Loto-Québec plans on building a $150-million, 200-room hotel next to its flagship Montreal casino on Parc Jean-Drapeau.
“I think all the casinos of our size has a hotel, and I think it just makes sense for the casino of Montreal to have a hotel,” said Jean-François Bergeron, president and CEO of Loto-Québec.
The Crown corporation plans on erecting the luxury hotel above its underground parking lot. While it hasn’t been finalized what the hotel will look like, Loto-Québec intends to keep the hotel to around four storeys, so as not to obstruct any views on the island.
It will feature restaurants, a spa and a swimming pool. The corporation plans on establishing a partnership with an existing hotel chain to manage the facility.
Bergeron says Montreal’s casino is the only one in Quebec not to have a hotel, noting the others in Lac Lemay and the Charlevoix region have hotels. He says they all do extremely well and bring in people from across Quebec, Canada and beyond.
He said hotel occupancy rates in Montreal are back at around 80 per cent, which are numbers that he says can sustain another luxury hotel. He says several million people visit the Montreal casino every year, and this will improve numbers even more.
“Sometimes you have to mobilize all stakeholders, and sometimes the timing has to be there,” Bergeron said. “Right now it’s the perfect storm. All players are on board and the timing is good for us. I think we have been waiting too long, to be honest.”
Montreal Mayor Valérie Plante says she supports the project. She said she promotes the use of green space on Parc Jean-Drapeau, and is moving forward with a plan to have the island greener by 2030, but that the hotel is in keeping with those plans.
“The hotel is not eating up any greenspaces. It’s being built on the existing infrastructure of the casino so that was important for me,” Plante said. “It was important Loto-Québec would come up with a project that respects the environment, respects the park itself.”
But opponents were quick to speak up. Independent city councillor Craig Sauvé said it’s the wrong move to build a hotel on the island.
“It’s not something we would do elsewhere. We would not place an expensive hotel in the middle of Mont-Royal or in the middle of Parc Lafontaine,” Sauvé said. “We just voted a 600-page master plan about what we wanted to do to Parc Jean-Drapeau, how to improve it. This project is nowhere inside this master plan.”
While supporting the project, the Société Parc Jean-Drapeau says the plan must respect the spirit of the park.
“We do have concerns but we are in partnership together. The concern we have is the best integration we can get in the park,” said Société Parc Jean-Drapeau manager Véronique Doucet.
Loto-Québec plans on putting out a call for tenders sometime in the new year. Officials want the process to move quickly, because they hope to open the new hotel in two to three years.
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