Montreal Metropolitan Airport | Open House for Research

MET — Montréal Metropolitan Airport in Saint-Hubert wants to go further than its shift to commercial aviation. Its operator will open the doors of its offices and provide access to its land to lay the foundations for a research and development hub.

The goal: to serve as an ecosystem for research projects that do not belong to a company, an educational institution or an organization, but which can “serve society.”

“Take cybersecurity,” says UQAM professor and director of the Observatoire de l’aéronautique et de l’aviation civile, Mehran Ebrahimi. “It’s a serious issue and many SMEs don’t have the means to get involved in it. We want to create a movement that works on cybersecurity, in particular, with solutions that will belong to the scientific and business community.”

The professor is heading the “LIA – Living Lab for Aerospace Innovation”, the details of which will be revealed at the Farnborough Air Show, the major annual event for the aeronautics industry, which begins next Monday in the United Kingdom.

Mr. Ebrahimi will be there, as will Longueuil Mayor Catherine Fournier, who will be accompanied by a delegation of approximately 30 people. The project is coming to fruition as Longueuil (research and education component) is one of the three hubs of the Quebec aerospace innovation zone, alongside Mirabel and Saint-Laurent.

Building Communities

The Press was able to consult the document which summarizes the project guidelines.

MET — Montreal Metropolitan Airport will offer office space, workspaces and access to its gigantic land of more than 500 hectares to projects submitted to it.

“We may have projects in artificial intelligence and robotization in airport operations,” says Mr. Ebrahimi. “It’s not to serve MET. It’s to advance knowledge.”

The concept, says the professor, is to “create communities around research and development projects” in order to “seek funding” more easily. The laboratory director wants to draw inspiration from the Quebec Institute of Artificial Intelligence (Mila), which says it brings together a community of scientists and interdisciplinary teams.

The airport located on the South Shore of Montreal will not have control over what comes out of the research work carried out within its facilities: in other words, MET states that the goal is not for it to be financially profitable.

This innovation laboratory is still in its infancy, but already, representatives from establishments such as the École de technologie supérieure, the Université de Montréal, the Centre technologique en aérospatiale as well as companies are among its “founding members”.

The cornerstone of the airport’s turnaround in Saint-Hubert is the construction of a terminal that will have the capacity to accommodate up to 4 million passengers. This volume is not expected as soon as it begins operations in the summer of 2025. Porter Airlines will be the terminal’s main user.

Including the 130-room Holiday Inn to be built nearby, the total project will cost more than $200 million. The Canada Infrastructure Bank has lent $90 million to complete the financing package for the project.

The terminal will serve primarily Canadian and regional markets. Porter will provide connections to major Canadian cities, while Pascan Aviation will focus on regional markets. The developers plan to welcome other carriers in the coming years.