Mount Royal Tunnel
| Overview | |
|---|---|
| Line | Deux-Montagnes line, Mascouche line |
| Location | Montreal, Quebec, Canada |
| Crosses | Mount Royal |
| Operation | |
| Work begun | 1911 |
| Opened | 1918 |
| Traffic | Commuter rail |
| Technical | |
| Track gauge | 1,435 mm (4 ft 8 1⁄2 in) |
| Tunnel clearance | 14 ft 6 in (4.42 m) |
The Mount Royal Tunnel (French: Tunnel sous le mont Royal, Tunnel du mont Royal) is a railway tunnel located in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The tunnel, third longest in Canada, connects the city's Central Station, located downtown, with the north side of the Island of Montreal and Laval, passing through Mount Royal. Until 2014, the only trains using the tunnel were commuter trains from AMT's Deux-Montagnes service. Since December 2014, it is now also used by the Mascouche Line serving the northeastern part of the Island of Montreal, then the suburban communities of Repentigny, Terrebonne, and Mascouche. AMT also wants to reroute its Saint-Jérôme Line trains to Central Station via the tunnel, from their present termini at either Parc or Lucien L'Allier, for a 15-minute time saving.
The structure gauge of the Mount Royal Tunnel limits the height of bilevel cars to 14 feet 6 inches (4.42 m).
The tunnel was conceived in 1910 by the Canadian Northern Railway (CNoR) as a means to give the company access to downtown Montreal. The only easy routes along the south side of Mount Royal had long been taken by rivals Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR) and Grand Trunk Railway (GTR). CNoR wanted to avoid crossing the CPR and GTR lines. Likewise CNoR preferred a direct route as opposed to detouring the railway around the north and east sides of Mount Royal.
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