Quebec municipalities group calls government to address public transit underfunding

Edmond Leclerc, the chair of the association’s board of directors, says the cities are also facing a $550 million shortfall in funding for transit operations in the coming years.

The municipalities group says it wants stable, predictable, and sustainable funding, as well as a reduction in bureaucracy, provincial micromanagement and administrative delays.

“We believe the Quebec government is capable of making an effort toward efficiency, that it’s capable of optimizing how it handles current investments,” said Marquis-Bissonnette, who is also the mayor of Gatineau.

She said the province also wastes money, citing the example of the construction of a garage to charge electric buses in Quebec City. She said the Quebec government withdrew funding partway through the project, after $94 million had already been spent.

“Currently, there’s a tarp covering the construction site,” she said.

Laval Mayor Stéphane Boyer, for his part, criticized what he called the government’s “stop-and-go” approach.

“In 2021, the Quebec government had granted a $2.2 million subsidy to conduct a study on implementing a high service level bus system with dedicated lanes on Concorde Boulevard,” he said. The next year, Quebec halted the project even though “the studies were 90 per cent complete,” he said.

As a result, the city lost $65 million in federal grants and “wasted $2 million on incomplete studies,” he said.

Marquis-Bissonnette said the underfunding threatens transit systems that are in desperate need of maintenance. That includes Montreal’s aging metro system, which dates to the 1960s and 1970s, and a lift in Sherbrooke, Que. that is needed to hoist buses in need of repairs.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 29, 2026.

Stéphane Blais, The Canadian Press

by The Canadian Press

Quebec municipalities group calls government to address public transit underfunding

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