The city’s last industrial area
Would it even be possible to turn the Louvain‑Chabanel area into another Plateau, as is suggested here? Development is about to start on the big space left when the old munitions factory was demolished a few years ago. Can a walkable neighbourhood be created here deliberately – and should it?
DeWolf 14:56 on 2025-10-23 Permalink
There are so many annoying things in that article I don’t even know where to start.
The whole Plateau question is a really silly way to frame the discussion. There’s no plan to get rid of the industrial areas in Chabanel, only a plan to develop mixed-use projects on vacant land. There is already a lot of residential around there: everything south of Chabanel and north of Sauvé. It’s a light industrial area not much different than the old garment district in Mile End or the industrial areas on the edge of the Plateau. (So maybe it’s already like the Plateau?) We’re not talking about oil refineries or steel mills, we’re talking about workshops and light manufacturing. Those are essential to the health of the city but they don’t need to be quarantined in some isolated area the way more noxious industrial uses do.
Also, the article states that Chabanel is the “last industrial area in Montreal” which is like… huh? There are vast industrial areas in VSL and Anjou, not to mention LaSalle and Montreal North.
The mattress guy complaining about the bike path is exactly the kind of blowhard who dominates media coverage despite a total lack of credibility. He’s lying through his teeth when he says the bike path suddenly appeared overnight. There were notices delivered to mailboxes, signs put up… it’s this kind of bellicose rhetoric that is poisoning any discussion of municipal issues. And the kicker is he isn’t even directly affected by the bike path!
Speaking of which, all the discussion of the bike path I’ve seen makes it sound like it was just randomly plopped there with no rhyme or reason. But look at a map: it’s meant to connect the western part of Ahuntsic with Chabanel and Park Ex. There are people that need to get to and from these areas without risking their lives. And whatever Soraya says, the opinion of bellyaching business owners does not change the fact that it’s much safer to cycle to and through Chabanel than it was before.
There are industrial areas next to highways with no sidewalks and nothing else nearby. This isn’t one of them. It’s a central district surrounded by residential areas with no shortage of retail. Those big industrial buildings are full of workshops, small factories and studios whose employees and customers often come by public transit — and even sometimes by bike! — and they need safe and comfortable ways to get where they’re going.
Ian 22:10 on 2025-10-23 Permalink
I used to work up there at a garment factory, and I rode my bike. A whole sewing factory and shipping and receiving warehouse and office and I was the only person who rode a bike. Everyone who didn’t drive took the bus, no exaggeration. I never understood why, the bus in those mixed light industrial areas really sucked, riding my bike was fast and easy in comparison.
After reading this article, I think more important than what grouchy merchants or well-meaning urbanists think, I’d love to see a survey of residents and workers in the area, and I don’t mean just an invite to attend council meeetings to express their views because most people simply don’t have time for that especially working class people with factory jobs. WHY don’t more people in the old schmata district bike? Is it really because of bike paths?
This seems to be an underlying assumption that every cross-section of society wants to bicycle, and honestly, despite what cycling advocates & sympathetic urbanists seem to think is an inherent truth, I don’t see that universality in working class adults – and I’d like to know why.
DeWolf 23:45 on 2025-10-23 Permalink
That’s a good question, but at the same time, both Montreal and Chabanel have changed a lot over the years. 20 years ago I didn’t feel safe riding my bike anywhere but on quiet residential streets around Mile End. It’s no wonder most people wouldn’t have considered commuting by bike back then. It’s not for nothing the modal share of cycling has doubled over the past several years.
Ian 11:47 on 2025-10-24 Permalink
Oh, I don’t disagreee – I’d just like to know why there seems to be a class divide.
There has been a bike path going up the back of Marché Centrale for a while that you can go down Meilleur then around the bridge over the 40 then into residential Parc Ex which is pretty easy to navigate & is a 30 zone so relatively safe – plus the path on Querbes – but it’s massively underused compared to the paths throuh the Plateau. I see way more bicyclists on Bernard than Ogilvy, for instance. I really don’t see why that is though becasue they seem like comparable rides, and I don’t think it’s just proximity to the trendy “artisanal doughnut shop to bilboquet “corridor