The Saint-Pierre interchange is among many roads and arteries that have been plagued with potholes this winter. Frederic Chartrand, a mobile forklift mechanic, who spends much of his job on the road, said he’s never seen it so bad. Last week, when he was en route to a job on the South Shore, he said he was nearly stopped in his tracks as he got on the ramp from Highway 20. “I like braked, and I stopped the truck and I thought maybe the road was closed,” Chartrand said. He said there were large potholes on the road and it was nearly impossible to swerve and pass them. He posted a video of the potholes, which he said garnered thousands of responses from frustrated drivers, like him. “I don’t understand how the roads can be in such a ruined state,” Chartrand said. Built in the mid-1960s, the Saint-Pierre interchange falls under the jurisdiction of Quebec’s Ministry of Transport and Sustainable Mobility (MTQ). In 2022, the MTQ announced a reconstruction project was under study. MTQ spokesperson Sarah Bensadoun confirmed it has not yet moved past that phase. Meanwhile, she said the MTQ has been doing what it can to repair the potholes. “From Nov. 22, 2025, to Feb. 15, 2026, the ministry carried out more than 32 road repairs on the Saint-Pierre interchange ramps,” she said. “These interventions consisted solely of urgent pothole repairs, due to the winter weather conditions.” Bensadoun said the lifespan of emergency repairs can be as short as a few weeks and that permanent repairs can’t be carried out until the temperature is above 10 C with no precipitation.
