Mont-Joli () is a city in the

La Mitis Regional County Municipality La Mitis is a regional county municipality in the Bas-Saint-Laurent region in eastern Quebec, Canada on the Gaspé peninsula. It is named for the Mitis River (''The Mitis'') which has its source in the region (at Lac Inférieur) and flows through ...

within the Bas-Saint-Laurent region of

Quebec Quebec is Canada's List of Canadian provinces and territories by area, largest province by area. Located in Central Canada, the province shares borders with the provinces of Ontario to the west, Newfoundland and Labrador to the northeast, ...

, Canada. It is the county seat. The city is located east of

Rimouski Rimouski ( ; ) is a city in Quebec, Canada. Rimouski is located in the Bas-Saint-Laurent region, at the mouth of the Rimouski River. It has a population of 48,935 (as of 2021). Rimouski, whose motto is ''Legi patrum fidelis'' (Faithful to ...

near the south shore of the

Saint Lawrence River The St. Lawrence River (, ) is a large international river in the middle latitudes of North America connecting the Great Lakes to the North Atlantic Ocean. Its waters flow in a northeasterly direction from Lake Ontario to the Gulf of St. Lawrenc ...

History

In 1867, the main condition for New Brunswick and Nova-Scotia entering into the Canadian Confederation was, to be linked to the rest of the country by the railway. In 1868, work began on the

Intercolonial Railway The Intercolonial Railway of Canada , also referred to as the Intercolonial Railway (ICR), was a historic Canada, Canadian railway that operated from 1872 to 1918, when it became part of Canadian National Railways. As the railway was also compl ...

and the authorities decided to have the railway turn at Saint-Octave-de-Métis in Gaspésie. However, this village, because of its rugged landscape, was not suitable to receive the train station and maintenance shops. The engineers turned to the higher 2nd farming rank of Sainte-Flavie, and the train station was named Sainte-Flavie-Station. In 1880, Sainte-Flavie-Station became separate and was named Mont-Joli, the name which the first settlers had used to describe the area. On 13 June 2001, the neighbouring municipality of Saint-Jean-Baptiste (not to be confused with a different Saint-Jean-Baptiste in the

Montérégie Montérégie () is an administrative region in the southwest part of Quebec. It includes the cities of Boucherville, Brossard, Châteauguay, Longueuil, Saint-Hyacinthe, Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, Salaberry-de-Valleyfield and Vaudreuil-Dorion. ...

region) merged with Mont-Joli.

Geography

Climate

Mont-Joli has a

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 cold ...

(

Köppen Köppen is a German surname. Notable people with the surname include: * Bernd Köppen (1951–2014), German pianist and composer * Carl Köppen (1833-1907), German military advisor in Meiji era Japan * Edlef Köppen (1893–1939), German author ...

''Dfb''). The average annual temperature in Mont-Joli is . The average annual precipitation is with October as the wettest month. The temperatures are highest on average in July, at around , and lowest in January, at around . The highest temperature ever recorded in Mont-Joli was on 4 July 1983; the coldest temperature ever recorded was on 3 January 2014.

Demographics

In the 2021 Census of Population conducted by

Statistics Canada Statistics Canada (StatCan; ), formed in 1971, is the agency of the Government of Canada commissioned with producing statistics to help better understand Canada, its population, resources, economy, society, and culture. It is headquartered in ...

, Mont-Joli had a population of living in of its total private dwellings, an increase of from its 2016 population of . With a land area of , it had a population density of in 2021.

Infrastructure

Mont-Joli is the easternmost end of Autoroute 20, whose segment connects with the city of Rimouski. Route 132 runs through the centre of Mont-Joli as part of a loop that circumnavigates the

Gaspé Peninsula The Gaspé Peninsula, also known as Gaspesia (, ; ), is a peninsula along the south shore of the St. Lawrence River that extends from the Matapedia Valley in Quebec, Canada, into the Gulf of St. Lawrence. It is separated from New Brunswick on it ...

; it is about southeast of Sainte-Flavie, where Route 132 intersects with itself. Mont-Joli Airport is the only airport with scheduled service in the Bas-Saint-Laurent region. Mont-Joli is also served by the Mont-Joli railway station.

Notable people

* Gaétan D'Amours: Mr. Québec 1960, Mr. Canada 1961, Mr. America 1961, Mr. Universe 1967 (5th place) * Danielle Doyer: politician * Donald Dufresne: ex-NHL hockey player and assistant manager to the Rimouski Océanic *

René Dupéré René Dupéré (born 1946) is a Canadian composer from Mont-Joli, Québec, Canada. Biography Dupéré is best known as the composer and arranger of music for contemporary circus productions by the Canadian entertainment company Cirque du Sol ...

: composer for

Cirque du Soleil Cirque du Soleil (, ; ) is a Canadian entertainment company and the largest contemporary circus producer in the world. Located in the inner-city area of Saint-Michel, Montreal, Saint-Michel, Montreal, it was founded in Baie-Saint-Paul on 16 Jun ...

* Pierre Labrie: writer * Maurice Lamontagne: economist and Canadian Senator * Robert Piché: airline pilot in Mont-Joli, involved in the 236 Air Transat incident * Gervais Rioux: Olympic cyclist ( Seoul, 1988)

References

External links

City website
{{authority control Cities and towns in Quebec Incorporated places in Bas-Saint-Laurent