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Montreal ( ; officially Montréal, ) is the second-most populous city in Canada and
most populous city The United Nations uses three definitions for what constitutes a city, as not all cities in all jurisdictions are classified using the same criteria. Cities may be defined as the city proper, cities proper, the extent of their urban area, or th ...
in the Canadian province of
Quebec Quebec ( ; )According to the Canadian government, ''Québec'' (with the acute accent) is the official name in Canadian French and ''Quebec'' (without the accent) is the province's official name in Canadian English is one of the thirtee ...
. Founded in 1642 as '' Ville-Marie'', or "City of Mary", it is named after
Mount Royal Mount Royal (french: link=no, Mont Royal, ) is a large intrusive rock hill or small mountain in the city of Montreal, immediately west of Downtown Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The best-known hypothesis for the origin of the name Montreal is the ...
, the triple-peaked hill around which the early city of Ville-Marie is built. The city is centred on the Island of Montreal, which obtained its name from the same origin as the city, and a few much smaller peripheral islands, the largest of which is
Île Bizard Île Bizard is an island near the Island of Montreal in the Hochelaga Archipelago region. History Historically named Île Bonaventure, by 1723 it had come to be named Île Bizard, after Jacques Bizard, to whom it was conceded as a fief in 16 ...
. The city is east of the national capital
Ottawa Ottawa (, ; Canadian French: ) is the capital city of Canada. It is located at the confluence of the Ottawa River and the Rideau River in the southern portion of the province of Ontario. Ottawa borders Gatineau, Quebec, and forms the core ...
, and southwest of the provincial capital,
Quebec City Quebec City ( or ; french: Ville de Québec), officially Québec (), is the capital city of the Canadian province of Quebec. As of July 2021, the city had a population of 549,459, and the metropolitan area had a population of 839,311. It is t ...
. As of 2021, the city had a population of 1,762,949, and a metropolitan population of 4,291,732, making it the second-largest city, and second-largest metropolitan area in Canada. French is the city's official language. In 2021, it was spoken at home by 59.1% of the population and 69.2% in the
Montreal Census Metropolitan Area Greater Montreal (french: Grand Montréal) is the most populous metropolitan area in Quebec and the second most populous in Canada after Greater Toronto. In 2015, Statistics Canada identified Montreal's Census Metropolitan Area (CMA) as with ...
. Overall, 85.7% of the population of the city of Montreal considered themselves fluent in French while 90.2% could speak it in the metropolitan area. Montreal is one of the most bilingual cities in Quebec and Canada, with 58.5% of the population able to speak both English and French. Historically the commercial capital of Canada, Montreal was surpassed in population and in economic strength by
Toronto Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the ancho ...
in the 1970s. It remains an important centre of commerce, aerospace, transport, finance, pharmaceuticals, technology, design, education, art, culture,
tourism Tourism is travel for pleasure or business; also the theory and practice of touring (disambiguation), touring, the business of attracting, accommodating, and entertaining tourists, and the business of operating tour (disambiguation), tours. Th ...
, food, fashion, video game development, film, and world affairs. Montreal is the location of the headquarters of the
International Civil Aviation Organization The International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO, ) is a specialized agency of the United Nations that coordinates the principles and techniques of international air navigation, and fosters the planning and development of international a ...
, and was named a
UNESCO The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) aimed at promoting world peace and security through international cooperation in education, arts, sciences and culture. It ...
City of Design in 2006. In 2017, Montreal was ranked the 12th-most liveable city in the world by the
Economist Intelligence Unit The Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) is the research and analysis division of the Economist Group, providing forecasting and advisory services through research and analysis, such as monthly country reports, five-year country economic forecasts, ...
in its annual
Global Liveability Ranking The Global Livability Ranking is a yearly assessment published by the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU), ranking 172 global cities (previously 140) for their urban quality of life based on assessments of stability, healthcare, culture and environ ...
, although it slipped to rank 40 in the 2021 index, primarily due to stress on the healthcare system from the
COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identif ...
. It is regularly ranked as a top ten city in the world to be a university student in the
QS World University Rankings ''QS World University Rankings'' is an annual publication of university rankings by Quacquarelli Symonds (QS). The QS system comprises three parts: the global overall ranking, the subject rankings (which name the world's top universities for the ...
. Montreal has hosted multiple international conferences and events, including the 1967 International and Universal Exposition and the 1976 Summer Olympics. It is the only Canadian city to have held the Summer Olympics. In 2018, Montreal was ranked as a global city. The city hosts the
Canadian Grand Prix The Canadian Grand Prix (french: Grand Prix du Canada) is an annual motor racing event held since 1961. It has been part of the Formula One World Championship since 1967. It was first staged at Mosport Park in Bowmanville, Ontario, as a spor ...
of
Formula One Formula One (also known as Formula 1 or F1) is the highest class of international racing for open-wheel single-seater formula racing cars sanctioned by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA). The World Drivers' Championship, ...
; the
Montreal International Jazz Festival The Festival International de Jazz de Montréal ( en, Montreal International Jazz Festival) is an annual jazz festival held in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The Montreal Jazz Fest holds the 2004 Guinness World Record as the world's largest jazz fes ...
, the largest jazz festival in the world; the Just for Laughs festival, the largest comedy festival in the world; and Les Francos de Montréal, the largest French-language music festival in the world. It is also home to the
Montreal Canadiens The Montreal CanadiensEven in English, the French spelling is always used instead of ''Canadians''. The French spelling of ''Montréal'' is also sometimes used in the English media. (french: link=no, Les Canadiens de Montréal), officially ...
of the
National Hockey League The National Hockey League (NHL; french: Ligue nationale de hockey—LNH, ) is a professional ice hockey league in North America comprising 32 teams—25 in the United States and 7 in Canada. It is considered to be the top ranked professional ...
, who have won the
Stanley Cup The Stanley Cup (french: La Coupe Stanley) is the championship trophy awarded annually to the National Hockey League (NHL) playoff champion. It is the oldest existing trophy to be awarded to a professional sports franchise in North America, an ...
more times than any other team.


Etymology and original names

In the
Ojibwe language Ojibwe , also known as Ojibwa , Ojibway, Otchipwe,R. R. Bishop Baraga, 1878''A Theoretical and Practical Grammar of the Otchipwe Language''/ref> Ojibwemowin, or Anishinaabemowin, is an indigenous language of North America of the Algonquian lan ...
, the land is called which was "the first stopping place" in the Ojibwe migration story as related in the
seven fires prophecy Seven fires prophecy is an Anishinaabe prophecy that marks phases, or epochs, in the life of the people on Turtle Island (North America), Turtle Island, the original name given by the indigenous peoples of the now North American continent. The seve ...
. In the
Mohawk language Mohawk (; ''Kanienʼkéha'', " anguageof the Flint Place") is an Iroquoian language currently spoken by around 3,500 people of the Mohawk nation, located primarily in current or former Haudenosaunee territories, predominately Canada (southern ...
, the land is called . “Tiohtià꞉ke” is an abbreviation of “Teionihtiohtiá꞉kon”, which loosely translates as “where the group divided/parted ways.” French settlers from
La Flèche La Flèche () is a town and commune in the French department of Sarthe, in the Pays de la Loire region in the Loire Valley. It is the sub-prefecture of the South-Sarthe, the chief district and the chief city of a canton, and the second most po ...
in the Loire valley first named their new town, founded in 1642, ("City of Mary"), named for the
Virgin Mary Mary; arc, ܡܪܝܡ, translit=Mariam; ar, مريم, translit=Maryam; grc, Μαρία, translit=María; la, Maria; cop, Ⲙⲁⲣⲓⲁ, translit=Maria was a first-century Jewish woman of Nazareth, the wife of Joseph and the mother o ...
. Its current name comes from Mount Royal, the triple-peaked hill in the heart of the city. According to one theory, the name derives from , ( in modern French, although in 16th-century French the forms and were used interchangeably); Cartier's 1535 diary entry, naming the mountain, refers to . One of Cartier's officers was Claude de Pontbriand, lord of the Château de Montréal, in the
Occitan Occitan may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to the Occitania territory in parts of France, Italy, Monaco and Spain. * Something of, from, or related to the Occitania administrative region of France. * Occitan language, spoken in parts o ...
-speaking part of France. The toponym ''
Montréal Montreal ( ; officially Montréal, ) is the second-most populous city in Canada and most populous city in the Canadian province of Quebec. Founded in 1642 as '' Ville-Marie'', or "City of Mary", it is named after Mount Royal, the triple-p ...
'' and its reversed form '' Réalmont'', the direct Occitan translation of French (or ), are common in southern France. One possibility, noted by the
government of Canada The government of Canada (french: gouvernement du Canada) is the body responsible for the federal administration of Canada. A constitutional monarchy, the Crown is the corporation sole, assuming distinct roles: the executive, as the ''Crown ...
on its website concerning Canadian place names, speculates that the name as it is currently written originated when an early map of 1556 used the Italian name of the mountain, ; the Commission de toponymie du Québec has dismissed this idea as a misconception.


History


Pre-European contact

Archaeological Archaeology or archeology is the scientific study of human activity through the recovery and analysis of material culture. The archaeological record consists of artifacts, architecture, biofacts or ecofacts, sites, and cultural landscap ...
evidence in the region indicate that
First Nations First Nations or first peoples may refer to: * Indigenous peoples, for ethnic groups who are the earliest known inhabitants of an area. Indigenous groups *First Nations is commonly used to describe some Indigenous groups including: **First Natio ...
native people occupied the island of Montreal as early as 4,000 years ago. By the year AD 1000, they had started to cultivate
maize Maize ( ; ''Zea mays'' subsp. ''mays'', from es, maíz after tnq, mahiz), also known as corn (North American and Australian English), is a cereal grain first domesticated by indigenous peoples in southern Mexico about 10,000 years ago. Th ...
. Within a few hundred years, they had built
fortified A fortification is a military construction or building designed for the defense of territories in warfare, and is also used to establish rule in a region during peacetime. The term is derived from Latin ''fortis'' ("strong") and ''facere'' ...
villages. The
Saint Lawrence Iroquoians The St. Lawrence Iroquoians were an Iroquoian Peoples, Iroquoian indigenous peoples in Canada, Indigenous people who existed from the 14th century to about 1580. They concentrated along the shores of the St. Lawrence River in present-day Quebec a ...
, an ethnically and culturally distinct group from the
Iroquois The Iroquois ( or ), officially the Haudenosaunee ( meaning "people of the longhouse"), are an Iroquoian-speaking confederacy of First Nations peoples in northeast North America/ Turtle Island. They were known during the colonial years to ...
nations of the ''
Haudenosaunee The Iroquois ( or ), officially the Haudenosaunee ( meaning "people of the longhouse"), are an Iroquoian Peoples, Iroquoian-speaking Confederation#Indigenous confederations in North America, confederacy of First Nations in Canada, First Natio ...
'' (then based in present-day New York), established the village of Hochelaga at the foot of Mount Royal two centuries before the French arrived. Archeologists have found evidence of their habitation there and at other locations in the valley since at least the 14th century. The French explorer Jacques Cartier visited ''Hochelaga'' on October 2, 1535, and estimated the population of the native people at Hochelaga to be "over a thousand people". Evidence of earlier occupation of the island, such as those uncovered in 1642 during the construction of Fort Ville-Marie, have effectively been removed.


Early European settlement (1600–1760)

In 1603, French explorer
Samuel de Champlain Samuel de Champlain (; Fichier OrigineFor a detailed analysis of his baptismal record, see RitchThe baptism act does not contain information about the age of Samuel, neither his birth date nor his place of birth. – 25 December 1635) was a Fre ...
reported that the St Lawrence Iroquoians and their settlements had disappeared altogether from the St Lawrence valley. This is believed to be due to outmigration, epidemics of European diseases, or intertribal wars. In 1611, Champlain established a
fur Fur is a thick growth of hair that covers the skin of mammals. It consists of a combination of oily guard hair on top and thick underfur beneath. The guard hair keeps moisture from reaching the skin; the underfur acts as an insulating blanket t ...
trading post A trading post, trading station, or trading house, also known as a factory, is an establishment or settlement where goods and services could be traded. Typically the location of the trading post would allow people from one geographic area to tr ...
on the Island of Montreal on a site initially named ''La Place Royale''. At the confluence of ''Petite Riviere'' and St. Lawrence River, it is where present-day Pointe-à-Callière stands. On his 1616 map, Champlain named the island Lille de Villemenon in honour of the sieur de Villemenon, a French dignitary who was seeking the viceroyship of New France. In 1639,
Jérôme Le Royer de La Dauversière Jerome (c.347–420) was a priest, confessor, theologian and historian from Dalmatia. Jerome may also refer to: People Given name * Jerome (given name), a masculine name of Greek origin, with a list of people so named * Saint Jerome (disambiguat ...
obtained the Seigneurial title to the Island of Montreal in the name of the Notre Dame Society of Montreal to establish a Roman Catholic
mission Mission (from Latin ''missio'' "the act of sending out") may refer to: Organised activities Religion *Christian mission, an organized effort to spread Christianity *Mission (LDS Church), an administrative area of The Church of Jesus Christ of ...
to
evangelize In Christianity, evangelism (or witnessing) is the act of preaching the gospel with the intention of sharing the message and teachings of Jesus Christ. Christians who specialize in evangelism are often known as evangelists, whether they are in ...
natives. Dauversiere hired
Paul Chomedey de Maisonneuve Paul de Chomedey, sieur de Maisonneuve (15 February 1612 9 September 1676) was a French military officer and the founder of Fort Ville-Marie (modern day Montreal) in New France (Province of Quebec, Canada). Early life Maisonneuve was born in ...
, then age 30, to lead a group of colonists to build a mission on his new seigneury. The colonists left France in 1641 for Quebec and arrived on the island the following year. On May 17, 1642, Ville-Marie was founded on the southern shore of Montreal island, with Maisonneuve as its first governor. The settlement included a chapel and a hospital, under the command of
Jeanne Mance Jeanne Mance (November 12, 1606 – June 18, 1673) was a French nurse and settler of New France. She arrived in New France two years after the Ursuline nuns came to Quebec. Among the founders of Montreal in 1642, she established its first hospit ...
. By 1643, Ville-Marie had come under Iroquois raids. In 1652, Maisonneuve returned to France to raise 100 volunteers to bolster the colonial population. If the effort had failed, Montreal was to be abandoned and the survivors re-located downriver to
Quebec City Quebec City ( or ; french: Ville de Québec), officially Québec (), is the capital city of the Canadian province of Quebec. As of July 2021, the city had a population of 549,459, and the metropolitan area had a population of 839,311. It is t ...
. Before these 100 arrived in the fall of 1653, the population of Montreal was barely 50 people. By 1685, Ville-Marie was home to some 600 colonists, most of them living in modest wooden houses. Ville-Marie became a centre for the fur trade and a base for further
exploration Exploration refers to the historical practice of discovering remote lands. It is studied by geographers and historians. Two major eras of exploration occurred in human history: one of convergence, and one of divergence. The first, covering most ...
. In 1689, the English-allied Iroquois attacked Lachine on the Island of Montreal, committing the worst massacre in the history of New France. By the early 18th century, the
Sulpician Order The Society of Priests of Saint-Sulpice (french: Compagnie des Prêtres de Saint-Sulpice), abbreviated PSS also known as the Sulpicians is a society of apostolic life of Pontifical Right for men, named after the Church of Saint-Sulpice, Paris ...
was established there. To encourage French settlement, it wanted the Mohawk to move away from the fur trading post at Ville-Marie. It had a mission village, known as
Kahnewake The Kahnawake Mohawk Territory (french: Territoire Mohawk de Kahnawake, in the Mohawk language, ''Kahnawáˀkye'' in Tuscarora) is a First Nations reserve of the Mohawks of Kahnawá:ke on the south shore of the Saint Lawrence River in Quebec, C ...
, south of the St Lawrence River. The fathers persuaded some Mohawk to make a new settlement at their former hunting grounds north of the Ottawa River. This became
Kanesatake Kanesatake (''Kanehsatà:ke'' in Mohawk) is a Mohawk (''Kanien'kéha:ka'' in Mohawk) settlement on the shore of the Lake of Two Mountains in southwestern Quebec, Canada, at the confluence of the Ottawa and Saint Lawrence rivers and about west of ...
. In 1745, several Mohawk families moved upriver to create another settlement, known as
Akwesasne The Mohawk Nation at Akwesasne ( ; french: Nation Mohawk à Akwesasne; moh, Ahkwesáhsne) is a Mohawk Nation (''Kanienʼkehá:ka'') territory that straddles the intersection of international (United States and Canada) borders and provincial (Ont ...
. All three are now Mohawk reserves in Canada. The Canadian territory was ruled as a French colony until 1760, when Montreal fell to a British offensive during the
Seven Years' War The Seven Years' War (1756–1763) was a global conflict that involved most of the European Great Powers, and was fought primarily in Europe, the Americas, and Asia-Pacific. Other concurrent conflicts include the French and Indian War (1754 ...
. The colony then surrendered to Great Britain. Ville-Marie was the name for the settlement that appeared in all official documents until 1705, when Montreal appeared for the first time, although people referred to the "Island of Montreal" long before then.


American occupation (1775–1776)

As part of the
American Revolution The American Revolution was an ideological and political revolution that occurred in British America between 1765 and 1791. The Americans in the Thirteen Colonies formed independent states that defeated the British in the American Revolut ...
, the invasion of Quebec resulted after Benedict Arnold captured
Fort Ticonderoga Fort Ticonderoga (), formerly Fort Carillon, is a large 18th-century star fort built by the French at a narrows near the south end of Lake Champlain, in northern New York, in the United States. It was constructed by Canadian-born French milit ...
in present-day upstate New York in May 1775 as a launching point to Arnold's invasion of Quebec in September. While Arnold approached the
Plains of Abraham The Plains of Abraham (french: Plaines d'Abraham) is a historic area within the Battlefields Park in Quebec City, Quebec, anada. It was established on 17 March 1908. The land is the site of the Battle of the Plains of Abraham, which took plac ...
, Montreal fell to American forces led by Richard Montgomery on November 13, 1775, after it was abandoned by Guy Carleton. After Arnold withdrew from Quebec City to
Pointe-aux-Trembles Pointe-aux-Trembles was a municipality, founded in 1674, that was annexed by Montreal, Quebec, Canada, in 1982. This was the last city to be merged into Montreal until the 2002 municipal reorganization. On January 1, 2002 this neighbourhood a ...
on November 19, Montgomery's forces left Montreal on December 1 and arrived there on December 3 to plot to attack Quebec City, with Montgomery leaving
David Wooster David Wooster ( – May 2, 1777) was an American general who served in the French and Indian War and in the American Revolutionary War. He died of wounds sustained during the Battle of Ridgefield, Connecticut. Several cities, schools, and public ...
in charge of the city. Montgomery was killed in the failed attack and Arnold, who had taken command, sent Brigadier General
Moses Hazen Moses Hazen (June 1, 1733 – February 5, 1803) was a brigadier general in the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War. Born in the Province of Massachusetts Bay, he saw action in the French and Indian War with Rogers' Rang ...
to inform Wooster of the defeat. Wooster left Hazen in command on March 20, 1776, as he left to replace Arnold in leading further attacks on Quebec City. On April 19, Arnold arrived in Montreal to take over command from Hazen, who remained as his second-in-command. Hazen sent Colonel
Timothy Bedel Timothy Bedel (1737 – February 24, 1787) was a soldier and local leader prominent in the early history of New Hampshire and Vermont. Bedel was born in Salem, New Hampshire. During the French and Indian War he served as a lieutenant in the New Ha ...
to form a garrison of 390 men 40 miles upriver in a garrison at
Les Cèdres, Quebec Les Cèdres is a municipality located north of the Saint Lawrence River in the Montérégie of Quebec, Canada, near Vaudreuil-Dorion. The population as of the Canada 2021 Census was 7,184. The name means "The Cedars" in French. There is an ex ...
, to defend Montreal against the British army. In the Battle of the Cedars, Bedel's lieutenant
Isaac Butterfield Isaac Butterfield was an American officer who served under Colonel Timothy Bedel during the invasion of Quebec in the American Revolutionary War. He was either a Major or a Lieutenanthttps://books.google.ca/books?id=ev56CoLLW8oC&pg=PA27 In an od ...
surrendered to George Forster. Forster advanced to
Fort Senneville Fort Senneville is one of the outlying forts of Montreal, Quebec, Canada, built by the Canadiens of New France near the Sainte-Anne-de-Bellevue in 1671. The property was part of a fief ceded to Dugué de Boisbriant in 1672 by the Sulpicians. A ...
on May 23. By May 24, Arnold was entrenched in Montreal's borough of Lachine. Forster initially approached Lachine, then withdrew to Quinze-Chênes. Arnold's forces then abandoned Lachine to chase Forster. The Americans burned Senneville on May 26. After Arnold crossed the
Ottawa River The Ottawa River (french: Rivière des Outaouais, Algonquin: ''Kichi-Sìbì/Kitchissippi'') is a river in the Canadian provinces of Ontario and Quebec. It is named after the Algonquin word 'to trade', as it was the major trade route of Eastern ...
in pursuit of Forster, Forster's cannons repelled Arnold's forces. Forster negotiated a prisoner exchange with
Henry Sherburne Henry Sherburne (March 28, 1611 – 1680) of Portsmouth, New Hampshire, landed there June 12, 1632 from London, a pioneer who rose to considerable wealth in pre-independence colonial New Hampshire. His descendant Samuel Sherburne built the 1766 (a ...
and Isaac Butterfield, resulting in a May 27 boating of their deputy Lieutenant Park being returned to the Americans. Arnold and Forster negotiated further and more American prisoners were returned to Arnold at
Sainte-Anne-de-Bellevue, Quebec Sainte-Anne-de-Bellevue () is an on-island suburb located at the western tip of the Island of Montreal in southwestern Quebec, Canada. It is the second oldest community in Montreal's West Island, having been founded as a parish in 1703. The olde ...
, ("Fort Anne") on May 30 (delayed two days by wind). Arnold eventually withdrew his forces back to the New York fort of Ticonderoga by the summer. On June 15, Arnold's messenger approaching Sorel spotted Carleton returning with a fleet of ships and notified him. Arnold's forces abandoned Montreal (attempting to burn it down in the process) prior to the June 17 arrival of Carleton's fleet. The Americans did not return British prisoners in exchange, as previously agreed, due to accusations of abuse, with Congress repudiating the agreement at the protest of George Washington. Arnold blamed Colonel Timothy Bedel for the defeat, removing him and Lieutenant Butterfield from command and sending them to Sorel for court-martial. The retreat of the American army delayed their court martial until August 1, 1776, when they were convicted and
cashiered Cashiering (or degradation ceremony), generally within military forces, is a ritual dismissal of an individual from some position of responsibility for a breach of discipline. Etymology From the Flemish (to dismiss from service; to discard ...
at Ticonderoga. Bedel was given a new commission by Congress in October 1777 after Arnold was assigned to defend Rhode Island in July 1777.


Modern history as city (1832–present)

Montreal was incorporated as a city in 1832. The opening of the Lachine Canal permitted ships to bypass the unnavigable Lachine Rapids, while the construction of the Victoria Bridge established Montreal as a major railway hub. The leaders of Montreal's business community had started to build their homes in the
Golden Square Mile / ''Mille carré doré'' , native_name_lang = , settlement_type = Neighbourhood , image_skyline = Ravenscrag.jpg , image_alt = , image_caption = '' Ravenscrag'', built for Sir Hugh Allan ...
from about 1850. By 1860, it was the largest municipality in
British North America British North America comprised the colonial territories of the British Empire in North America from 1783 onwards. English overseas possessions, English colonisation of North America began in the 16th century in Newfoundland (island), Newfound ...
and the undisputed economic and cultural centre of Canada. In the 19th century, maintaining Montreal's drinking water became increasingly difficult with the rapid increase in population. A majority of the drinking water was still coming from the city's harbour, which was busy and heavily trafficked, leading to the deterioration of the water within. In the mid-1840s, the City of Montreal installed a water system that would pump water from the St. Lawrence and into
cistern A cistern (Middle English ', from Latin ', from ', "box", from Greek ', "basket") is a waterproof receptacle for holding liquids, usually water. Cisterns are often built to catch and store rainwater. Cisterns are distinguished from wells by t ...
s. The cisterns would then be transported to the desired location. This was not the first water system of its type in Montreal, as there had been one in private ownership since 1801. In the middle of the 19th century, water distribution was carried out by "fontainiers". The fountainiers would open and close water valves outside of buildings, as directed, all over the city. As they lacked modern plumbing systems it was impossible to connect all buildings at once and it also acted as a conservation method. However, the population was not finished rising — it rose from 58,000 in 1852 to 267,000 by 1901. Montreal was the capital of the
Province of Canada The Province of Canada (or the United Province of Canada or the United Canadas) was a British North America, British colony in North America from 1841 to 1867. Its formation reflected recommendations made by John Lambton, 1st Earl of Durham ...
from 1844 to 1849, but lost its status when a
Tory A Tory () is a person who holds a political philosophy known as Toryism, based on a British version of traditionalism and conservatism, which upholds the supremacy of social order as it has evolved in the English culture throughout history. The ...
mob burnt down the Parliament building to protest the passage of the
Rebellion Losses Bill The Rebellion Losses Bill (full name: ''An Act to provide for the Indemnification of Parties in Lower Canada whose Property was destroyed during the Rebellion in the years 1837 and 1838'') was a controversial law enacted by the legislature of ...
. Thereafter, the capital rotated between Quebec City and
Toronto Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the ancho ...
until in 1857,
Queen Victoria Victoria (Alexandrina Victoria; 24 May 1819 – 22 January 1901) was Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland from 20 June 1837 until her death in 1901. Her reign of 63 years and 216 days was longer than that of any previo ...
herself established
Ottawa Ottawa (, ; Canadian French: ) is the capital city of Canada. It is located at the confluence of the Ottawa River and the Rideau River in the southern portion of the province of Ontario. Ottawa borders Gatineau, Quebec, and forms the core ...
as the capital due to strategic reasons. The reasons were twofold. First, because it was located more in the interior of the Province of Canada, it was less susceptible to attack from the United States. Second, and perhaps more importantly, because it lay on the border between French and English Canada, Ottawa was seen as a compromise between Montreal, Toronto, Kingston and Quebec City, which were all vying to become the young nation's official capital. Ottawa retained the status as capital of Canada when the Province of Canada joined with
Nova Scotia Nova Scotia ( ; ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is one of the three Maritime provinces and one of the four Atlantic provinces. Nova Scotia is Latin for "New Scotland". Most of the population are native Eng ...
and
New Brunswick New Brunswick (french: Nouveau-Brunswick, , locally ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is one of the three Maritime provinces and one of the four Atlantic provinces. It is the only province with both English and ...
to form the Dominion of Canada in 1867. An
internment camp Internment is the imprisonment of people, commonly in large groups, without charges or intent to file charges. The term is especially used for the confinement "of enemy citizens in wartime or of terrorism suspects". Thus, while it can simpl ...
was set up at Immigration Hall in Montreal from August 1914 to November 1918. After
World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
, the
prohibition Prohibition is the act or practice of forbidding something by law; more particularly the term refers to the banning of the manufacture, storage (whether in barrels or in bottles), transportation, sale, possession, and consumption of alcoholic ...
movement in the United States led to Montreal becoming a destination for Americans looking for alcohol. Unemployment remained high in the city and was exacerbated by the
Stock Market Crash of 1929 The Wall Street Crash of 1929, also known as the Great Crash, was a major American stock market crash that occurred in the autumn of 1929. It started in September and ended late in October, when share prices on the New York Stock Exchange colla ...
and the
Great Depression The Great Depression (19291939) was an economic shock that impacted most countries across the world. It was a period of economic depression that became evident after a major fall in stock prices in the United States. The economic contagio ...
. During
World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposi ...
, Mayor
Camillien Houde Camillien Houde (August 13, 1889 – September 11, 1958) was a Quebec politician, a Member of Parliament, and a four-time mayor of Montreal – one of the few Canadian politicians to have served at all three levels of government. Political c ...
protested against conscription and urged Montrealers to disobey the federal government's registry of all men and women. The federal government, part of the Allied forces, was furious over Houde's stand and held him in a prison camp until 1944. That year, the government decided to institute conscription to expand the armed forces and fight the
Axis powers The Axis powers, ; it, Potenze dell'Asse ; ja, 枢軸国 ''Sūjikukoku'', group=nb originally called the Rome–Berlin Axis, was a military coalition that initiated World War II and fought against the Allies. Its principal members were ...
. (See
Conscription Crisis of 1944 The Conscription Crisis of 1944 was a political and military crisis following the introduction of forced military service for men in Canada during World War II. It was similar to the Conscription Crisis of 1917, but not as politically damaging. B ...
.) Montreal was the official residence of the
Luxembourg Luxembourg ( ; lb, Lëtzebuerg ; french: link=no, Luxembourg; german: link=no, Luxemburg), officially the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, ; french: link=no, Grand-Duché de Luxembourg ; german: link=no, Großherzogtum Luxemburg is a small lan ...
royal family in exile during World War II. By 1951, Montreal's population had surpassed one million. However, Toronto's growth had begun challenging Montreal's status as the economic capital of Canada. Indeed, the volume of stocks traded at the
Toronto Stock Exchange The Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX; french: Bourse de Toronto) is a stock exchange located in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is the 10th largest exchange in the world and the third largest in North America based on market capitalization. Based in the ...
had already surpassed that traded at the
Montreal Stock Exchange The Montreal Exchange (MX; french: Bourse de Montréal), formerly the Montreal Stock Exchange (MSE), is a derivatives exchange, located in Montreal, Quebec, Canada that trades futures contracts and options on equities, indices, currencies, ETFs, ...
in the 1940s. The
Saint Lawrence Seaway The St. Lawrence Seaway (french: la Voie Maritime du Saint-Laurent) is a system of locks, canals, and channels in Canada and the United States that permits oceangoing vessels to travel from the Atlantic Ocean to the Great Lakes of North Ameri ...
opened in 1959, allowing vessels to bypass Montreal. In time, this development led to the end of the city's economic dominance as businesses moved to other areas. During the 1960s, there was continued growth as Canada's tallest skyscrapers, new expressways and the subway system known as the
Montreal Metro The Montreal Metro (french: Métro de Montréal) is a rubber-tired underground rapid transit system serving Greater Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The metro, operated by the Société de transport de Montréal (STM), was inaugurated on October 14, ...
were finished during this time. Montreal also held the World's Fair of 1967, better known as
Expo67 The 1967 International and Universal Exposition, commonly known as Expo 67, was a general exhibition from April 27 to October 29, 1967. It was a category One World's Fair held in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. It is considered to be one of the most su ...
. The 1970s ushered in a period of wide-ranging social and political changes, stemming largely from the concerns of the French-speaking majority about the conservation of their culture and language, given the traditional predominance of the
English Canadian English Canadians (french: Canadiens anglais or ), or Anglo-Canadians (french: Anglo-Canadiens), refers to either Canadians of English ethnic origin and heritage or to English-speaking or Anglophone Canadians of any ethnic origin; it is use ...
minority in the business arena. The
October Crisis The October Crisis (french: Crise d'Octobre) refers to a chain of events that started in October 1970 when members of the Front de libération du Québec (FLQ) kidnapped the provincial Labour Minister Pierre Laporte and British diplomat James Cr ...
and the 1976 election of the
Parti Québécois The Parti Québécois (; ; PQ) is a sovereignist and social democratic provincial political party in Quebec, Canada. The PQ advocates national sovereignty for Quebec involving independence of the province of Quebec from Canada and establishin ...
, which supported sovereign status for Quebec, resulted in the departure of many businesses and people from the city. In 1976, Montreal hosted the
Summer Olympics The Summer Olympic Games (french: link=no, Jeux olympiques d'été), also known as the Games of the Olympiad, and often referred to as the Summer Olympics, is a major international multi-sport event normally held once every four years. The inau ...
. While the event brought the city international prestige and attention, the
Olympic Stadium ''Olympic Stadium'' is the name usually given to the main stadium of an Olympic Games. An Olympic stadium is the site of the opening and closing ceremonies. Many, though not all, of these venues actually contain the words ''Olympic Stadium'' as ...
built for the event resulted in massive debt for the city. During the 1980s and early 1990s, Montreal experienced a slower rate of economic growth than many other major Canadian cities. Montreal was the site of the 1989
École Polytechnique massacre École may refer to: * an elementary school in the French educational stages normally followed by secondary education establishments (collège and lycée) * École (river), a tributary of the Seine flowing in région Île-de-France * École, Savoi ...
, one of Canada's worst
mass shooting There is a lack of consensus on how to define a mass shooting. Most terms define a minimum of three or four victims of gun violence (not including the shooter or in an inner city) in a short period of time, although an Australian study from 20 ...
s, where 25-year-old
Marc Lépine Marc Lépine (; born October 26, 1964 – December 6, 1989) was a Canadian antifeminist mass murderer from Montreal, Quebec, who, in 1989, murdered fourteen women, and wounded ten women and four menNote: Many sources state thirteen were wounded ...
shot and killed 14 people, all of them women, and wounding 14 other people before shooting himself at
École Polytechnique École may refer to: * an elementary school in the French educational stages normally followed by secondary education establishments (collège and lycée) * École (river), a tributary of the Seine flowing in région Île-de-France * École, Savoi ...
. Montreal was
merged Mergers and acquisitions (M&A) are business transactions in which the ownership of companies, other business organizations, or their operating units are transferred to or consolidated with another company or business organization. As an aspect ...
with the 27 surrounding municipalities on the Island of Montreal on January 1, 2002, creating a unified city encompassing the entire island. There was substantial resistance from the suburbs to the merger, with the perception being that it was forced on the mostly English suburbs by the Parti Québécois. As expected, this move proved unpopular and several mergers were later rescinded. Several former municipalities, totalling 13% of the population of the island, voted to leave the unified city in separate
referendum A referendum (plural: referendums or less commonly referenda) is a direct vote by the electorate on a proposal, law, or political issue. This is in contrast to an issue being voted on by a representative. This may result in the adoption of a ...
s in June 2004. The demerger took place on January 1, 2006, leaving 15 municipalities on the island, including Montreal. Demerged municipalities remain affiliated with the city through an agglomeration council that collects taxes from them to pay for numerous shared services. The 2002 mergers were not the first in the city's history. Montreal annexed 27 other cities, towns and villages beginning with Hochelaga in 1883, with the last prior to 2002 being
Pointe-aux-Trembles Pointe-aux-Trembles was a municipality, founded in 1674, that was annexed by Montreal, Quebec, Canada, in 1982. This was the last city to be merged into Montreal until the 2002 municipal reorganization. On January 1, 2002 this neighbourhood a ...
in 1982. The 21st century has brought with it a revival of the city's economic and cultural landscape. The construction of new residential skyscrapers, two super-hospitals (the
Centre hospitalier de l'Université de Montréal The Centre hospitalier de l'Université de Montréal (CHUM, translated as University of Montreal Health Centre) is one of two major healthcare networks in the city of Montreal, Quebec. It is a teaching institution affiliated with the French-lang ...
and
McGill University Health Centre The McGill University Health Centre (MUHC; french: Centre universitaire de santé McGill) is one of two major healthcare networks in the city of Montreal, Quebec. It is affiliated with McGill University and is one of the largest medical complex in ...
), the creation of the Quartier des Spectacles, reconstruction of the
Turcot Interchange The Turcot Interchange is a three-level four-way freeway interchange within the city of Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Located southwest of downtown, the interchange links Autoroutes 15 (Décarie and Décarie South Expressways) and 20 (Remembrance H ...
, reconfiguration of the Decarie and Dorval interchanges, construction of the new Réseau électrique métropolitain, gentrification of
Griffintown Griffintown is a historic neighbourhood of Montreal, Quebec, southwest of downtown. The area existed as a functional neighbourhood from the 1820s until the 1960s, and was mainly populated by Irish immigrants and their descendants. Mostly depopulat ...
, subway line extensions and the purchase of new subway cars, the complete revitalization and expansion of Trudeau International Airport, the completion of
Quebec Autoroute 30 Autoroute 30 (A-30), or the Autoroute de l'Acier (In English, ''Steel Freeway'') is an Autoroute in Quebec, Canada. Construction of the A-30 dates back to the early days of autoroute construction in the 1960s. Originally called Highway 3, the A ...
, the reconstruction of the Champlain Bridge and the construction of a new toll bridge to Laval are helping Montreal continue to grow.


Geography

Montreal is in the southwest of the province of Quebec. The city covers most of the Island of Montreal at the confluence of the Saint Lawrence and Ottawa Rivers. The port of Montreal lies at one end of the Saint Lawrence Seaway, the river gateway that stretches from the
Great Lakes The Great Lakes, also called the Great Lakes of North America, are a series of large interconnected freshwater lakes in the mid-east region of North America that connect to the Atlantic Ocean via the Saint Lawrence River. There are five lak ...
to the Atlantic. Montreal is defined by its location between the Saint Lawrence river to its south and the
Rivière des Prairies The Rivière des Prairies (; ), called the Back River in English, is a delta channel of the Ottawa River in southwestern Quebec, Canada. The Kanien'kehá:ka called it ''Skowanoti'', meaning "River behind the island". The river separates the citi ...
to its north. The city is named after the most prominent geographical feature on the island, a three-head hill called Mount Royal, topped at above sea level. Montreal is at the centre of the
Montreal Metropolitan Community Greater Montreal (french: Grand Montréal) is the most populous metropolitan area in Quebec and the second most populous in Canada after Greater Toronto. In 2015, Statistics Canada identified Montreal's Census Metropolitan Area (CMA) as with a ...
, and is bordered by the city of Laval to the north;
Longueuil Longueuil () is a city in the province of Quebec, Canada. It is the seat of the Montérégie administrative region and the central city of the urban agglomeration of Longueuil. It sits on the south shore of the Saint Lawrence River directly ac ...
, Saint-Lambert,
Brossard Brossard (, , ) is a municipality in the Montérégie region of Quebec, Canada and is part of the Greater Montreal area. According to the 2021 census, Brossard's population was 91,525. It shares powers with the urban agglomeration of Longueuil ...
, and other municipalities to the south; Repentigny to the east and the
West Island The West Island () is the unofficial name given to the cities, towns and boroughs at the western end of the Island of Montreal, in Quebec, Canada. It is generally considered to consist of the Lakeshore municipalities of Dorval, Pointe-Cla ...
municipalities to the west. The
anglophone Speakers of English are also known as Anglophones, and the countries where English is natively spoken by the majority of the population are termed the ''Anglosphere''. Over two billion people speak English , making English the largest language ...
enclaves of Westmount,
Montreal West Montreal West (French: Montréal-Ouest) is an on-island suburb in southwestern Quebec, Canada, on the Island of Montreal. Montreal West is a small, close-knit community made up primarily of single-family dwellings. The town is largely composed ...
,
Hampstead Hampstead () is an area in London, which lies northwest of Charing Cross, and extends from Watling Street, the A5 road (Roman Watling Street) to Hampstead Heath, a large, hilly expanse of parkland. The area forms the northwest part of the Lon ...
,
Côte Saint-Luc Côte Saint-Luc (; also spelled Côte-Saint-Luc, and known historically in English as Cote St. Luke) is a city on the island of Montreal in Quebec, Canada. Geography Along with Hampstead and Montreal West, Côte Saint-Luc forms an enclave with ...
, the
Town of Mount Royal Mount Royal (french: Mont-Royal, officially Town of Mount Royal, french: Ville de Mont-Royal, abbreviated TMR, french: VMR) is an affluent on-island suburban town located on the northwest side of the eponymous Mount Royal, northwest of Downtown M ...
and the francophone enclave
Montreal East Montreal ( ; officially Montréal, ) is the second-most populous city in Canada and most populous city in the Canadian province of Quebec. Founded in 1642 as '' Ville-Marie'', or "City of Mary", it is named after Mount Royal, the triple-pe ...
are all surrounded by Montreal.


Climate

Montreal is classified as a
warm-summer humid continental climate A humid continental climate is a climatic region defined by Russo-German climatologist Wladimir Köppen in 1900, typified by four distinct seasons and large seasonal temperature differences, with warm to hot (and often humid) summers and freezing ...
(
Köppen climate classification The Köppen climate classification is one of the most widely used climate classification systems. It was first published by German-Russian climatologist Wladimir Köppen (1846–1940) in 1884, with several later modifications by Köppen, notabl ...
: Dfb). Summers are warm to hot and humid with a daily maximum average of in July; temperatures in excess of are common. Conversely, cold fronts can bring crisp, drier and windy weather in the early and later parts of summer. Winter brings cold, snowy, windy, and, at times, icy weather, with a daily average ranging from in January. However, some winter days rise above freezing, allowing for rain on an average of 4 days in January and February each. Usually, snow covering some or all bare ground lasts on average from the first or second week of December until the last week of March. While the air temperature does not fall below every year, the wind chill often makes the temperature feel this low to exposed skin. Spring and fall are pleasantly mild but prone to drastic temperature changes; spring even more so than fall. Late season heat waves as well as "
Indian summer An Indian summer is a period of unseasonably warm, dry weather that sometimes occurs in autumn in temperate regions of the northern hemisphere. Several sources describe a true Indian summer as not occurring until after the first frost, or more s ...
s" are possible. Early and late season snow storms can occur in November and March, and more rarely in April. Montreal is generally snow free from late April to late October. However, snow can fall in early to mid-October as well as early to mid-May on rare occasions. The lowest temperature in Environment Canada's books was on January 15, 1957, and the highest temperature was on August 1, 1975, both at Dorval International Airport. Before modern weather record keeping (which dates back to 1871 for McGill), a minimum temperature almost 5 degrees lower was recorded at 7 a.m. on January 10, 1859, where it registered at . Annual precipitation is around , including an average of about of snowfall, which occurs from November through March. Thunderstorms are common in the period beginning in late spring through summer to early fall; additionally, tropical storms or their remnants can cause heavy rains and gales. Montreal averages 2,050 hours of sunshine annually, with summer being the sunniest season, though slightly wetter than the others in terms of total precipitation—mostly from thunderstorms.


Architecture

For over a century and a half, Montreal was the industrial and financial centre of Canada. This legacy has left a variety of buildings including factories,
elevators An elevator or lift is a cable-assisted, hydraulic cylinder-assisted, or roller-track assisted machine that vertically transports people or freight between floors, levels, or decks of a building, vessel, or other structure. They are ...
,
warehouses A warehouse is a building for storing goods. Warehouses are used by manufacturers, importers, exporters, wholesalers, transport businesses, customs, etc. They are usually large plain buildings in industrial parks on the outskirts of cities, town ...
, mills, and refineries, that today provide an invaluable insight into the city's history, especially in the downtown area and the Old Port area. There are 50 National Historic Sites of Canada, more than any other city. Some of the city's earliest still-standing buildings date back to the late 17th and early 18th centuries. Although most are clustered around the Old Montreal area, such as the Sulpician Seminary adjacent to Notre Dame Basilica that dates back to 1687, and Château Ramezay, which was built in 1705, examples of early colonial architecture are dotted throughout the city. Situated in Lachine, the Le Ber-Le Moyne House is the oldest complete building in the city, built between 1669 and 1671. In Point St. Charles visitors can see the Maison Saint-Gabriel, which can trace its history back to 1698. There are many historic buildings in Old Montreal in their original form: Notre Dame of Montreal Basilica,
Bonsecours Market Bonsecours Market (french: Marché Bonsecours), at 350 rue Saint-Paul in Old Montreal, is a two-story domed public market. For more than 100 years, it was the main public market in the Montreal area. It also briefly accommodated the Parliament of ...
, and the 19th‑century headquarters of all major Canadian banks on St. James Street (French: Rue Saint Jacques). Montreal's earliest buildings are characterized by their uniquely French influence and grey stone construction.
Saint Joseph's Oratory Saint Joseph's Oratory of Mount Royal (french: Oratoire Saint-Joseph du Mont-Royal) is a Roman Catholic minor basilica and national shrine located at 3800 Queen Mary Road in the Côte-des-Neiges neighborhood on Mount Royal's Westmount Summit in ...
, completed in 1967,
Ernest Cormier Ernest Cormier OC (December 5, 1885 – January 1, 1980) was a Canadian engineer and architect. He spent much of his career in the Montreal area, designing notable examples of Art Deco architecture, including the Université de Montré ...
's
Art Deco Art Deco, short for the French ''Arts Décoratifs'', and sometimes just called Deco, is a style of visual arts, architecture, and product design, that first appeared in France in the 1910s (just before World War I), and flourished in the Unite ...
Université de Montréal The Université de Montréal (UdeM; ; translates to University of Montreal) is a French-language public research university in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The university's main campus is located in the Côte-des-Neiges neighborhood of Côte- ...
main building, the landmark
Place Ville Marie Place Ville Marie (PVM for short) is a large office and shopping complex skyscraper in Downtown Montreal, Quebec, Canada, comprising four office buildings and an underground shopping plaza. It serves as the main and official headquarters for Ro ...
office tower, the controversial Olympic Stadium and surrounding structures, are but a few notable examples of the city's 20th-century architecture. Pavilions designed for the 1967 International and Universal Exposition, popularly known as Expo 67, featured a wide range of architectural designs. Though most pavilions were temporary structures, several have become landmarks, including Buckminster Fuller's
geodesic dome A geodesic dome is a hemispherical thin-shell structure (lattice-shell) based on a geodesic polyhedron. The triangular elements of the dome are structurally rigid and distribute the structural stress throughout the structure, making geodesic do ...
U.S. Pavilion, now the Montreal Biosphere, and Moshe Safdie's striking Habitat 67 apartment complex. The Montreal Metro has public artwork by some of the biggest names in Culture of Quebec, Quebec culture. In 2006 Montreal was named a UNESCO City of Design, one of only three design capitals of the world (the others being Berlin and Buenos Aires). This distinguished title recognizes Montreal's design community. Since 2005 the city has been home for the International Council of Graphic Design Associations (Icograda); the International Design Alliance (IDA). The Underground City, Montreal, Underground City (officially RESO) is an important tourist attraction. It is the set of interconnected shopping complexes (both above and below ground). This impressive network connects pedestrian thoroughfares to universities, as well as hotels, restaurants, bistros, subway stations and more, in and around downtown with of tunnels over of the most densely populated part of Montreal.


Neighbourhoods

The city is composed of 19 large Boroughs of Montreal, boroughs, subdivided into neighbourhoods. The boroughs are: Côte-des-Neiges–Notre-Dame-de-Grâce, Côte-des-Neiges–Notre-Dame-de-Grace, Le Plateau-Mont-Royal, The Plateau Mount Royal, Outremont (borough), Outremont and Ville-Marie (Montreal), Ville Marie in the centre; Mercier–Hochelaga-Maisonneuve, Rosemont–La Petite-Patrie and Villeray–Saint-Michel–Parc-Extension in the east; Anjou (borough), Anjou, Montréal-Nord, Rivière-des-Prairies–Pointe-aux-Trembles and Saint-Leonard, Quebec, Saint-Leonard in the northeast; Ahuntsic-Cartierville, L'Île-Bizard–Sainte-Geneviève, Pierrefonds-Roxboro and Saint-Laurent (borough), Saint-Laurent in the northwest; and Lachine (borough), Lachine, LaSalle (borough), LaSalle, Le Sud-Ouest, The South West and Verdun (borough), Verdun in the south. Many of these boroughs were independent cities that were forced to be merged with Montreal in January 2002 following the 2002-2006 municipal reorganization of Montreal, 2002 municipal reorganization of Montreal. The borough with the most neighbourhoods is Ville Marie, which includes downtown, the historical district of Old Montreal, Chinatown (Montreal), Chinatown, the Gay Village, Montreal, Gay Village, the Quartier Latin, Montreal, Latin Quarter, the gentrified Quartier international de Montréal, Quartier international and Cité Multimédia as well as the Quartier des Spectacles which is under development. Other neighbourhoods of interest in the borough include the affluent Golden Square Mile neighbourhood at the foot of Mount Royal and the Shaughnessy Village/Quartier Concordia, Concordia U area home to thousands of students at Concordia University (Montreal), Concordia University. The borough also comprises most of Mount Royal Park, Saint Helen's Island, and Île Notre-Dame, Notre-Dame Island. The Plateau Mount Royal borough was a working class francophone area. The largest neighbourhood is the Plateau (not to be confused with the whole borough), which is undergoing considerable gentrification, and a 2001 study deemed it as Canada's most creative neighbourhood because artists comprise 8% of its labour force. The neighbourhood of Mile End, Montreal, Mile End in the northwestern part of the borough has been a very multicultural area of the city, and features two of Montreal's well-known Montreal-style bagel, bagel establishments, St-Viateur Bagel and Fairmount Bagel. The McGill Ghetto is in the extreme southwestern portion of the borough, its name being derived from the fact that it is home to thousands of McGill University students and faculty members. The South West borough was home to much of the city's industry during the late 19th and early-to-mid 20th century. The borough included Goose Village, Montreal, Goose Village and was historically home to the traditionally working-class Irish Quebecer, Irish neighbourhoods of Griffintown and Pointe-Saint-Charles, Point Saint Charles as well as the low-income neighbourhoods of Saint-Henri, Saint Henri and Little Burgundy. Other notable neighbourhoods include the multicultural areas of Notre-Dame-de-Grâce and Côte-des-Neiges in the Côte-des-Neiges–Notre-Dame-de-Grace borough, and Little Italy, Montreal, Little Italy in the borough of Rosemont–La Petite-Patrie and Hochelaga-Maisonneuve, home of the Olympic Stadium, Montreal, Olympic Stadium in the borough of Mercier–Hochelaga-Maisonneuve.


Old Montreal

Old Montreal is a historic area southeast of downtown containing many attractions such as the Old Port of Montreal, Place Jacques-Cartier, Montreal City Hall, the
Bonsecours Market Bonsecours Market (french: Marché Bonsecours), at 350 rue Saint-Paul in Old Montreal, is a two-story domed public market. For more than 100 years, it was the main public market in the Montreal area. It also briefly accommodated the Parliament of ...
, Place d'Armes, Pointe-à-Callière Museum, the Notre-Dame de Montréal Basilica, and the Montreal Science Centre. Architecture and cobbled streets in Old Montreal have been maintained or restored. Old Montreal is accessible from the downtown core via the underground city, Montreal, underground city and is served by several Société de transport de Montréal, STM bus routes and Metro stations, ferries to the South Shore and a network of bicycle paths. The riverside area adjacent to Old Montreal is known as the Old Port. The Old Port was the site of the Port of Montreal, but its shipping operations have been moved to a larger site downstream, leaving the former location as a recreational and historical area maintained by Parks Canada. The new Port of Montreal is Canada's largest container port and the largest inland port on Earth.


Mount Royal

The mountain is the site of Mount Royal Park, one of Montreal's largest Open space reserve, greenspaces. The park, most of which is wooded, was designed by Frederick Law Olmsted, who also designed New York's Central Park, and was inaugurated in 1876. The park contains two belvedere (structure), belvederes, the more prominent of which is the Kondiaronk Belvedere, a semicircular plaza with a chalet overlooking Downtown Montreal. Other features of the park are Beaver Lake, a small man-made lake, a short skiing, ski Ski slope, slope, a sculpture garden, Smith House, an interpretive centre, and a well-known George-Étienne Cartier Monument, monument to Sir George-Étienne Cartier. The park hosts athletic, tourist and cultural activities. The mountain is home to two major cemeteries, Notre-Dame-des-Neiges (founded in 1854) and Mount Royal (1852). Mount Royal Cemetery is a terraced cemetery on the north slope of Mount Royal in the borough of Outremont. Notre Dame des Neiges Cemetery is much larger, predominantly French-Canadian and officially Catholic. More than 900,000 people are buried there. Mount Royal Cemetery contains more than 162,000 graves and is the final resting place for a number of notable Canadians. It includes a veterans section with several soldiers who were awarded the British Empire's highest military honour, the Victoria Cross. In 1901, the Mount Royal Cemetery Company established the first crematorium in Canada. The first Mount Royal Cross, cross on the mountain was placed there in 1643 by Paul Chomedey de Maisonneuve, the founder of the city, in fulfilment of a vow he made to the Mary, mother of Jesus, Virgin Mary when prayer, praying to her to stop a disastrous flood. Today, the mountain is crowned by a 31.4 m-high (103 ft) illuminated cross, installed in 1924 by the Société Saint-Jean-Baptiste, John the Baptist Society and now owned by the city. It was converted to optical fibre, fibre optic light in 1992. The new system can turn the lights red, blue, or purple, the last of which is used as a sign of mourning between the death of the Pope and the election of the next.


Demographics

In the 2021 Canadian census, 2021 Census of Population conducted by Statistics Canada, Montréal had a population of living in of its total private dwellings, a change of from its 2016 population of . With a land area of , it had a population density of in 2021. According to Statistics Canada, at the 2016 Canadian census the city had 1,704,694 inhabitants. A total of 4,098,927 lived in the Montreal Census Metropolitan Area (CMA) at the same 2016 census, up from 3,934,078 at the 2011 census (within 2011 CMA boundaries), which is a population growth of 4.19% from 2011 to 2016. In 2015, the Greater Montreal population was estimated at 4,060,700. According to StatsCan, by 2030, the Greater Montreal Area is expected to number 5,275,000 with 1,722,000 being visible minorities. In the 2016 census, children under 14 years of age (691,345) constituted 16.9%, while inhabitants over 65 years of age (671,690) numbered 16.4% of the total population of the CMA.


Ethnicity

People of European ethnic groups, European ethnicities formed the largest cluster of ethnic groups. The largest reported European ethnicities in the 2006 census were French people, French 23%, Italian people, Italians 10%, Irish people, Irish 5%, English people, English 4%, Scottish people, Scottish 3%, and Spanish people, Spanish 2%. Some 26% of the population of Montreal and 16.5% that of Greater Montreal, are members of a visible minority (non-white) group, up from 5.2% in 1981. Visible minorities comprised 34.2% of the population in the Canada 2016 Census, 2016 census. The five most numerous visible minorities are Black Canadians (10.3%), Arab Canadians (7.3%), Latin American Canadians, Latin Americans (4.1%), South Asian Canadian (3.3%), and Chinese Canadians (3.3%). Visible minorities are defined by the Canadian Employment Equity Act as "persons, other than Aboriginal peoples of Canada, Aboriginals, who are non-white in colour".


Language

In terms of mother language (first language learned), the 2006 census reported that in the Greater Montreal Area, 66.5% spoke French as a first language, followed by English at 13.2%, while 0.8% spoke both as a first language. The remaining 22.5% of Montreal-area residents are Allophone (Quebec), allophones, speaking languages including Italian (3.5%), Arabic (3.1%), Spanish (2.6%), Creole language, Creole (1.3%), Chinese (1.2%), Greek (1.2%), Portuguese (0.8%), Berber language (0.8%), Romanian (0.7%), Vietnamese (0.7%), and Russian (0.7%). In terms of additional languages spoken, a unique feature of Montreal among Canadian cities, noted by Statistics Canada, is the working knowledge of both French and English possessed by most of its residents.


Immigration

The 2021 Canadian census, 2021 census reported that Immigration to Canada, immigrants (individuals born outside Canada) comprise 576,125 persons or 33.4% of the total population of Montreal. Of the total immigrant population, the top countries of origin were Haiti (47,550 persons or 8.3%), Algeria (43,840 persons or 7.6%), France (39,275 persons or 6.8%), Morocco (33,005 persons or 5.7%), Italy (30,215 persons or 5.2%), China (26,335 persons or 4.6%), Philippines (20,475 persons or 3.6%), Lebanon (17,455 persons or 3.0%), Vietnam (16,395 persons or 2.8%), and India (13,575 persons or 2.4%).


Religion

The Greater Montreal Area is predominantly Catholic Church, Catholic; however, weekly attendance in Quebec was among the lowest in Canada in 1998. Historically Montreal has been a centre of Catholicism in North America with its numerous seminaries and churches, including the Notre-Dame Basilica (Montreal), Notre-Dame Basilica, the Cathédrale Marie-Reine-du-Monde, and
Saint Joseph's Oratory Saint Joseph's Oratory of Mount Royal (french: Oratoire Saint-Joseph du Mont-Royal) is a Roman Catholic minor basilica and national shrine located at 3800 Queen Mary Road in the Côte-des-Neiges neighborhood on Mount Royal's Westmount Summit in ...
. Some 49.5% of the total population is Christian, largely Roman Catholic (35.0%), primarily because of descendants of original French settlers, and others of Italian and Irish origins. Protestants which include Anglican Church in Canada, United Church of Canada, Lutheran, owing to British and German immigration, and other denominations number 11.3%, with a further 3.2% consisting mostly of Eastern Orthodox, Orthodox Christians, fuelled by a large Greek population. There is also a number of Russian and Ukrainian Orthodox parishes. Islam is the largest non-Christian religious group, with 218,395 members, the second-largest concentration of Muslims in Canada at 12.7%. The Jewish community in Montreal has a population of 35,930. In cities such as Côte Saint-Luc and Hampstead, Jewish people constitute the majority, or a substantial part of the population. As recently as 1971 the Jewish community in Greater Montreal was as high as 109,480. Political and economic uncertainties led many to leave Montreal and the province of Quebec.


Economy

Montreal has the second-largest economy of Canadian cities based on GDP Toronto was first in Canada with GDP. and the largest in Quebec. In 2014, Metropolitan Montreal was responsible for of Quebec's GDP. The city is today an important centre of commerce, finance, industry, technology, culture, world affairs and is the headquarters of the Montreal Exchange. In recent decades, the city was widely seen as weaker than that of Toronto and other major Canadian cities, but it has recently experienced a revival. Industries include aerospace, electronics, electronic goods, pharmaceuticals, printed goods, software engineering, telecommunications, textile and apparel manufacturing, tobacco, petrochemicals, and transportation. The service sector is also strong and includes civil engineering, civil, mechanical engineering, mechanical and process engineering, finance, higher education, and research and development. In 2002, Montreal was the fourth-largest centre in North America in terms of aerospace jobs. The Port of Montreal is one of the largest inland ports in the world handling 26 million tonnes of cargo annually. As one of the most important ports in Canada, it remains a transshipment point for cereal, grain, sugar, petroleum products, machinery, and consumer goods. For this reason, Montreal is the railway hub of Canada and has always been an extremely important rail city; it is home to the headquarters of the Canadian National Railway, and was home to the headquarters of the Canadian Pacific Railway until 1995. The headquarters of the Canadian Space Agency is in Longueuil, southeast of Montreal. Montreal also hosts the headquarters of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO, a United Nations body); the World Anti-Doping Agency (an International Olympic Committee, Olympic body); the Airports Council International (the association of the world's airports – ACI World); the International Air Transport Association (IATA), IATA Operational Safety Audit and the International Gay and Lesbian Chamber of Commerce (IGLCC), as well as some other international organizations in various fields. Montreal is a centre of film and television production. The headquarters of Alliance Films and five studios of the Academy Awards, Academy Award-winning documentary producer National Film Board of Canada are in the city, as well as the head offices of Telefilm Canada, the national feature-length film and television funding agency and Télévision de Radio-Canada. Given its eclectic architecture and broad availability of film services and crew members, Montreal is a popular filming location for feature-length films, and sometimes stands in for European locations. The city is also home to many recognized cultural, film and music festivals (Just For Laughs, Just For Laughs Gags,
Montreal International Jazz Festival The Festival International de Jazz de Montréal ( en, Montreal International Jazz Festival) is an annual jazz festival held in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The Montreal Jazz Fest holds the 2004 Guinness World Record as the world's largest jazz fes ...
, and others), which contribute significantly to its economy. It is also home to one of the world's largest cultural enterprises, the Cirque du Soleil. Montreal is also a global hub for artificial intelligence research with many companies involved in this sector, such as Facebook AI Research (FAIR), Microsoft Research, Google Brain, DeepMind, Samsung Research and Thales Group (cortAIx). The city is also home to Mila (research institute), an artificial intelligence research institute with over 500 researchers specializing in the field of deep learning, the largest of its kind in the world. The video game industry has been booming in Montreal since November 2, 1995, coinciding with the opening of Ubisoft Montreal. Recently, the city has attracted world leading game developers and publishers studios such as EA Montreal, EA, Eidos Interactive, BioWare, Artificial Mind and Movement, Strategy First, THQ, Gameloft mainly because of the quality of local specialized labour, and tax credits offered to the corporations. Recently, Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment, a division of Warner Bros., announced that it would open a video game studio. Relatively new to the video game industry, it will be Warner Bros. first studio opened, not purchased, and will develop games for such Warner Bros. franchises as Batman and other games from their DC Comics portfolio. The studio will create 300 jobs. Montreal plays an important role in the finance industry. The sector employs approximately 100,000 people in the Greater Montreal Area. As of March 2018, Montreal is ranked in the 12th position in the Global Financial Centres Index, a ranking of the Competition (companies), competitiveness of financial centres around the world. The city is home to the Montreal Exchange, the oldest stock exchange in Canada and the only financial derivatives exchange in the country. The corporate headquarters of the Bank of Montreal and Royal Bank of Canada, two of the biggest banks in Canada, were in Montreal. While both banks moved their headquarters to Toronto, Ontario, their legal corporate offices remain in Montreal. The city is home to head offices of two smaller banks, National Bank of Canada and Laurentian Bank of Canada. The Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec, an institutional investor managing assets totalling $248 billion CAD, has its main business office in Montreal. Many foreign subsidiaries operating in the financial sector also have offices in Montreal, including HSBC, Aon (company), Aon, Société Générale, BNP Paribas and AXA. Several companies are headquartered in Greater Montreal Area including Rio Tinto Alcan, Bombardier Inc., Canadian National Railway, CGI Group, Air Canada, Air Transat, CAE (company), CAE, Saputo Incorporated, Saputo, Cirque du Soleil, Stingray Group, Quebecor, Ultramar, Kruger Inc., Jean Coutu Group, Uniprix, Proxim (pharmacy), Proxim, Domtar, Le Château, Power Corporation, Cellcom Communications, Bell Canada. Standard Life (Canada), Standard Life, Hydro-Québec, AbitibiBowater, Pratt and Whitney Canada, Molson, Tembec, Canada Steamship Lines, Fednav, Alimentation Couche-Tard, SNC-Lavalin, MEGA Brands, Aeroplan, Agropur, Metro Inc., Laurentian Bank of Canada, National Bank of Canada, Transat A.T., Via Rail, GardaWorld, Novacam Technologies, SOLABS, Dollarama, Rona (company), Rona and the Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec. The Montreal Oil Refining Centre is the largest refining centre in Canada, with companies like Petro-Canada, Ultramar, Gulf Oil, Petromont, Ashland Canada, Parachem Petrochemical, Coastal Petrochemical, Interquisa (Cepsa) Petrochemical, Nova Chemicals, and more. Shell decided to close the refining centre in 2010, throwing hundreds out of work and causing an increased dependence on foreign refineries for eastern Canada.


Culture

Montreal was referred to as "Canada's Cultural Capital" by Monocle (2007 magazine), ''Monocle'' magazine. The city is Canada's centre for French-language television productions, radio, theatre, film, multimedia, and print publishing. Montreal's many cultural communities have given it a distinct local culture. Montreal was designated as the World Book Capital for the year 2005 by
UNESCO The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a specialized agency of the United Nations (UN) aimed at promoting world peace and security through international cooperation in education, arts, sciences and culture. It ...
. Being at the confluence of the French and the English traditions, Montreal has developed a unique and distinguished cultural face. The city has produced much talent in the fields of visual arts, theatre, dance, and music, with a tradition of producing both jazz and rock music. Another distinctive characteristic of cultural life is the vibrancy of its downtown, particularly during summer, prompted by cultural and social events, including its more than 100 annual festivals, the largest being the Montreal International Jazz Festival which is the largest jazz festival in the world. Other popular events include the Just for Laughs (largest comedy festival in the world), Montreal World Film Festival, Les FrancoFolies de Montréal, , Pop Montreal, Divers/Cité, Fierté Montréal and the Montreal Fireworks Festival, and many smaller festivals. The city of Montreal is also widely recognized for its diverse and vibrant night life, which is considered a vital part of the local cultural ecosystem. A cultural heart of classical art and the venue for many summer festivals, the Place des Arts is a complex of different concert and theatre halls surrounding a large square in the eastern portion of downtown
Place des Arts
has the headquarters of one of the world's foremost orchestras, the Montreal Symphony Orchestra. The Orchestre Métropolitain du Grand Montréal and the chamber orchestra I Musici de Montréal are two other well-regarded Montreal orchestras. Also performing at Place des Arts are the Opéra de Montréal and the city's chief ballet company Les Grands Ballets Canadiens. Internationally recognized avant-garde dance troupes such as , La La La Human Steps, , and the have toured the world and worked with international popular artists on videos and concerts. The unique choreography of these troupes has paved the way for the success of the world-renowned Cirque du Soleil. Nicknamed ' (the city of a hundred steeples), Montreal is renowned for its churches. There are an estimated 650 churches on the island, with 450 of them dating back to the 1800s or earlier. Mark Twain noted, "This is the first time I was ever in a city where you couldn't throw a brick without breaking a church window." The city has four Roman Catholic basilicas: Mary, Queen of the World Cathedral, Notre-Dame Basilica (Montreal), Notre-Dame Basilica, St. Patrick's Basilica, Montreal, St Patrick's Basilica, and
Saint Joseph's Oratory Saint Joseph's Oratory of Mount Royal (french: Oratoire Saint-Joseph du Mont-Royal) is a Roman Catholic minor basilica and national shrine located at 3800 Queen Mary Road in the Côte-des-Neiges neighborhood on Mount Royal's Westmount Summit in ...
. The Oratory is the largest church in Canada, with the second largest copper dome in the world, after Saint Peter's Basilica in Rome. Beginning in the 1940s, Quebec literature began to shift from pastoral tales romanticising the French Canadians, French-Canadian country-side to writing set in the multicultural city of Montreal. Notable pioneering works describing the character of the city include Gabrielle Roy's 1945 novel The Tin Flute, ''Bonheur D'Occasion'', translated as ''The Tin Flute'', and Gwethalyn Graham's 1944 novel ''Earth and High Heaven''. Subsequent writers of fiction who have set their work in Montreal have included Mordecai Richler, Claude Jasmin, Francine Noel, and Heather O'Neill, among List of people from Montreal, many others.


Sports

The most popular sport is ice hockey. The professional hockey team, the
Montreal Canadiens The Montreal CanadiensEven in English, the French spelling is always used instead of ''Canadians''. The French spelling of ''Montréal'' is also sometimes used in the English media. (french: link=no, Les Canadiens de Montréal), officially ...
, is one of the Original Six teams of the
National Hockey League The National Hockey League (NHL; french: Ligue nationale de hockey—LNH, ) is a professional ice hockey league in North America comprising 32 teams—25 in the United States and 7 in Canada. It is considered to be the top ranked professional ...
(NHL), and has won an NHL-record 24
Stanley Cup The Stanley Cup (french: La Coupe Stanley) is the championship trophy awarded annually to the National Hockey League (NHL) playoff champion. It is the oldest existing trophy to be awarded to a professional sports franchise in North America, an ...
championships. The Canadiens' most recent Stanley Cup victory came in 1993 Stanley Cup Finals, 1993. They have major rivalries with the Toronto Maple Leafs and Boston Bruins, both of which are also Original Six teams, and with the Ottawa Senators, the closest team geographically. The Canadiens have played at the Bell Centre since 1996. Prior to that they played at the Montreal Forum. The Montreal Alouettes of the Canadian Football League (CFL) play at Molson Stadium on the campus of McGill University for their regular-season games. Late season and playoff games are played at the much larger, enclosed Olympic Stadium, which also hosted the 2008 Grey Cup. The Alouettes have won the Grey Cup seven times, most recently in 98th Grey Cup, 2010. The Alouettes has had two periods on hiatus. During the second one, the Montreal Machine played in the World League of American Football in 1991 and 1992. The McGill Redbirds and Martlets, McGill Redbirds, Concordia Stingers, and Montreal Carabins, Université de Montréal Carabins play in the U Sports football league. Montreal has a storied baseball history. The city was the home of the minor-league Montreal Royals of the International League until 1960. In 1946 Jackie Robinson broke the Baseball colour line with the Royals in an emotionally difficult year; Robinson was forever grateful for the local fans' fervent support. Major League Baseball came to town in the form of the Montreal Expos in 1969. They played their games at Jarry Park Stadium until moving into Olympic Stadium in 1977. After 36 years in Montreal, the team relocated to Washington, D.C., in 2005 and re-branded themselves as the Washington Nationals. CF Montréal (formerly known as the Montreal Impact) are the city's professional soccer team. They play at a soccer-specific stadium called Saputo Stadium. They joined North America's biggest soccer league, Major League Soccer, in 2012. The Montreal games of the 2007 FIFA U-20 World Cup and 2014 FIFA U-20 Women's World Cup were held at Olympic Stadium, and the venue hosted Montreal games in the 2015 FIFA Women's World Cup. Montreal is the site of a high-profile auto racing event each year: the Canadian Grand Prix of Formula One (F1) racing. This race takes place on the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve on Île Notre-Dame. In 2009, the race was dropped from the Formula One calendar, to the chagrin of some fans, but the Canadian Grand Prix returned to the Formula One calendar in 2010. It was dropped from the calendar again since 2020, due to
COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identif ...
. The Circuit Gilles Villeneuve also hosted a round of the Champ Car World Series from 2002 to 2007, and was home to the NAPA Auto Parts 200, a Xfinity Series, NASCAR Nationwide Series race, and the Montréal 200, a Grand American Road Racing Association, Grand Am Rolex Sports Car Series race. Uniprix Stadium, built in 1993 on the site of Jarry Park, is used for the Canada Masters, Rogers Cup men's and women's tennis tournaments. The men's tournament is a ATP World Tour Masters 1000, Masters 1000 event on the Association of Tennis Professionals, ATP Tour, and the women's tournament is a WTA Premier tournaments, Premier tournament on the Women's Tennis Association, WTA Tour. The men's and women's tournaments alternate between Montreal and Toronto every year. Montreal was the host of the 1976 Summer Olympic Games. The stadium cost $1.5 billion; with interest that figure ballooned to nearly $3 billion, and was paid off in December 2006. Montreal also hosted the first ever World Outgames in the summer of 2006, attracting over 16,000 participants engaged in 35 sporting activities. Montreal was the host city for the 17th unicycling world championship and convention (UNICON) in August 2014.


Media

Montreal is Canada's second-largest media market, and the centre of francophone Canada's media industry. There are four Terrestrial television, over-the-air English-language television stations: CBMT-DT (CBC Television), CFCF-DT (CTV Television Network, CTV), CKMI-DT (Global Television Network, Global) and CJNT-DT (Citytv). There are also five over-the-air French-language television stations: CBFT-DT (Ici Radio-Canada Télé, Ici Radio-Canada), CFTM-DT (TVA (Canadian TV network), TVA), CFJP-DT (Noovo), CIVM-DT (Télé-Québec), and CFTU-DT (Canal Savoir). Montreal has three daily newspapers, the English-language ''Montreal Gazette'' and the French-language ''Le Journal de Montréal'', and ''Le Devoir''; another French-language daily, ''La Presse (Canadian newspaper), La Presse'', became an online daily in 2018. There are two free French dailies, ''Metro International, Métro'' and ''24 Hours (newspaper), 24 Heures''. Montreal has numerous weekly tabloids and community newspapers serving various neighbourhoods, ethnic groups and schools.


Government

The head of the city government in Montreal is the mayor, who is first among equals in the city council. The city council is a democratically elected institution and is the final decision-making authority in the city, although much power is centralized in the executive committee. The council consists of 65 members from all boroughs. The council has jurisdiction over many matters, including public security, agreements with other governments, subsidy programs, the natural environment, environment, urban planning, and a three-year capital expenditure program. The council is required to supervise, standardize or approve certain decisions made by the borough councils. Reporting directly to the council, the executive committee exercises decision-making powers similar to those of the cabinet in a parliamentary system and is responsible for preparing various documents including budgets and by-laws, submitted to the council for approval. The decision-making powers of the executive committee cover, in particular, the awarding of contracts or grants, the management of human and financial resources, supplies and buildings. It may also be assigned further powers by the city council. Standing committees are the prime instruments for public consultation. They are responsible for the public study of pending matters and for making the appropriate recommendations to the council. They also review the annual budget forecasts for departments under their jurisdiction. A public notice of meeting is published in both French and English daily newspapers at least seven days before each meeting. All meetings include a public question period. The standing committees, of which there are seven, have terms lasting two years. In addition, the City Council may decide to create special committees at any time. Each standing committee is made up of seven to nine members, including a chairman and a vice-chairman. The members are all elected municipal officers, with the exception of a representative of the government of Quebec on the public security committee. The city is only one component of the larger Montreal Metropolitan Community (Communauté Métropolitaine de Montréal, CMM), which is in charge of planning, coordinating, and financing economic development, public transportation, garbage collection and waste management, etc., across the metropolitan area. The president of the CMM is the mayor of Montreal. The CMM covers , with 3.6 million inhabitants in 2006. Montreal is the seat of the Judicial districts of Quebec, judicial district of Montreal, which includes the city and the other communities on the island.


Policing

Law enforcement on the island itself is provided by the ''SPVM, Service de Police de la Ville de Montréal,'' or the SPVM for short.


Crime

The overall crime rate in Montreal has declined, with a few notable exceptions, with murders at the lowest rate since 1972 (23 murders in 2016). Sex crimes have increased 14.5 per cent between 2015 and 2016 and fraud cases have increased by 13 per cent over the same period. The major criminal organizations active in Montreal are the Rizzuto crime family, Hells Angels and West End Gang.


Education

The Education in Quebec, education system in Quebec is different from other systems in North America. Between high school (which ends at grade 11) and university students must go through an additional school called CEGEP. CEGEPs offer pre-university (2-years) and technical (3-years) programs. In Montreal, List of CEGEPs, seventeen CEGEPs offer courses in French and five in English. French-language elementary and secondary public schools in Montreal are operated by the Centre de services scolaire de Montréal (CSDM), Centre de services scolaire Marguerite-Bourgeoys and the Centre de services scolaire de la Pointe-de-l'Île. English-language elementary and secondary public schools on Montreal Island are operated by the English Montreal School Board and the Lester B. Pearson School Board. With four universities, seven other degree-awarding institutions, and 12 CEGEPs in an radius, Montreal has the highest concentration of post-secondary students of all major cities in North America (4.38 students per 100 residents, followed by Boston at 4.37 students per 100 residents).


Higher education (English)

* McGill University is one of Canada's leading post-secondary institutions and is widely regarded as a world-class institution. In 2021, McGill was ranked as the top medical-doctoral university in Canada for the seventeenth consecutive year by Maclean's and second in Canada and the 27th best university in the world by the
QS World University Rankings ''QS World University Rankings'' is an annual publication of university rankings by Quacquarelli Symonds (QS). The QS system comprises three parts: the global overall ranking, the subject rankings (which name the world's top universities for the ...
. * Concordia University (Montreal), Concordia University was created from the merger of Concordia University (Montreal)#Sir George Williams University, Sir George Williams University and Concordia University (Montreal)#Loyola College, Loyola College in 1974. The university has been ranked as one of the most comprehensive universities in Canada by Macleans.


Higher education (French)

* ''
Université de Montréal The Université de Montréal (UdeM; ; translates to University of Montreal) is a French-language public research university in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The university's main campus is located in the Côte-des-Neiges neighborhood of Côte- ...
'' (UdeM) is the second largest research university in Canada and ranked as one of the top universities in Canada. Two separate institutions are affiliated to the university: the ''École Polytechnique de Montréal'' (School of Engineering) and ''HEC Montréal'' (School of Business). HEC Montreal was founded in 1907 and is considered one of the best business schools in Canada. * ''Université du Québec à Montréal'' (''UQAM'') is the Montreal campus of ''Université du Québec''. ''UQAM'' generally specializes in liberal-arts, although many programs related to the sciences are available. ** The ''Université du Québec'' network also has three separately run schools in Montréal, notably the ''École de technologie supérieure (ETS)'', the ''École nationale d'administration publique (ÉNAP)'' and the ''Institut national de la recherche scientifique (INRS)''. * ''L'Institut de formation théologique de Montréal des Prêtres de Saint-Sulpice'' (''IFTM'') specializes in theology and philosophy. * ''Conservatoire de musique du Québec à Montréal'' offers both a Bachelor's degree, Bachelor and a Master's degree, Master program in classical music. Additionally, two French-language universities, Université de Sherbrooke and Université Laval have campuses in the nearby suburb of Longueuil on Montreal's South Shore (Montreal), south shore. Also, lInstitut de pastorale des Dominicains'' is Montreal's university centre of Ottawa's Collège Universitaire Dominicain/Dominican University College. The ''Faculté de théologie évangélique'' is
Nova Scotia Nova Scotia ( ; ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is one of the three Maritime provinces and one of the four Atlantic provinces. Nova Scotia is Latin for "New Scotland". Most of the population are native Eng ...
's Acadia University Montreal based serving French Protestant community in Canada by offering both a Bachelor and a Master program in theology


Transportation

Like many major cities, Montreal has a problem with vehicular traffic congestion. Commuting traffic from the cities and towns in the West Island (such as Dollard-des-Ormeaux and Pointe-Claire) is compounded by commuters entering the city that use twenty-four road crossings from numerous off-island suburbs on the North Shore (Laval), North and South Shores. The width of the Saint Lawrence River has made the construction of fixed links to the south shore expensive and difficult. There are presently four road bridges (including two of the country's busiest) along with one bridge-tunnel, two railway bridges, and a Metro line. The far narrower Rivière des Prairies to the city's north, separating Montreal from Laval, is spanned by nine road bridges (seven to the city of Laval and two that span directly to the north shore) and a Metro line. The island of Montreal is a hub for the Quebec Autoroute (Quebec), Autoroute system, and is served by Quebec Autoroutes Quebec Autoroute 10, A-10 (known as the Bonaventure Expressway on the island of Montreal), Quebec Autoroute 15, A-15 (aka the Decarie Expressway south of the A-40 and the Laurentian Autoroute to the north of it), Quebec Autoroute 13, A-13 (aka Chomedey Autoroute), Quebec Autoroute 20, A-20, Quebec Autoroute 25, A-25, Quebec Autoroute 40, A-40 (part of the Trans-Canada Highway system, and known as "The Metropolitan" or simply "The Met" in its elevated mid-town section), Quebec Autoroute 520, A-520 and Quebec Route 136 (Montreal), R-136 (aka the Ville-Marie Autoroute). Many of these Autoroutes are frequently congested at rush hour. However, in recent years, the government has acknowledged this problem and is working on long-term solutions to alleviate the congestion. One such example is the extension of
Quebec Autoroute 30 Autoroute 30 (A-30), or the Autoroute de l'Acier (In English, ''Steel Freeway'') is an Autoroute in Quebec, Canada. Construction of the A-30 dates back to the early days of autoroute construction in the 1960s. Originally called Highway 3, the A ...
on Montreal's south shore, which will be a bypass (road), bypass for trucks and intercity traffic.


Société de transport de Montréal

Public local transport is served by a network of buses, subways, and commuter trains that extend across and off the island. The subway and bus system are operated by the Société de transport de Montréal (STM, Montreal Transit Society). The List of Montreal bus routes, STM bus network consists of 203 daytime and 23 night time routes. STM bus routes serve 1,347,900 passengers on an average weekday in 2010. It also provides adapted transport and wheelchair-accessible buses. The STM won the award of Outstanding Public Transit System in North America by the APTA in 2010. It was the first time a Canadian company won this prize. The Metro was inaugurated in 1966 and has 68 stations on four lines. It is Canada's busiest subway system in total daily passenger usage, serving 1,050,800 passengers on an average weekday (as of Q1 2010). Each station was designed by different architects with individual themes and features original artwork, and the trains run on rubber tires, making the system quieter than most. The project was initiated by Montreal Mayor Jean Drapeau, who later brought the Summer Olympic Games to Montreal in 1976. The Metro system has long had a station on the South Shore in Longueuil, Quebec, Longueuil, and in 2007 was extended to the city of Laval, north of Montreal, with three new stations. The metro has recently been modernizing its trains, purchasing new ''Azur'' models with inter-connected wagons.


Air

Montreal has two international airports, one for passengers only, the other for cargo. Montréal-Pierre Elliott Trudeau International Airport, Pierre Elliott Trudeau International Airport (also known as ''Dorval Airport'') in the City of Dorval serves all commercial passenger traffic and is the headquarters of Air Canada and Air Transat. To the north of the city is Montréal-Mirabel International Airport, Montreal Mirabel International Airport in Mirabel, Quebec, Mirabel, which was envisioned as Montreal's primary airport but which now serves cargo flights along with MEDEVACs and general aviation and some passenger services. In 2018, Trudeau was the List of the busiest airports in Canada, third busiest airport in Canada by passenger traffic and aircraft movements, handling 19.42 million passengers, and 240,159 aircraft movements. With 63% of its passengers being on non-domestic flights it has the largest percentage of international flights of any Canadian airport. It is one of Air Canada's major airline hub, hubs and operates on average approximately 2,400 flights per week between Montreal and 155 destinations, spread on five continents. Airlines servicing Trudeau offer year-round non-stop flights to five continents, namely Africa, Asia, Europe, North America and South America. It is one of only two airports in Canada with direct flights to five continents or more.


Rail

Montreal-based Via Rail Canada provides rail service to other cities in Canada, particularly to Quebec City and Toronto along the Quebec City – Windsor Corridor. Amtrak, the U.S. national passenger rail system, operates its ''Adirondack (Amtrak), Adirondack'' daily to New York. All intercity trains and most commuter trains operate out of Central Station (Montreal), Central Station. Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR), headquartered in Calgary, Alberta, was founded here in 1881. Its corporate headquarters occupied Windsor Station (Montreal), Windsor Station at 910 Peel Street, Montreal, Peel Street until 1995. With the Port of Montreal kept open year-round by icebreakers, lines to Eastern Canada became surplus, and now Montreal is the railway's eastern and intermodal freight terminus. CPR connects at Montreal with the Port of Montreal, the Delaware and Hudson Railway to New York, the Quebec Gatineau Railway to Quebec City and Buckingham, Quebec, Buckingham, the Central Maine and Quebec Railway to Halifax, and Canadian National Railway (CN). The CPR's flagship train, ''The Canadian'', ran daily from Windsor Station to Vancouver, but in 1978 all passenger services were transferred to Via. Since 1990, ''The Canadian'' has terminated in Toronto instead of in Montreal. Montreal-based CN was formed in 1919 by the Canadian government following a series of country-wide rail bankruptcies. It was formed from the Grand Trunk Railway, Grand Trunk, Midland and Canadian Northern Railways, and has risen to become CPR's chief rival in freight carriage in Canada. Like the CPR, CN divested itself of passenger services in favour of Via. CN's flagship train, the ''Super Continental'', ran daily from Central Station to Vancouver and subsequently became a Via train in 1978. It was eliminated in 1990 in favour of rerouting ''The Canadian''. The commuter rail system is managed and operated by Exo (public transit), Exo, and reaches the outlying areas of Greater Montreal with six lines. It carried an average of 79,000 daily passengers in 2014, making it the seventh busiest in North America following New York, Chicago, Toronto, Boston, Philadelphia, and Mexico City. On April 22, 2016, the forthcoming automated rapid transit system, the Réseau express métropolitain (REM), was unveiled. Groundbreaking occurred April 12, 2018, and construction of the networkconsisting of three branches, 26 stations, and the conversion of the region's busiest commuter railwaycommenced the following month. To be opened in three phases as of 2022, the REM will be completed by mid-2024, becoming the fourth largest automated rapid transit network after the Dubai Metro, the Mass Rapid Transit (Singapore), Singapore Mass Rapid Transit, and the SkyTrain (Vancouver), Vancouver SkyTrain. Most of it will be financed by pension fund manager Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec (CDPQ Infra). On December 15, 2020, CDPQ Infra announced another network, the REM de l'Est. None of its trackage will link to the initial network, although its inner terminus close to the city's centre is to double as a passenger interchange. Covering the eastern half of the island, it is to be in length with 23 stations. Plans to elevate its trunk segment through the eastern end of the city centre and an adjacent inner-city district, however, have become controversial, while the north-bound one of its pair of branches is to be tunnelled through suburban districts. And by January 18, 2021, North Shore mayors of municipalities north of the Rivière des Mille Îles announced their desires to erect yet another REM network paralleling the river to link their North Shore communities between Oka and L'Assomption, a distance of roughly .


Bike Share Program

Main articles The city of Montreal is world-renowned for being in the top 20 most cyclist-friendly cities around the globe. It follows that they have one of the world's most successful bike share systems in BIXI Montréal, BIXI. First launched in 2009 with Montreal-based PBSC Urban Solutions ICONIC bikes, the bicycle-sharing scheme has since grown its fleet to include 750 docking and charging stations across the different neighbourhoods with 9000 bikes available for users. In what the Société de transport de Montréal, STM states is a mission to combine different forms of mobility, transit card holders can now take advantage of their membership to also rent bicycles at select stations.


Notable people


International relations


Sister cities

* Algiers, Algeria – 1999 * Brussels, Belgium * Bucharest, Romania * Busan, South Korea – 2000 * Boston, United States – 1995 * Guadalajara, Mexico – 2004 * Hanoi, Vietnam – 1997 * Hiroshima, Japan – 1998 * Lyon, France – 1979 * Manila, Philippines – 2005 * Melbourne, Australia – 2007 * Port-au-Prince, Haiti – 1995 * Quito, Ecuador – 1997 * Rio de Janeiro, Brazil – 1998 * San Salvador, El Salvador – 2001 * Shanghai, China – 1985 * Tunis, Tunisia – 1999 * Yerevan, Armenia – 1998


Friendship cities

* Paris, France – 2006


See also

* List of mayors of Montreal * List of Montreal music venues * List of shopping malls in Montreal * List of tallest buildings in Montreal


Notes


References


Further reading

* Collard, Edgar A. (1976). ''Montréal: the Days That Are No More'', in series, ''Totem Book[s].'' This ed. slightly edited [anew]. Toronto, Ont.: Doubleday Canada, [1978], cop. 1976. x, 140, [4] p., ill. in b&w with maps and numerous sketches. * Gagnon, Robert (1996). ''Anglophones at the C.E.C.M.: a Reflection of the Linguistic Duality of Montréal''. Trans. by Peter Keating. Montréal: Commission des écoles catholiques de Montréal. 124 p., ill. with b&w photos. * * Heritage Montréal (1992). ''Steps in Time = Patrimoine en marche''. Montréal: Québécor. 4 vol. of 20, 20 p. each. Text printed "tête-bêche" in English and in French. On title covers: "Montréal, fête, 350 ans". * * Tomàs, Mariona. "Exploring the metropolitan trap: the case of Montreal." ''International Journal of Urban and Regional Research'' (2012) 36#3 pp: 554–567. . * * * Natural Resources Canada (2005)
Canadian Geographical Names: Island of Montreal
Retrieved August 29, 2005. * Michael Sletcher, "Montréal", in James Ciment, ed., ''Colonial America: An Encyclopedia of Social, Political, Cultural, and Economic History'', (5 vols., N.Y., 2005).


External links

* * * {{Authority control Montreal, Cities and towns in Quebec 1832 establishments in Canada Administrative regions of Quebec Former colonial capitals in Canada Catholic missions of New France Hudson's Bay Company trading posts Populated places established in 1642 Quebec populated places on the Saint Lawrence River Port settlements in Quebec