STM Won’t Add More Metro Elevators Due to Lack of Funds

The elevators inaugurated at the Atwater Metro station in Montreal, Canada, in mid-April will be the last universal accessibility project taken on by the Société de transport de Montréal (STM) in the near future due to a lack of funding, Yahoo! News reports. STM points to Quebec’s spring budget in a news release, saying that, for the third year in a row, the government had not allocated any new funding for infrastructure maintenance or universal accessibility. According to the STM, maintenance funding is set to decrease over the next three years. Without necessary funding, STM can’t launch projects to both maintain its infrastructure and build elevators. Elevator installation work that is already underway at the Berri-UQAM Metro station on the Yellow line and Édouard-Monpetit on the Blue line, will continue. The elevator project at Atwater means it is now the 30th of 68 stations in the Metro network to become universally accessible. While STM was aiming to make 41 stations accessible by 2030, that target, it now says, is unlikely to be reached.