En ce moment, il n’y a même pas de trottoir sur ce tronçon de Gouin Ouest 
Only one sidewalk: Residents angry over Gouin Blvd. redo that favours bike path
City’s redesign sacrifices pedestrian safety along a narrow, dangerous stretch of the artery in Ahuntsic-Cartierville, they say.
Linda Gyulai • Montreal Gazette
May 05, 2022 • 11 minutes ago • 5 minute read
“On such a busy boulevard, the sidewalk on the south side is not a luxury, it is a necessity,” says Bachir Azzi, seen standing on the sidewalk curve that will be removed, along with several feet of his property, on the corner of Gouin Blvd. PHOTO BY JOHN MAHONEY /Montreal Gazette
The city of Montreal has begun a long-awaited redesign of a narrow, treacherous stretch of Gouin Blvd. in Ahuntsic-Cartierville, but some residents contend the city is sacrificing pedestrian safety to accommodate a bike path in the project.
The residents’ beef is with the city’s decision to alter a 40-year promise to lay sidewalks on Gouin W. through the Bois-de-Saraguay Nature Park. The project that is forging ahead will see one sidewalk built on the north side, while the sidewalk on the south side was dropped to make room for a protected two-way bike path.
“On such a busy boulevard, the sidewalk on the south side is not a luxury, it is a necessity,” said Bachir Azzi, who lives on a side street at the corner of Gouin in the 1.7-kilometre stretch that will be redone. A bike path exists one street south, on Jean-Bourdon Ave.
The stretch of Gouin to be rebuilt, between Toupin Blvd. and Martin Ave., is heavily travelled by cars and public transit buses in both directions. But it has only narrow shoulders along most of it. Neighbours on Gouin say they’ve witnessed numerous traffic accidents. The Société de transport de Montréal says the 68 bus and the 468 express bus that run on Gouin each averaged 3,000 passenger boardings a day before the pandemic.
The $30-million redesign involves burying the Hydro-Québec power lines on the north side. The sidewalk will be built in the corridor where the Hydro poles are removed. The city also anticipates having to cut 75 mature trees on each side of the road, 150 in all, because the traffic lanes will be shifted south to build the bike path next to the sidewalk. The city will also pour a concrete pad at each bus stop on the south side since there’s no sidewalk.
Azzi said he and several neighbours were angered when they learned that Mayor Valérie Plante and her Projet Montréal administration had decided to drop the second sidewalk so the city can relocate the Jean-Bourdon bike path to Gouin.
“The city is breaking its own promise and its own planning,” said Elie Kassissia, a Gouin resident. “The city is saying, ‘You’ll have a sidewalk.’ No, a sidewalk on a major artery means a sidewalk on each side.”
Jean-Bourdon is wider than Gouin and already accommodates two-way traffic, car parking on both sides, the existing bike path and two sidewalks, he said.
Kassissia added that he supports cycling, but said he feels the city is making walking and public transit subordinate to cycling.
However, borough mayor Émilie Thuillier said the city is trying to make Gouin safe for all users.
“It’s not one in relation to the other,” she said of cyclists and pedestrians. “It’s about making sure that everyone has the right to a safe straight-line route.”
Jean-Bourdon feeds into Gouin, so cyclists end up on Gouin, she noted.
A compromise was necessary because Gouin is too narrow for two sidewalks and a bike path, said Thuillier, who is also responsible for infrastructure work on the city executive committee. A century-old stone wall along the north side can’t be moved, which limits how much the artery can be widened on that side, she said.
Bachir Azzi shows the stone wall on the north side of Gouin Blvd. in the Bois-de-Saraguay Nature Park. The wall cannot be moved to expand the roadway to add a second sidewalk. PHOTO BY JOHN MAHONEY /Montreal Gazette
“Of course it would have been more interesting to build two sidewalks plus a bike path,” Thuillier said.
However, that would have required cutting more trees and expropriating an additional two metres of property from homeowners on the south side who are already giving up a band of land for the redesign, she said.
An existing stretch of sidewalk on the south side of Gouin between Toupin and Albert-Prévost Ave., where the road happens to be wide, will be rebuilt, she said. However, a short length of sidewalk just west of Albert-Prévost, where Gouin narrows, will go.
Thuillier said the proposal to move the bike path from Jean-Bourdon to Gouin and to build one sidewalk was the better of two options that were presented at a city public consultation in 2020.
The second option, allowing two sidewalks on Gouin, would have involved removing street parking on both sides of Jean-Bourdon to install a dedicated, unidirectional bike path on both sides of the street, she said. The current path is just painted lines.
“Everyone agreed with the proposition to put it (the bike path) on Gouin, except several residents on Gouin,” Thuillier said of the public consultation. “We can’t do projects in 2022 that create unanimity. That’s rare.”
However, Azzi and Kassissia contend the city divided residents at the 2020 consultation by threatening to remove all street parking on Jean-Bourdon.
Residents have always seen the absence of sidewalks as a temporary problem since the city kept promising to build them, Azzi said. But one sidewalk is also dangerous, he said, and now it will be permanent.
Only a handful of houses are on the north side of Gouin. So anyone catching an eastbound bus will be coming from the south and will have to cross twice in front of vehicles and bike traffic, Azzi said. They’ll have to cross the street to get to the sidewalk on the north side and then they’ll have to cross back once they reach their stop, he said.
Artist’s conception of redesigned Gouin Blvd., with integrated bike path and one sidewalk on its north side, at Joseph-Saucier Ave. PHOTO BY CITY OF MONTREAL
“To visit your neighbour, you’ll have to cross the street, cross the bike path, walk on the sidewalk on the north side and then cross back to the south side,” he said.
Moving the traffic lanes closer to the south side of Gouin is another irritant, Kassissia said, because it will bring trucks, buses and cars closer to houses.
Still, Sylvia Oljemark, a member of the Green Coalition, said something had to be done to improve safety on Gouin.
“This is a very old and very narrow section of Gouin Blvd. through the Saraguay Forest that is particularly dangerous for cyclists and pedestrians,” she said, adding that the Hydro-Québec poles “disfigure the place.”
Once the wires are buried, she said, “that will provide a good deal of the required space for a pedestrian walkway and segregated bicycle path, we understand. Our best hopes are that a very minimum number of trees will be sacrificed in the endeavour.”
Oljemark fought to save Bois-de-Saraguay from development in 1977 as a member of the Saraguay Citizens Group. Oljemark said she hopes the project to redo Gouin will lead the city to finally open the waterfront portions of the park on the north side.
The redesign is expected to be completed in 2023. However, the debate over sidewalks and bike paths probably isn’t over. The city has also long promised to build sidewalks farther west on Gouin.
