Noisy Montreal ready to listen to St-Lambert

Montreal the noisy neighbour is ready to talk, but it won’t say yet whether it will turn down the volume.

For years, St-Lambert residents have complained about noise from concerts at Parc Jean-Drapeau, on the Montreal side of the St. Lawrence River.

On Monday, Mayor Valérie Plante said she was ready to talk to St-Lambert Mayor Pierre Brodeur about the issue, though she would not say what, if anything, Montreal was ready to do to placate the South Shore city.

St-Lambert has said it is worried that an open-air amphitheatre being built in Parc Jean-Drapeau will increase noise. Its configuration would mean speakers for major music festivals would face StLambert, as they do now.

Under former mayor Denis Coderre, Montreal refused to change the configuration.

“That was my predecessor and now it’s me,” Plante told reporters before a meeting with Brodeau on Monday afternoon.

“I’m going there with a very open mind. I want to get to know better my colleague on the other side of the river. He has concerns; I want to hear what those concerns are. It’s important for me to hear what my neighbours have to say.”

Following the one hour meeting, Plante’s spokesperson issued a press release saying both cities will work together to find short, medium- and long-term solutions to the problem.

A committee will be formed to study ways of reducing noise that travels across the river.