Land acquisition will increase access to lakeshore in Pierrefonds

Public access to the waterfront is poised to improve in Pierrefonds-Roxboro. Montreal has made a promise to purchase some land owned by the Communauté des Frères de Saint-Gabriel.

The city made an offer of $750,000 for the 10,000-square-metre property, which runs parallel to Rivière-des-Prairies.

Borough council passed a resolution in December to make a $75,000 deposit to ensure that the procedure to purchase would remain valid.

“The money comes from Montreal,” Mayor Jim Beis said. “We are always on the lookout for land acquisitions that make sense for the borough and this was a great opportunity.”

Beis said that if the borough sees an opportunity to acquire a green space and Montreal does not agree to pay for it, the borough can draw on its million-dollar-plus parks fund, kept healthy by 10-per-cent parks fees paid by developers who opt to pay cash instead of flagging a portion of the land to be developed as green space.

The green space is flanked by Collège Beaubois on one side and the borough’s Port-de-Plaisance Marina on the other. Collège Beaubois is a private school.

Upgrades to the Port-de-Plaisance Marina are part of the larger parks redevelopment program included in the borough’s three-year capital works program. The idea is to improve the area with upgrades to the bike path and the installation of new picnic and play areas.

Few, if any, changes will be made to the new green space.

“It could be made into a nature park,” Beis said. “We’ve had our eye on the property for quite some time. It will be left in its natural state, like the Cap St-Jacques and Bois-de-Liesse nature parks.”

Beis said that it is possible, in future, that walking paths could be created, but that work would be kept to a minimum. He said that they suspect at least a portion of the green space is located in what is called a 0-to-20 flood zone, which indicates a high probability of flooding.

“We are waiting for the Quebec government to release updated floodplain information,” Beis said. “If (the green space) is in a 0-to-20 flood zone, we can’t build anything.”

Historic flooding in spring 2017 wreaked havoc on 261 communities provincewide, including Pierrefonds-Roxboro, Île-Bizard-Ste-Geneviève, Rigaud and Île-Mercier. More than 4,000 people were forced from their homes. The flooding resulted in the launch of a government plan to overhaul floodplain documentation.