Residents of rue du Boisé and Avenue du Parc attended yet another city council meeting on Tuesday evening to try and fight the construction of a road that would cut through their local Perrot forest to link the two streets.
Residents aren’t happy with the changes. Many say they moved to the area precisely because of the peace and quiet a dead-end street can bring. Still, on Tuesday the mayor stood by his earlier arguments that the project has been in the works for the past ten years, and that this new road would help alleviate traffic and thus benefit the majority of the ile Perrot population.
“Yes, it’s going to disturb some people,” said mayor Marc Roy. “We don’t have a choice, we live in a community.”
By the end of the meeting, many were resigned to the fact that the road will indeed be built, but now have other concerns. The hardware store Rona owns a big portion of the forest, and residents worry that, with a new road, Rona might now decide to sell that land to developers.
“We are convinced that it is a step in another direction, a step to providing access to this forest land,” said Michael Moore, a resident of the du Parc.
“Our greater concern is trying to preserve a unique gem of a forest that is thousands of years old,” he added.
The mayor argued that land is out of his control.
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“I don’t even know if it is for sale,” he said. “It belongs to the Allard family.”
“It’s just shrouded in mystery and we can’t get an answer,” said Moore. “Every time we ask the question, ‘I don’t know anything about that, it’s private property’. He just takes refuge behind what he thinks we’re going to accept, and that’s just not fair.”
Other residents are concerned about safety, with the increase in traffic the new road is sure to bring.
“My main concern was the safety of the kids,” said Katherine Vincent, a resident of du Boisé. She explained she worries that because this new road is meant to be a short cut, it may attract frustrated drivers.
As a result, some parents on the block asked the mayor if the road could be closed off at peak hours to discourage drivers from using it. The mayor replied it wasn’t a bad idea, and that he would take it into consideration.
In the meantime, residents of the sleepy cul-de-sac are coming to the realization that their neck of the woods will never be the same again.
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