Montreal: A Metro Stuck in the Past

An amazing metro, that needs to enter the 21st century.

I love the Montreal Metro. The system is architecturally magnificent, fairly extensive, unique in several ways (like being entirely enclosed including the yards), and just of a scale (giant underground station caverns, sometimes large enough to swallow the buildings on the surface that surround them, big interchanges) that few systems on this continent match. Canada certainly doesn’t have another system that feels like it belongs in a grand global city. I also can’t help but mention that the Azur trains are still probably the best metro trains in North America both functionally and aesthetically, and that’s fitting of such an attractive system.

Verdun Station

So I’m broadly very positive on the Montreal Metro, but upon planning a trip to the city in the summer to attend Paige Saunders’s annual event, I couldn’t help but be annoyed. Especially now that I have a kid in tow, the Montreal Metro feels like a symbol of what is wrong with public transit in the city — especially the transit run by the STM and ARTM: it’s stuck in the past, and substandard in many ways. It just feels like the system is missing a lot of features that would make using it casually a lot easier.

Something which has annoyed me over the years is the energy and vigor Montreal transit folks have had to complain about the REM — complaints that I have become more sympathetic to over the years, especially since there have been more service disruptions on the initial segment than is reasonable (I’m obviously still very excited for the whole island-spanning system to open). While in the meantime, the STM and ARTM seem to mostly get by doing all kinds of crazy things — like not doing something with the horrible commuter train service, or fixing the rather dysfunctional bus network, things that could be addressed to varying degrees. But, probably prime among these given its importance is the state of the metro, and the sort of excuse-making about its problems.

The most obvious of these is the inaccessibility of the system. I complain about Toronto a lot, but the Toronto subway was similarly inaccessible to the Metro a couple decades ago, and in just a handful of years it will be 100% step-free accessible, and newer lines go even further (only a few stations actually don’t have elevators anymore). I understand that the TTC’s hand was forced because of legislation — that any transit agency needs to be forced to do things like add elevators that make the system more attractive to use for all riders says a lot — but the outcome is the same. (Quebec does have notably less accessible structures and facilities than Ontario, and I notice it every time I visit — so I guess good job Ontario).

Now, it’s fair to say that making the metro accessible is harder than the Toronto subway. The stations are often deeper and grander, meaning that adding an elevator is just a bigger more expensive task, but I’d argue the level of access is much worse than even this would suggest. Looking at the Metro map after booking our hotel, I was shocked that the entire stretch of stations near it is elevator-free — they didn’t even try to get one or two done so this general part of the city had at least some options. There are also the rather horrible heavy swinging doors that are used on the system, which, again, make access harder for literally everyone.

If I were a Montrealer, I’d be heaping the pressure on the city and STM to fix this. I understand that maybe part of the issues have to do with a desire to respect the architecture of the beautiful stations (which has had mixed results), but clearly the greater good here is just having a system that people can use with a stroller or with someone who can’t do stairs. This is like the one place where doing what Paris does (having a poorly accessible system) is really bad! Part of the solution is probably using some “unique” technologies, like incline elevators, which might allow for unique placement and insertion of elevators into some of the stations. Just call the Swiss — they are good at this stuff.

The next problem, which I’ve talked about before, and which I will keep beating the drum on, is air conditioning. Yes, it is the case that the Metro is generally bearable even in the summer thanks to having lots of ventilation, but Quebec is literally an electricity superpower in one of the wealthiest countries in the world — air condition your subway system! Having to be sweaty no matter where you go because you took the metro is a real disincentive to using it! People’s cars have A/C! Buses have A/C! This issue also does interact with mobility, because some groups like old people and pregnant women who might be more reliant on transit than average (if they can access the stations that are rather lacking in powered vertical circulation elements) are also heat sensitive!

Every time I bring this issue up, someone jumps in with the “the system is sealed, it’s impossible!” excuse, which is laughable (an official STM social media account even had the gall to do this at one point!). It may be the case that air conditioning the system today requires some unique technical solutions and spending on other things — it might even require getting rid of the doors on stations so that air can flow freely into and out of the system, and building extra ventilation plants (as the STM has already been doing), and that would be ok! Its ok to do a big investment program for access and quality-of-life features! It’s an investment in a better, more accessible system that’s better adapted to an older population and a hotter climate! This stuff is common sense! London, which is by all measures much more constrained in installing A/C on the tube is even doing it in a limited sense with its new trains, which required crazy engineering to enable it.

The reality is, this is a perfect example of the effect mentioned in my “GO Transit Setback” post, where it’s very easy in technical fields like metro planning and engineering to come up with excuses as to why various things “aren’t possible” when clearly it’s more of a matter of funding, but especially will.

The other point that I’m reminded of every time I am in Montreal is both “wow the fares are so low, especially for passes, this is great!” and wow it’s insane that they have so many fare gates, and like one fare machine per station. Now, having one fare machine shouldn’t be as big of a problem as it is, but Montreal is now arguably the hardest big city in the country to pay for transit in: even Ottawa beat you to open payment guys, and LAVAL. Stuff like this is where you realize just how far behind North America remains on transit. I can understand us being bad at building electric trains or subways when we don’t do it much, but not being able to make paying for stuff easy? Really? This is obviously not only a problem in Montreal, but like all these problems, it stands out because Montreal should be good at this stuff; it’s a city that wants to be transit-first and often is, and then it trips up on basic stuff.

And before you say “they’re testing open payment now and you’ll have it in next year!” that’s no help for me today, or this summer, or ten plus years ago when London had this. North American cities should immediately get the soft parts of transit in order; they need not be hard, we just need to care.

There are also the slightly more forward-looking things. It annoys me that while Montreal emulates Parisian Metro inaccessibility, it does not emulate the retrofitting of platform screen doors and automation of lines (other French cities have automated metros, or are retrofitting). There was musing a few years ago (and even renders) about screen doors on the Orange Line, and then that died — and that’s too bad because even in Quebec it seems more capital dollars are available for transit than operating dollars, and screen doors are a useful tool for converting capital dollars into screen doors that save you operating dollars in the form of disruptions.

I’ve talked about it before, but the work happening to resignal the Blue line and prep stations for the extension was an obvious time to automate the line and install screen doors (you might not even have to lengthen the stations this way!), but of course that didn’t happen, because having world-class public transit is not a top priority from a political to transit agency level. It might not surprise you to hear, but screen doors also have an accessibility element — it makes using a wheelchair or stroller a lot less stressful, and it’s similar for people with limited vision.

Montreal obviously has a transit expansion problem, but all of the things I mentioned in this post would make for a better, more robust system, and they also cost less than major expansion (but could be good training for it!). If cities want to be taken seriously on transit, they have to get the little things right, and step into the present day.