Three blue line metro stations in Montreal closed after structural issues discovered at St-Michel

Three of Montreal’s blue line metro stations – Fabre, d’Iberville and St-Michel – are closed until further notice.

The Société de transport de Montréal (STM) made the announcement in a press release on Thursday night, adding that it’s “a preventive safety measure, for an indefinite period.” No trains will be stopping at these stations.

“Work currently underway at Saint-Michel station has revealed significant degradation of some of the main beams above the footbridge, following assessment by the engineering teams. Given the location of the turnouts, Fabre and d’Iberville stations will also have to be closed,” reads the release.

Further assessments will need to be made to determine the structural work to be carried out, “which is likely to take several days, if not weeks,” according to the STM.

“I think it’s sad because at the same time, it brings light to something we’ve been saying for a very, very long time,” said Montreal Mayor Valérie Plante. “There’s numbers, so those are out there. We’re at the lowest point of investment from the government of Quebec in terms of maintaining the system. We have many citizens that, you know, are late for work, might be struggling with the kids, going to school and all that, and they’re counting on us, the City of Montreal, the STM, but also the other level of government to say, yeah, we need to take care of the foundation of our network, which is the line.”

“If they’re going to have shutdowns like this, I would like a good couple of weeks in advance to be advised and not like the night before. Yeah. I mean, I was like 12 hours, not even,” said one transit user CityNews spoke to.

Another saying, “I just hope they somehow find a way to make it faster. I just need it to be faster. I need to get places.”

“I hope maybe the buses fix it somehow. I mean, the buses is not the same,” said a transit user.

“We’ve been here for 15, 20 minutes waiting for a bus, and they keep getting full, and we keep waiting longer and longer. And if I had work tonight, I don’t know if I would make it on time.”

Mitigation measures in place 

The STM introduced a shuttle bus service (line 809) between Saint-Michel and Jean-Talon stations on Thursday night. It will stop at each metro station on this section of the blue line, and will run in both directions. 

“STM personnel are already in place, and will be for the next few days, to accompany customers on their journeys.” 

To find out about bus travel options, the STM also invites customers to use the route planner, unchecking the metro option, available on the website or mobile applications.  

STM General Manager Marie-Claude Léonard said that they’re working to create better services for public transit users in the area.

“We decide to close for safety reasons here. We already put a bus shuttle in place to be sure that the customer will have an option. We will work during the next few days to have better services and work with the city. Of course we have to investigate right now. We cannot say how long it will take, but we know that it will take some days, maybe some weeks, but at that time it’s very hard for us to tell you.”

‘The importance of maintaining assets’

The STM also said in it’s press release that these closures come at a time when the STM has received confirmation of the absence of funding from the Quebec government’s Plan québécois des infrastructures for its asset maintenance and universal accessibility projects.

“Despite the STM’s requests and representations, no additional credit has been granted by the provincial government in this area since 2022.  To avoid an increase in our investment deficit, $560 million a year would be needed to ensure the maintenance of aging assets and infrastructures that have reached the end of their useful life.”

Planted added that over 160,000 people take the blue line every day.

“Right now, we’re looking at all the options because we know how important the blue line is for workers, families. It’s very important. So, everything is looked at because we want to support the population to adapt this. It’s sad, but important. I think everybody will agree that we need to do the repair. We don’t want to put people’s health at stake, but we also want to make their life easier. So, we will look at every option that we have for sure.”

A planned Friday morning press conference for the extension of the metro’s blue line was cancelled after the three stations were closed. The press conference was going to be in the presence of all three levels of government.