Hydro-Quebec downtown installation met with backlash

Hydro-Quebec plans to build a transformer station in a park next to the Grande Bibliothèque in The Village and is being met with fierce opposition from historians, urban planners, architects and politicians.

When the library was inaugurated 20 years ago, it was supposed to mark the revival of a decaying neighbourhood. Now, a nearby transformer station is aging and Hydro-Quebec wants to replace it.

A group of seven respected architects, historians, and prominent figures in Quebec culture say it will take away the library’s beauty and positive visual impact.

“It would mark the tacit approval of the growing degradation of a neighbourhood plagued with urban misery, which we pretend to feel sorry about,” they wrote in a letter published Tuesday.

Québec Solidaire MNA Manon Massé told journalists the area is the last green space downtown, and “sadly for Hydro-Quebec, people don’t want their installation.”

But the Crown corporation said it doesn’t have a choice. Spokesperson Pascal Poinlane said it has too many technical and urban constraints, and “the substation has to be in the middle of the area.”

These substations tend to be industrial-looking, where functionality comes first. But faced with backlash, Hydro-Quebec said it will try to make it look nice.

Poinlane said there will be an architectural competition to come up with the design, “and we think it’s possible to do something great.”

Massé, the MNA for the area, wants more reassurance from the government, which has to authorize the land transfer.

Massé told Energy Minister Christine Fréchette at the National Assembly on Nov. 5, “just imagine if we were to build something like this across the street.”

Fréchette said she’s sympathetic to Hydro-Quebec’s arguments and “very complex analyses were done and this is the result.” The transformer will be built in that location, she added.

However, the project is still in its infancy and construction isn’t expected to start before the end of the decade.