While Aéroports de Montréal (ADM) has ideas of grandeur, planning to invest $4 billion within four years in particular to improve access to the Montréal-Trudeau airport, citizens who complain about the noise of planes in residential neighborhoods fear that Montrealers will suffer from the expected increase in air traffic.
On April 5, ADM CEO Yves Beauchamp revealed what the organization plans to do to make access to the airport smoother. The plan presented to the Chamber of Commerce of Metropolitan Montreal provides for the addition of parking lots, the construction of a new landing stage, the development of road access, the connection with the Réseau express métropolitain and the addition of a pier which will allow new satellite boarding gates.
Montreal airport welcomed 21 million passengers in 2023. This is an increase of 32.3% compared to 2022, and even 4.1% compared to 2019, i.e. before the pandemic. ADM forecasts ridership of 25 million passengers by 2028 and 35 million between 2035 and 2045.
Citizens who denounce the noise pollution caused by the frequent passage of planes over residential neighborhoods feel left behind by ADM.
Mario F. Paquet, who is an activist within the citizen group For the Love of Heaven, notes that in its communications concerning the project, ADM fails to address the issue of noise pollution from air traffic.
However, over the years, more and more Montreal neighborhoods are subject to the passage of planes, which are no longer satisfied with a few air corridors. Rosemont–La Petite-Patrie, the borough where Mr. Paquet lives, is not spared from the noisy passage of aircraft, he points out. “The entire metropolitan region is affected,” he said.
And citizens, he adds, do not have the ear of Transport Canada. “Transport Canada’s mission is safety and support for the industry. That’s all it is. The rest falls into place. »
In a letter sent to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau last month, Mr. Paquet called for independent impact studies to be carried out on noise, changes in wind patterns, air pollution and public health.
The sleep of Montrealers
The concerns of Pour l’amour du ciel echo those of Les Pollués de Montréal-Trudeau, a group of citizens created more than 10 years ago which obtained court approval for collective action.
Its president, Pierre Lachapelle, recalls that an airport expansion project was presented by ADM in 2018, only to be put aside.
The same project is resurfacing, he says. “For us, this is a project that is unacceptable as long as it does not undergo the democratic exercise, in a society of law, of examination and impact studies. It is certain that there are not many insects and birds left on the apron of the Montreal-Trudeau airport, but the impact is outside the site. The caricature is a bit strong, but the Montreal-Trudeau airport is our own Horne foundry, but with the added noise, which keeps people from sleeping. »
Mr. Lachapelle points out that a study published in 2018 by researchers at McGill University noted a large concentration of fine particles of contaminants in the air on the airport tarmac, higher than that observed in the city center.
Airplane noise is at the heart of the dispute between Les Pollués and ADM. In 2018, the request for collective action against noise pollution filed by the citizen group was authorized by the court. In 2020, the Superior Court, however, qualified an injunction filed by the group concerning in particular a curfew as abusive because the court had already rejected some of these requests two years previously.
Pierre Lachapelle observes that plane movements affect a large number of Montreal neighborhoods. In this regard, he notes that the work on the north runway carried out in recent years has concentrated takeoff and landing activities on the other runway, the one located on the south side. It will then be the turn of the southern runway to undergo work, which means that neighborhoods in the north of the city, such as Ahuntsic, risk suffering. “We recognize that we are in a big city and that there is an airport, but we have to be able to sleep at night,” he says.
More efficient devices
ADM ensures that sound climate management is a “priority issue” for the organization. Between 2022 and 2023, the number of noise-related complaints increased by 29%, but, at the same time, the number of complainants decreased by 6%. ADM reports by email that “81% of complaints were submitted by the same five people in 2023”.
According to the company, the increase in air traffic does not necessarily mean, given the modernization of fleets, a proportional increase in air movements.
Thus, in 2011, the Montreal-Trudeau airport welcomed 14 million passengers with 230,922 plane movements. In 2023, even with 21 million passengers, the number of movements has been reduced to 200,658, ADM argues. “This is mainly explained by a better occupancy rate and the use of larger capacity aircraft,” explains Eric Forest, communications advisor at ADM. “However, these larger planes are not necessarily noisier. For example, the A220 is the most efficient aircraft in terms of acoustics, while the B737 Max is also more efficient than its predecessors in this regard. »