Montreal’s Urban Planning and Mobility Plan (PUM) was adopted in June 2025, following a process to which Les Amis de la montagne actively contributed. In recent years, our organization closely monitored this issue and submitted two documents: one dealing with the City Project (in October 2022) and the other relating to the PUM 2050 draft, in which we set out 16 specific recommendations (in September 2024). Now that the plan is officially in effect, the time has come to take stock of its implementation and the conditions required for its objectives to be achieved on the ground.
Progress worth highlighting
As an organization dedicated to the conservation, preservation and enhancement of Mount Royal’s historical, landscape and natural heritage, and renowned for its expertise in these areas, Les Amis de la montagne welcomes the recognition of Mount Royal as an iconic part of Montreal. The PUM also upholds the principle that the mountain should take centre stage in the Montreal landscape, ensuring it remains visible and prominent within the cityscape, rather than being gradually obscured by buildings. Les Amis has appreciated the City’s efforts to develop new tools to protect views to and from the mountain, while giving greater priority to issues of biodiversity, accessibility and mobility. We welcome these real gains.
The PUM’s prospects of success now depend on its implementation
Although the principles set out in the PUM represent significant progress, vigilance will be required to ensure the plan is implemented in a consistent, measurable and harmonized manner throughout the City’s various departments, boroughs, and relevant partner network.
The urban plan therefore raises considerable expectations regarding its implementation.
The PUM allows high-rise developments of up to 232.5 metres in the downtown area. However, constructing buildings as high as the mountain’s highest peak risks gradually undermining its prominence in the Montreal landscape. The proliferation of such towers could hamper the visual connection between the mountain and the river. Consequently, despite being recognized in the PUM, the principle of the mountain’s prominence is undermined. The mountain is also shared by four boroughs and the City of Westmount, each of which has different regulatory frameworks. These areas also include heritage sectors of great importance which, while recognized in the PUM, are not designated as such in the Cultural Heritage Act. Given the lack of clear harmonization and monitoring measures, it is important to ensure that the regulations applicable to the mountain are used to safeguard it.
A reminder of the key measures for implementation: what we are specifically calling for
Les Amis is calling on the City to ensure that it uses monitoring measures and tools suited to the ambitious implementation of the PUM 2050.
Several tools are needed to ensure that the PUM achieves its stated objectives:
- Protect the landscape and heritage of Mount Royal as an iconic area:
- Extend recognition of this iconic area to include the geological foundation of Mount Royal
- Establish a buffer zone around the heritage site in order to better regulate densification, including developments and buildings (even ancillary ones) that could threaten the mountain’s natural and cultural heritage
- Recognize the concept of ‘carrying capacity’, originally developed to limit construction on the mountain, and apply it to the entire landscape and its natural components, both within the Mount Royal Heritage Site (MRHS) and across the mountain’s topography and adjoining neighbourhoods
- Review the list and classification of protected visual corridors and establish an overarching framework for visual corridors, applicable to the boroughs and incorporating common definitions and rules
- Clarify the regulatory framework distinguishing between so-called ‘interesting’ visual corridors and those identified as ‘exceptional’
- Ensure an equivalent protection system for corridors visible from borough parks, streets and other public spaces, granting them a level of protection equivalent to that of more heavily frequented areas, in accordance with the principle of territorial equity expressly enshrined in the PUM 2050.
- Preserving Mount Royal’s ecosystems and biodiversity
- Recognize the limited capacity of natural habitats to withstand pressure and implement measures to protect these habitats throughout Mount Royal’s ecological network
- Consolidate the network of green corridors and link it to the Mount Royal ecological network, emphasizing the mountain’s place and role in Montréal’s urban landscape, while strengthening connectivity with the Montérégiennes
- Draw on a regularly updated assessment of the overall health of the ecological network to ensure the consistent and harmonized management of natural environments.
- Ensure an integrated vision of mobility and accessibility with a focus on territorial equity
- Continue working with the Table de concertation du Mont-Royal (TCMR) on the accessibility vision, by exploring ways to integrate the public and active transportation infrastructure into the existing network
- Continue planning the Camillien-Houde Way, ensuring that the principle of territorial equity guides selected development and transportation options
- Ensure equitable public transportation solutions for the eastern and western sides of the mountain
- Integrate the mountain into development projects announced for the public transportation network (such as streetcars).
- Establish a harmonized and transparent governance framework
- Establish a public register of projects carried out within the MRHS and on its outskirts detailing, in particular, building heights, exemptions granted, mitigation measures and, where relevant, the opinions of the urban planning advisory committees (Comité consultatif d’urbanisme or CCU in French), in order to enable transparent monitoring of the area’s development
- Establish permanent coordination measures between the City of Montreal, the four neighbouring boroughs and the City of Westmount, based on a shared vision of the principles and rules governing the protection and enhancement of the mountain, and clarifying the roles and responsibilities of each party
- Strengthen and clarify the roles of the Bureau du Mont-Royal (BMR) and the Conseil du patrimoine de Montréal in the governance and protection of the MRHS. These roles must be key to achieving this harmonization.
A recent case demonstrating the need for the requested tools
For Les Amis, the recent announcement of the impending sale of the Villa Maria estate clearly illustrates the importance of having rigorous measures in place to urgently implement the PUM. It also highlights the limitations of an approach based solely on the current MPHS framework. These administrative limitations are more than a technical issue, as the Villa Maria case so eloquently demonstrates.
The sale of this estate illustrates what can happen when a heritage and landscape complex – despite being intimately linked to Mount Royal – lies outside the MRHS’s current boundaries. This institutional complex fits perfectly into the landscape of Mount Royal: it shares its geological foundation, contributes to its cultural and natural landscape, and embodies one of its core purposes: knowledge. Its future underscores the importance of recognizing the topographical integrity of Mount Royal, strengthening the protection of green spaces in urban areas, and vigilantly ensuring the preservation of built and natural heritage well beyond current administrative boundaries.
Villa Maria is home to several heritage buildings, which is why it is urgent for measures to be put in place before any irreversible damage occurs.
The adoption of the PUM 2050 represents a significant step forward and sets out important guidelines for the protection of Mount Royal. The scope of these guidelines will, however, depend on the regulations, governance measures and monitoring tools that will enable their implementation. Les Amis therefore asks the City to draw up a clear implementation plan, complete with timelines, defined responsibilities, measurable indicators and a schedule for completion, as well as public accountability measures, in order to ensure the long-term protection of Mount Royal’s entire landscape. Decisions taken now will determine whether the recognition of the mountain as an iconic area will be reflected, in practice, in the development of Montréal.
