Montrealers sidestepping fallen branches, damaging secondary trails on Mount Royal

Montrealers are being urged to avoid using secondary forest trails on Mount Royal in the aftermath of last month’s ice storm.

Fallen branches from the April 5 storm have yet to be cleared on the mountain.

Some visitors are getting around the branches by frequenting trails that are closed off, says the non-profit group Les Amis de la Montagne, which can cause damage to the surrounding environment.

“Let the forest recover from this stressful episode,” said Ariane Bernier, the group’s environmental conservation patrol lead. “By going in the secondary path, you may have to walk by piles of branches and step on wildflowers and increase the compaction of the soil, and thus leads to forest fragmentation, which is very bad for vegetation.

“Respect that nature.”

Les Amis de la Montagne also says the fallen and damaged branches and downed tree trunks can be unsafe.

“The safety risk is that there are limbs of trees that can be dangerous and that can fall because they’re not secured yet,” said Bernier.

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The group is urging Montrealers to be patient and wait until specialized teams have done their work to clear the branches.

Bernier says the only trail that is officially open and usable is Olmsted Path, the main path on Mount Royal, accessible from the Peel Street entrance.

The city of Montreal says it will takes weeks before the secondary trails are safe to reopen because of the work required to cut down branches that are unsafe and to clear those that have fallen on the trail.

“We need an engineer, a forester, an engineer to make sure there is no danger coming from the trees. And then we will build our action plan to take off the branches that are unstable,” said Phillipe Sabourin, spokesperson for the city of Montreal.

While the city of Montreal is preparing to deal with this issue, visitors will have to adapt.

“If I’m asked not to go there, I’ll happily comply, because I can understand that there’s a lot of work to be done and I wouldn’t want to be in the in the way. And also, it’s fairly muddy these days. So I’m rather better on the on the big track,” said Jérôme Mautonnet, a Montrealer, referring to Olmsted path.