Tunnel de la mort

"Tunnel de la mort" (Tunnel of Death) is the informal name given, in Montreal, to the notoriously dangerous intersection of Rue d'Iberville and Boulevard Saint-Joseph, at the border of the Rosemont–La Petite-Patrie and Plateau-Mont-Royal boroughs. The intersection owes this name to the dangerously poor visibility caused by the three railway overpasses immediately to the north, east, and west of it,[fn 1] and by concrete retaining walls on all four corners. More than 250 serious accidents were reported at that intersection between 1992 and 2002.[1][2]

The Rue d'Iberville Nord approach of the intersection.

The intersection of Rue d'Iberville and Boulevard Saint-Joseph with the two railway overpasses still in existence. Originally, there was a third overpass right above the spot from which this picture was taken.

Both streets narrow at the approach of this intersection. The east-west Boulevard Saint-Joseph, elsewhere six lanes wide, narrows to four lanes in the vicinity of the Tunnel de la Mort. The four-lane Rue d'Iberville narrows to two lanes in the underpass just north of the intersection before widening again to the south and splitting into two four-lane one-way streets, Iberville (southbound) and Frontenac (northbound). As part of an effort to make the intersection safer, advance signals were installed on the Iberville north and Saint-Joseph east approaches, where flashing yellow lights warn motorists that they are about to come to a red light. All left turns are forbidden at the intersection.

The configuration of this intersection makes it nearly impossible for police to enforce traffic laws.[3] In September 2001, then-minister of transportation Guy Chevrette cited this particular intersection as an example of a place where it is too dangerous to post a patrol car and highway code enforcement would thus benefit from the use of photo-radar.[3] Finally, on April 4, 2002, roadwork to make the intersection safer began with the demolition of one of the three overpasses, the one above Saint-Joseph Boulevard just west of the intersection.[4] It has been speculated that the remaining two overpasses would be eventually demolished as well, but to this day they are still in place. A major Canadian Pacific Railway line uses these two overpasses, making it impossible to demolish them in the short term.[5]

According to the Ministère des Transports du Québec, the tunnel should have been completely demolished and reconstructed by July 2010. As of August 2016, the tunnel is still in place.