Line of Two-Mountains

Service

This line connects, between 6:00 and 24:00, the Central station with the downtown area of Montreal with Two-Mountains, suburbs on northern bank of the St. Lawrence river. It offers frequent departures (between 10 and 30 minutes) to the rush hours and horairement the remainder of time over week. The frequency is less saturdays and Sunday. The way is double between the downtown area and the station Wood-Franc, then becomes simple.

The trains are the property of the Agency metropolitan of transport but operated by division Montrain of the Canadian National. According to arrival and the starting zone, one counts five tariffs. The two first give right to the correspondence with the network of bus of STM. More than 33.000 people use the line daily, that is to say more than 50% of all the custom of the suburban trains of the area. The AMT estimates that it will exceed 40 000 during the next years, requiring certain installation additional of which the doubling of the way between the stations Wood-Franc and Roxboro, the addition of two stations and the purchase of 22 additional cars. The two stations would be under the subway stations McGill and Edouard-Montpetit in order to better integrate the metropolitan grid system. One mentions even the possibility of moving in 2017 the terminal of the Central station towards the new station under the McGill subway.

History

The Canadian Northern Railway, one of the transcontinental railroad companies of Canada at the beginning of the 20th century, was to have a terminus with the downtown area of Montreal. Its line arriving by the north of the island of Montreal, it was necessary for him to circumvent theRoyal one. The road by the west was already taken by the the Canadian Pacific (CP) and that of the east was rather expensive because of expropriations necessary. Moreover, the good sites for the station were already occupied by its rivals: the CP (Windsor Station) and the Large Trunk Railway (Bonaventure Station). One thus decided in 1910 to dig under the " montagne" and to establish a provisional station with the downtown area. The company hoped to finance this project by the development of new suburbs, Ville Mount-Royal, northern side of the work.

Construction was started in 1912, but the work of digging finished December 1913 when the teams coming from the two directions met with less than 3 cm of field alignment error. However the work of completion, whose bétonnement considerably by the First World War was delayed, finishing in December 1916. The way and the Caténaire were posed only in September 1918. The tunnel cost 5 million CAN of 1918 and the poor ventilation of the tunnel forced the use of electric engines. It is electrified of Montreal with Lazard, that is to say a distance of 12 kilometers, including a trap siding of 1 km towards Cartierville.

The war prevented the promoters from profiting from the real development waited, which involved major financial problems with the CNoR . The latter were added with its problems in the west of the country and carried out it towards the bankruptcy. The Canadian government amalgamated possibly the CNoR in the Canadian Government Railways to form the Canadian National (CN) in 1919. This last will take its final form in January 1923 with the addition of the Grand Trunk Railway.

The CN was found with four stations to serve Montreal following this fusion: the Station Moreau with more than 5 km of the downtown area, the station of “Montreal Sauteux” which partagait the same ways as the Montreal Tramways Company, in the middle of the Rue of the Commune in the center of the businesses, the temporary one of the tunnel of CNoR and the Gare Bonaventure. The second president of CN, Sir Henry Thornton, proposed a new station inspired by the Grand Final Exchange of New York, to gather the traffic. The site the temporary station would be the focal point and all the trains arriving of the west would pass by the tunnel by exchanging their engines to vapor for electric to cross it.

In 1927, one began work but the economic crisis of 1929 forced of it finally the stop. It is only in 1943 that the Central station of Montreal was supplemented with some streets in north the Bonaventure station. Only the trains arriving before at the temporary station and the Moreau Station go there by the tunnel whereas those of the west pass by the rails of Large Trunk. The line extended then to north until the Lac Remi (150 km of Montreal) and thus served directly the goods traffic of the area of the Laurentides. In particular, the line was used by delivering the ore of quartz mine of Saint-Remi de Amherst towards Montreal. It were also connected by junctions towards the Outaouais and the Mauricie.

The increase in the traffic suburbs however made extend the electrification to Two-Mountains (then called Saint-Eustace-on-the-lake) thus giving 30 km of electrified line. During the Second world war, one opened an electrified minor road, close to the northern exit of the tunnel to reach the district Ahuntsic. There were thus two directions for the suburban trains. This second way was closed at the time of the opening of the subway station Sauvé which replaced this service road.

The line was cut to the west of Saint-Jerome (75 km in the North-West) of Montreal, near the future the airport of Mirabel in 1960, during the prolongation of the highway (part of the unused way is now a cycle Track). The traffic thus became increasingly local but périclita with the profit of the car even if the train towards Quebec by northern bank and certain goods trains still used it, by the junctions, until in the Années 1990. Moreover, the administration of Montreal supported the construction of the subway and the tariffs increased because they did not profit from any governmental subsidy.

In 1982, the government of Quebec ordered the tariff with the service of bus and the subway of CTCUM, later famous integration STCUM, against the wishes of the latter. Tariff integration was thus done with move back: with the beginning the passengers provided with a train ticket were acquiter an additional full price to use the buses or the subway. On the other hand, the subscribers with the monthly chart of the train TRAM paid their chart from 20 to 50% expensive than the chart Bus-Subway (CAM). Gradually, the tariffs were adjusted by creating tariff zones proportional to the distance, especially after the creation of the AMT. Those of the first zone, to the current station of Wood-Franc, obtained a total interchangeability between the CAMWOOD and the TRAM towards 1990 but this zone was brought back to the Montpellier station at the beginning of the Années 2000. There exist at present five tariff zones and even in the first, the price between the CAMWOOD and the TRAM is slightly different.

The advent of the AMT marked a change in mentality vis-a-vis public transport. The government of Quebec had decided to consider this last overall for all the area montréalaise and either only for the island of Montreal. One of the mandates of the AMT is to promote this one in order to solve the problems of motor vehicle traffic and one decided to renovate the line of Two-Mountains. 1992 with 1995, the rails, the electric system, the stations, indication and rolling stock were completely changed. One stopped even the summer service, the substitute by buses, for large work of which the rebuilding of certain bridges.

The old trains were composed of heavy cars with six axles, of which some dated even from the original opening of the line. The seats with reversible file, made it possible all the travellers to enjoy an armchair in the “direction of walk”. The lights weakened quickly at the time of the stoppings of the train whereas one fell on the primary battery rather than the Dynamo. Certain cars proviennaient of Via Rail which cut its service traveller on several lines in 1981. Several of these coaches went back to 1937: the heating was practically non-existent and air-conditioning was done by the opening of the windows. The engines were with the endorsement also, some going back to 1918.

Bombardier Transport obtained the contract for the motorized oars. The service was inaugurated in January 1996, offering all modern comfort. One have some minor problems with condensation on the electrical motors of Bogie S, because of a bad insulation, the first days but the whole was to regulate quickly. The custom increased quickly thanks to the inciting parkings included at the stations between Brook and Two-Mountains.

The line Montreal/Repentigny-Mascouche, at present in project but which recently was the subject of an official announcement of the government of Quebec, would use of good part the rails of the Canadian National in the east of the city and a portion of current the Ligne of Two-Mountains being spread out under the Mount-Royal to go until the Central station of Montreal.

List stations

Zones

Gares

Lieux

Correspondances

Achalandages

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