More forgotten Montreal dump sites identified
Contamination levels at sites haven't been made public, but city insists there's no health risk
The City of Montreal has released the locations of 94 former quarries, many of which had been used as dump sites before the land was redeveloped into parks and residential lots.
That's 15 more sites than were identified in a 1994 list of old dumping grounds and filled quarries obtained by Radio-Canada last fall through an access-to-information request.
According to that list of 62 locations, 24 were certified former landfills, while 38 were possible landfills and dumps. Montreal's current administration said it never knew about the list, and it promised to publish updated information.
The new sites were revealed on 16 maps published on the city's website today.
The quarries were used to extract stone for construction over the course of the last century.
They were then backfilled and largely forgotten. At the time, there was no legislation dictating how that process was to be carried out.
Several boroughs, including Saint-Léonard, Montreal North, Anjou and LaSalle, are absent from the city maps. The city says it has not found any information about dump sites in those parts of its territory.
Residents around Rosemont Park, one of the areas identified as a dump site in the data released last fall, have repeatedly asked the city to test the soil around their homes to determine if it's contaminated.
The city has refused.
"The city has the duty, the responsibility to inform us about the composition of the soil," said Martin Lavallée, whose home is adjacent to the park.
Other area residents are asking Mayor Denis Coderre to intervene.
'No active biogas'
Three weeks ago, Coderre promised "transparency on this file" and said he wanted to "answer all of these questions." However, some city-held information has yet to be released.
The city has an internal system, called SISTEC, which contains a large number of soil studies conducted in these areas. The studies haven't been made public.
Réal Ménard, the executive committee member responsible for the environment, said the city isn't proceeding with soil testing, but it did drill down, scope the sites with radar and test for methane in affected residential areas.
"In no way is there a public health problem posed,' he told Radio-Canada. "There is no active biogas that could present a public health issue."
The city says lawns, sidewalks, asphalt and other development of the properties prevent residents from coming in contact with any contaminated materials that still may be buried beneath.
The city is still doing tests and will post the results of methane levels at the sites as they become available, Ménard said.
See the maps here:
- Ahuntsic-Cartierville
- Anjou
- Côte-des-Neiges—Notre-Dame-de-Grâce
- Lachine
- Mercier—Hochelaga-Maisonneuve
- Outremont
- Pierrefonds—Roxboro
- Plateau—Mont-Royal
- Rivière-des-Prairies—Pointe-aux-Trembles 1
- Rivière-des-Prairies—Pointe-aux-Trembles 2
- Rosemont—La Petite-Patrie
- Saint-Laurent
- South-West
- Verdun
- Ville-Marie
- Villeray—Saint-Michel—Parc-Extension
with files from Radio-Canada reporter Benoît Giasson and CBC's Emily Brass