Montrealers have turned the street into a daily festival, with thick crowds almost around the clock, shopping, wandering, packing private patios, or sinking into the baby-blue Adirondack chairs laid out for public use.

According to Andrew-Gee, “With a span of 2.5 kilometres blocked off to traffic, covering more than 30 intersections, it’s about twice as expansive as more famous, albeit permanent, promenades such as Bordeaux’s Sainte-Catherine or Stroget in Copenhagen.”

In the wake of this success, the city is working to convert nine other commercial street segments to pedestrian areas.