REM’s Trudeau airport station is 80 per cent completed and on schedule
It seems hard to believe, but the Réseau express métropolitain’s Trudeau airport station is nearly completed and will be ready to see its first trains starting next year.
The airport authority gave reporters a sneak preview of the station on Wednesday. Architects take pride in its design, specifically a long shaft with a skylight at the top, which is designed to evoke an iceberg. Standing on the platform, commuters will be bathed in natural light coming from the skylight 40 metres up, and will be able to see a glazed walkway that will carry passengers to the airport terminal.
“Where we’re standing, it will feel like you’re in the ocean, looking through an iceberg from the bottom,” Steeve Bouffard, the project director for the REM station, said Wednesday. Standing where trains will be running 20 hours a day, Bouffard explained the station will make the experience of getting to the airport much easier.
“There will be no queue for parking, no queue for taxis; you get in and you’re there,” he said.
“Where we are standing, we’re just 100 metres from the check-in counters,” Bouffard said. “Commuters from the REM will use the same entrance as the drop-off area for the airport.”
Bouffard said the station is 80 per cent done and still on schedule to enter into service by the end of 2027, which will include a months-long phase of testing.
“We’re at the finish line now,” he said. “But we still have a lot to do. Time is precious, but space is precious as well. We’ll have to plan with every trade what needs to be done in a limited amount of time.”
The REM station abuts the airport’s multi-level parking garage, which is in the process of being demolished and rebuilt in a project expected to be completed in 2031. The road network around the airport will also be rebuilt and expanded over that period.
Much like the Édouard-Montpetit station, the airport station will be accessed by high-speed elevators. It will be the second-deepest in the network (after Édouard-Montpetit), roughly the equivalent of a 12-storey building. Commuters will be brought between the surface and the train platforms via 10 elevators that will hold up to 20 people each.
“I’m very proud to be part of this project,” Bouffard said. “I’ve seen a lot of stations, but I think this one is the best. I’m very proud of what we can achieve in Quebec. We have good engineers, good architects and great construction workers. That’s for sure.”
When completed, the $600-million station will serve as the terminus of its branch of the REM. At that time, the automated light-rail network will span 26 stations and cover 67 kilometres.
It’s expected the airport station will help alleviate chronic congestion, especially during the busiest times of year, like summer vacation. Last summer, traffic was often backlogged all the way to Highway 20 and the 520 expressway, with waiting times to approach the airport lasting longer than an hour during peak periods.
“It’s going to take a lot of pressure off the road network, which is already over capacity,” said Anne-Sophie Hamel, the director of media relations for Aéroports de Montréal. “It’s kind of a game-changer for people going downtown: 24 minutes from here to McGill station. We’re pretty excited to be able to offer this to Montrealers and tourists visiting downtown Montreal.”
Hamel said the station will also be a boon for the thousands of people who work at the airport every day. The airport also hopes the REM’s Des Sources station in Pointe-Claire will help alleviate some pressure, as it plans to offer a shuttle bus service when that station opens, likely this spring.
“We’re looking at different temporary solutions until the (airport) station opens in 2027,” she said. “The shuttle is just one of them.”
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