The City of Montreal and its public transit agency are rolling out a series of measures aimed at improving safety in the metro network, including hiring more special constables, increasing surveillance and adding social workers.
The plan comes as transit advocates say many passengers continue to feel unsafe using the metro.
“We know that one rider on two doesn’t feel safe in the metro,” said Brian Nash of Trajectoire Québec.
Six measures are being introduced, including a $6.5-million investment to hire more special constables and $3 million to improve electronic surveillance. The city also plans to increase collaboration with Montreal police and add more social workers in the metro system.
Dimitrios Jim Beis, a member of Montreal’s executive committee, said more than 50 constables will be added by the end of 2027.
“We are clearly responding to the insecurity that folks are feeling,” Beis said.
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Starting this fall, St. John Ambulance will help provide social workers, with two teams operating seven days a week during the winter and one team during the summer months.
Montreal Mayor Soraya Martinez Ferrada said the approach is intended to ensure different situations receive different responses.
“If you have a person that is in a homelessness situation, with a personal situation or a crisis, that doesn’t need to have the SPVM to come,” she said. “Maybe it’s the St. John Ambulance, the intervention of a social team that will come.”
Alongside the safety measures, city officials and the STM plan to increase metro service by five per cent as of 2027, with most of the additional service coming in the evenings.
“We see a lot more people having schedules outside of rush hour, so it is good news for them,” Nash said.
The service increase is expected to cost $8 million.
“The cost of not doing it is bigger than the cost of doing it,” Martinez Ferrada said.
Transit advocates welcomed the new measures but said more investment is still needed, particularly for bus service.