Image source: City of Montreal
Namur-Hippodrome
Background
The proposed Namur-Hippodrome district is an ambitious affordable housing initiative integrated into a broader strategy of urban transformation. The future neighbourhood spans approximately 95 hectares and includes two main areas: the municipally owned 46-hectare former Hippodrome site (underutilized former horseracing track) and the 49-hectare Namur metro area, which is made up of multiple private properties on commercial and industrial lands. An area long isolated by railway and highway infrastructure, the project aims to create a carbon-neutral, socially inclusive and mixed-tenure neighbourhood with approximately 45,000 new residents, 14 hectares of new green and public spaces, 130,000 m² of community-oriented spaces, 213,000 m² of commercial space, and an integrated public transportation system. Taken together, this underutilised land is being reclaimed as a civic asset, with the goal of delivering long-term affordability and creating a ‘complete neighbourhood’ with amenities, greenspaces, and improved connectivity.
Location:
Côte-des-Neiges–Notre-Dame-de-Grâce & Saint-Laurent boroughs, Montréal, Canada
Typology:
Mixed-Income, Transit-Oriented Neighbourhood
Time frame:
Master Plan adopted in 2024; phased development through the 2040s
Affordable Housing Strategy
At the heart of the masterplan is a strong commitment to affordability: a minimum of 50% of all new homes must be non-market. This exceeds Montréal’s wider goal of ensuring that 20% of all homes in the city are non-market by 2050, up from roughly 7% today. The goal for Namur-Hippodrome is supported by the following combination of integrated measures:
- Public land acquisition and non-market priorities: The City of Montréal plays an active role in affordable housing delivery using public land ownership and right-of-first-refusal tools. This includes acquiring development parcels and distributing them to non-profit and cooperative housing providers at below-market rates.
- Mandatory ‘inclusionary’ zoning: Montréal’s Diverse Metropolis by-law requires private developments to contribute to housing diversity through targets of 20% social housing, 10–20% affordable housing, and 10% family housing. Contributions may take the form of land, turnkey projects, or financial contributions, with smaller projects generally making financial contributions in lieu of physical units. (note: the term ‘inclusionary zoning’ is used in Montréal, and more broadly in North America, to describe the ways in which affordable housing is delivered through the planning system).
Image source: City of Montreal
- Municipal-provincial-federal co-financing: Affordable and social housing developments are supported financially via a tripartite blend of municipal capital, provincial and federal grants and operating subsidies. This includes rent supplements for tenants who meet set income thresholds.
- Zoning ‘bonuses’: Developers that exceed the inclusionary zoning affordable housing targets for Namur-Hippodrome are eligible for an additional density allowance and other incentives (e.g. specialized zoning) that help them offset the overall cost of the land and development.
Delivery Mechanisms
The City of Montréal convened a large multi-departmental team and is collaborating closely with external partners, community groups and local housing associations to deliver this $3.1 billion infrastructure and housing project. The project has been shaped by an extensive public engagement process running from 2019 to 2024 – including public forums, creative workshops, discussion tables, and online surveys – ensuring that local priorities shape both the vision and its implementation. These priorities include housing accessibility, family-friendly design service provision. The project is also supported by a working group/development corporation structure intended to help advance innovative funding and development strategies. City policy also supports delivery by allowing city-owned land to be sold below market value to non-profit housing groups.
Implementation Challenges
Based on its scale alone, the Namur-Hippodrome project faces various and significant challenges. These include a lack of sufficient infrastructure, physical isolation, rising construction costs, fluctuating provincial funding for social housing, as well as a need for better-integrated public transit and green space. For example, a major spatial challenge is the Décarie Expressway, which divides the site area and carries approximately 170,000 vehicles per day.
The implementation strategy adopts an incremental
and adaptive planning approach.
This includes using creative financial solutions: a new pre-development financing programme has been introduced for ‘shovel-ready’ projects, for example, and various transitional land uses are permitted and supported on site, including urban agriculture and temporary modular housing.
Image source: Urban Retrofit project team
Lessons learned
Lead with affordable housing
The municipal team behind Namur-Hippodrome has treated affordable housing not as a secondary outcome but as a core principal of their overall mission to deliver a sustainable community that prioritises social equity.
Planning for public land ownership and regulations
Montréal’s use of land ownership tools, incentive–based policies and inclusionary zoning is a potentially replicable model for cities facing similar land and housing pressures. This proactive approach to planning enables the city to protect a significant amount of housing from market forces and meet affordability goals.
Tangible Policy Integration
Namur-Hippodrome demonstrates that it is possible to coordinate planning across municipal departments, community partners and different levels of government – and that such collaboration is essential to achieving ambitious affordability targets and wider master planning ambitions.
While still in its planning stages, recent funding announcements will help kickstart construction at Namur-Hippodrome. While affordable housing is the project’s defining feature, the Namur-Hippodrome plan is also an urban retrofit strategy: it seeks to reconnect an infrastructure-fragmented district, prioritise active and public mobility, expand public and green space, and create a compact complete neighbourhood on a human scale. This has the potential to establish a precedent for sustainable urban redevelopment in Montréal and beyond.