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Underground City, Montreal

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Introduction

Montreal's Underground City (French: La ville souterraine) is the set of well-known underground city complexes in and around downtown Montreal, Quebec, Canada. It is also known as the indoor city (ville intérieure) as not all of it is underground.

In 2004 the underground city was rebranded and given the name RÉSO. The rebranding effort was managed by Bélanger Branding et Design. The name RÉSO is based on the French word réseau, or network (as in a network of tunnels).

Several different segments of underground city exist in Montreal. The largest and best-known is located in the centre of downtown, between Peel and Place-des-Arts metro stations on the Green Line and between Lucien-L'Allier and Place-d'Armes stations on the Orange Line.

It consists of 30 km of tunnels spread over an area of twelve square kilometres of downtown Montreal. The underground city includes 60 residential and commercial complexes comprising 3.6 square kilometres of floor space, including 80% of all office space and 35% of all commercial space in the centre.

Services include hotels, shopping malls, banks, corporate headquarters, museums, buildings of several universities, seven metro stations, two commuter train stations, and the Bell Centre hockey arena. There are more than 120 exterior access points to the underground city. Some 500,000 people use the underground city every day, especially to escape Montreal's harsh winter.

The underground city is promoted as an important tourist attraction by most Montreal travel guidebooks; although the urban planning achievement is impressive, the services accessible through them (mainly shopping malls) are rather commonplace.

Most parts of the underground city are open during the entire hours of operation of the metro (5:30 AM to 1:00 AM); though many accesses are closed outside of business hours, many others remain open. However, the tunnels between the Bell Centre arena and Bonaventure metro station cannot be used before and after events at the arena, owing to fire regulations (access is available via Lucien-L'Allier station instead). Access to the underground city is free. Maps of the underground city and the metro can be obtained free from all metro stations, and the network of buildings is usually indicated on city maps.

History

The first link of the underground city arose with the construction of the Place Ville-Marie office tower and underground shopping mall, built in 1962 to cover an unsightly pit of railway tracks north of the Central Station. A tunnel linked it to Central Station and the Queen Elizabeth Hotel.

File:Ville-souterraine-1.jpg
Directional panels to buildings accessible through the underground city, in Bonaventure metro station

The advent of the Montreal metro in 1966 brought tunnels joining Bonaventure station to the Château Champlain hotel, the Place du Canada office tower, Place Bonaventure, Gare Centrale, and Gare Windsor, forming the core of the Underground City. Square-Victoria station connected to the Tour de la Bourse, Montreal's stock exchange building.

Adding to the development of the underground city was the Montreal Urban Community Transit Commission's policy of offering the aerial rights above metro station entrances for construction through emphyteutic leases, an advantageous way to acquire prime real estate. When the metro began running in 1966, ten buildings were already connected directly to metro stations; development would continue until not a single free-standing entrance to Peel, McGill, Guy-Concordia, or Place-d'Armes stations was left.

In 1974, the Complexe Desjardins office tower complex was constructed, spurring the construction of a "second downtown" underground city segment between Place-des-Arts and Place-d'Armes station, via Place des Arts, Complexe Desjardins, the Complexe Guy-Favreau federal government building, and the Palais des Congrès (convention centre).

Between 1984 and 1992, the underground city expanded, with the construction of three major linked shopping centres in the Peel and McGill metro station areas: Cours Mont-Royal, Place Montréal-Trust, and the Promenades de la Cathédrale (built underneath Christ Church Cathedral). McGill station was already linked with The Bay, Eaton's (now the Complexe Les Ailes), Centre Eaton, and two other office/mall complexes. Between 1984 and 1989, the underground city grew from 12 km of passages to almost 22.

Mega-projects added to the size throughout the 1990s, including Le 1000 De La Gauchetière (the tallest building in Montreal), Le 1250 René-Lévesque, and the Centre de commerce mondiale. Although these office spaces have only a secondary commercial sector, they use their connection to the underground city as a selling point for their office space. Also, the construction of a tunnel between Eaton Centre and Place Ville-Marie consolidated the two central halves of the underground city. The construction of the Bell (originally Molson) Centre connected Lucien-L'Allier metro station to the underground city, as well as replacing Gare Windsor with the new Gare Lucien-L'Allier commuter train station.

The tunnel between the Centre CDP Capital and the Palais des Congrès. A display case sponsored by the Canadian Centre for Architecture holds a video artwork about the underground city.

Finally, in 2003, the complete redevelopment of the Quartier international de Montréal consolidated several segments of the central underground city with continuous pedestrian corridors. The construction of the ICAO headquarters joined Place Bonaventure to Square-Victoria station. This station was in turn was joined to the Palais des Congrès and the Place-des-Arts/Place-d'Armes section via the new Caisse de dépôt et de placement building and a tunnel under the Place Jean-Paul-Riopelle. Uniquely, the new tunnel sections in the Quartier International contain educational and artistic displays sponsored by major Montreal museums. As a result of this construction, one can now walk all the way across the centre of downtown, from Place des Arts to the Bell Centre, completely underground.

File:T00962.jpg

The various segments are listed in decreasing order of size, with entries for each of the buildings grouped according to nearest metro station.

Central segment

The central segment interconnects the following seven STM metro stations via indoor walkway. Depending on where you are going and how far you are from the Berri-UQAM station (which allows transfers between the orange and green lines), walking can actually be quicker than taking the metro.

Peel station

  • Royal & Sun Alliance
  • Tour La Maritime
  • Place Canada Trust
  • Tour Scotia
  • Cours Mont-Royal
  • Le 2000 Peel
  • Les Cours Mont-Royal
  • Carrefour Industrielle-Alliance (Paramount, Simons)
    • formerly Simpson's
    • (to McGill via Place Montréal Trust)

McGill station

Bonaventure station

Halles de la gare, going from Gare centrale to Place Ville-Marie

Lucien-L'Allier station

  • Gare Lucien-L'Allier
  • Centre Bell (to Bonaventure via Édifice Gare Windsor)

Square-Victoria station

Place-d'Armes station

  • Palais des congrès de Montréal
    • (to Square-Victoria via Place de la Cité internationale)
  • Complexe Guy-Favreau (Government of Canada)
    • (to Place-des-Arts via Complexe Desjardins)

Place-des-Arts station

It is only a short distance from this station to either La Baie or the building at 2021 Union Street. A link between them would provide easier access from the Ste-Catherine axis to the above locations, converting the topology of the central segment from the current 'U' to a more practical 'O'.

Berri-UQAM segment

Berri-UQAM station, the central hub of the metro network located at the eastern end of downtown, links:

Guy-Concordia segment

Guy-Concordia station is connected to the following Concordia University buildings:

  • Guy Metro Building
  • Engineering and Visual Arts Complex

Planned and proposed linkages are as follows:

  • John Molson School of Business (planned)
    • (Slated to begin construction soon, this major new building will connect to the metro station from the western side of Guy street)
  • Library Building (planned)
    • (Construction plans have been established to link this to the Engineering and Visual Arts Complex, contingent on the funds being raised. The Hall Building can currently be reached via tunnel from the Library building)
  • Faubourg Ste-Catherine, the Faubourg Tower and the Grey Nuns campus (proposed)
    • (Already interconnected by a single tunnel, these can potentially connect to the rest of the downtown campus via a tunnel from the Faubourg Tower to the Engineering and Visual Arts Complex, or to the newly acquired TD building which would presumably be linked to the new building)

Presently, Guy-Concordia station does not offer direct connections to the tower situated above its St-Mathieu entrance.

Longueuil segment

Longueuil station situated on the South shore is connected to the following:

Atwater segment

Atwater station, on the western edge of downtown just inside the territory of Westmount, is connected to:

  • Plaza Alexis-Nihon
  • Westmount Square shopping, office, and residential complexes
  • Dawson College, a major CÉGEP

Minor segments

Although not included in the RÉSO map, several other metro stations outside of downtown also directly connect to adjacent buildings and are listed here for completeness.

Vendôme station

Édouard-Montpetit station

Jean-Talon station

  • Tour Jean-Talon

Pie-IX station

Other resources

See also

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