Melting on the métro?

Older cars are providing more relief from the heat and humidity .

It says something about Montreal’s métro system that as this city finds itself in the grip of a wave of heat and humidity, it’s quite literally cooler to ride in a subway car so old its spare parts are no longer on the market.

The MR63, the repeatedly renovated and retro-fitted subway car with a drab grey interior that many of us can remember using to travel to Expo 67, is entering its 46th year of service this summer. Its main thoroughfare is the Green Line, connecting the Angrignon and Honoré Beaugrand stations. And while you might want to complain about the decision by the Société de Transport de Montréal (STM) to remove seats so more passengers could be packed in during the rush hour, you can’t complain about the heat – at least not as much as on the MR73, the “newer” 36-yearold model of subway car that rolls on the Orange Line.

For whatever reason, the designers of the MR73 decided to place their air circulation vents on the side of the subway car’s roof rather than under a rooftop hood, as was done in the MR63, a decision Montreal commuters already stuck with a subway system without air conditioning have been sweating over ever since.

No matter what model métro car you’re riding, expect a less-than-frosty commute as long as a heat wave is accompanied by high humidity.

Rouette said the sticky temperatures have compelled the STM to shut down the métro’s ventilation network, the presence of humid air within the stations and tunnels having led in the past to accumulations of condensation and, in turn, equipment failures.