Montréal–Trudeau International Airport () or Montréal–Trudeau, formerly known and still commonly referred to as Montréal–Dorval International Airport (Aéroport international Montréal-Dorval), is an international airport straddling the border of Dorval and Montreal, Quebec, Canada. It is the only Transport Canada designated international airport serving Montreal and is situated west of Downtown Montreal. The airport terminals are located entirely in the suburb of Dorval, while one runway is located in the Montreal borough of Saint-Laurent. Air Canada, the country's flag carrier, also has its corporate headquarters complex on the Saint-Laurent side of the airport."Detailed Map of Dorval ." City of Dorval. Retrieved November 4, 2010."ab11e5b4-ccb1-430e-9a7c-598d63c7480b.gif ." City of Montreal. Retrieved December 4, 2010. It also serves Greater Montreal and adjacent regions in Quebec and eastern Ontario, as well as the states of Vermont and northern New York in the United States.Montréal-Trudeau at a glance. Aéroports de Montréal The airport is named in honour of Pierre Trudeau (1919–2000), the 15th Prime Minister of Canada.
The airport is one of two managed and operated by Aéroports de Montréal (ADM), a not-for-profit corporation without share capital; the other is Montréal–Mirabel northwest of Montreal, which was initially intended to replace the one in Dorval but now deals almost solely with cargo and private flights. Montréal–Trudeau is owned by Transport Canada which has a 60-year lease with Aéroports de Montréal, as per Canada's National Airport Policy of 1994.
Trudeau is the busiest airport in the province of Quebec and the third-busiest airport in Canada by passenger traffic, with 22.4 million passengers in 2025. It is one of nine Canadian airports with United States border preclearance and is one of the main gateways into Canada with 15.79 million or 71% of its passengers being on non-domestic flights, the highest proportion amongst Canada's airports. YUL has also risen to become the 5th busiest transatlantic hub in North America. The route between Montreal and Paris is Canada's busiest international route and the 6th busiest international route from North America, with more than 1.5 million passengers a year. It is one of three Air Canada hubs and, in that capacity, serves mainly Quebec, the Atlantic Provinces and Eastern Ontario. On an average day, 58,000 passengers transit through Montréal-Trudeau.
Airlines servicing Trudeau offer year-round non-stop flights to five continents, namely Africa, Asia, Europe, North and South America. It is one of only two airports in Canada with non-stop flights to five continents, the other being Toronto Pearson International Airport. Trudeau airport is the headquarters of and a large hub for Air Canada, the country's largest airline. It is also the headquarters of Air Inuit and Air Transat, and an operation base for Porter Airlines. It also plays a role in general aviation as home to the headquarters of Innotech-Execair, Starlink, ACASS and Maintenance Repair & Overhaul (MRO) facilities of Air Transat and Air Inuit. Transport Canada operates a Civil Aviation Maintenance, Repair and Overhaul facility on site, with a fleet of Government owned and operated civil aircraft. Bombardier Aerospace has an assembly facility on site where they build Global and Challenger business jets.
History
Growth
In November 1960, the airport was renamed Montreal–Dorval International Airport/Aéroport international Dorval de Montréal. On December 15 of that year the Minister of Transport inaugurated a new $30 million terminal. The structure was built by Illsley, Templeton, Archibald, and Larose. At its height, it was the largest terminal in Canada and one of the biggest in the world. It was the gateway to Canada for all European air traffic and served more than two million passengers per year. Eight years later, Montréal–Dorval International Airport underwent a major expansion program. Despite this, the government of Prime Minister of Canada Pierre Elliott Trudeau (who represented a Montreal riding) predicted that Dorval would be completely saturated by 1985 and also projected that 20 million passengers would be passing through Montreal's airports annually. They decided to construct a new airport in Sainte-Scholastique, what became Montréal–Mirabel International Airport. As the first phase in the transition that would eventually have seen Dorval closed, all international flights (except those to and from the United States) were to be transferred to the new airport in 1975.
The opening and closing of Mirabel Airport
The Trudeau government had developed Mirabel Airport to handle an expected growth in international traffic and eventually, to replace Dorval. On November 29, 1975, Mirabel International Airport went into service. With an operations zone of and a buffer zone of , it became the largest airport in the world. Many connecting flights to Canadian centres were transferred to Mirabel and 23 international airlines moved their overseas activities there. As a consequence, Montréal–Dorval was repurposed to serve domestic flights and transborder flights to the United States, to eventually shift these activities to Mirabel in the future and lead to Dorval's closure for redevelopment.
However, the extra traffic never materialized. Mirabel's traffic decreased due to the advent in the 1980s of longer-range jets that did not need to refuel in Montreal before crossing the Atlantic Ocean from the major Western North American cities. Montreal's economic decline in the late 1970s and 1980s also had a significant effect on both airports' traffic, which made Mirabel's additional capacity redundant. Although this redundancy would have been resolved if Dorval was decommissioned as originally intended, public pressure supported Dorval's continued operation due to its closer proximity to downtown Montreal at instead of for Mirabel. Another obstacle of the planned transfer from Dorval to Mirabel was Air Canada's desire to keep flights in Dorval with its proximity to AVEOS workshops.Archived at Ghostarchive and the Wayback Machine:
In particular, the simultaneous operation of Mirabel (international flights) and Dorval (continental flights) made Montreal less attractive to international airlines. Passengers who used Montreal in transit had to take long bus rides for connections from domestic to international flights (exacerbated by the partially-completed road links and non-existent rail connecting Mirabel to Montreal), unnecessarily complicating their journeys, while Montrealers grew to resent Mirabel as they were forced to travel far out of town for international flights. Faced with the stark economic reality of operating two Canadian points of entry, most international airlines opted to bypass Montreal altogether in favour of Toronto which enjoyed a single major airport at Pearson handling domestic and international flights. Although Dorval resumed handling international flights in 1997, international airlines were slow to return as they were content having established Toronto Pearson as their eastern Canadian gateway.
Back to Montréal–Dorval, renaissance With all international scheduled flights returning to Montréal–Dorval in 1997, as well as charter flights in 2004, the consolidation of flights to Montréal–Dorval resulted in an increase in passenger traffic. Besides the transfer of flights, Montréal–Dorval International Airport could resume being a true hub for passengers in-transit, and those from continental flights would no longer have to travel to Mirabel to connect to international flights and vice versa. Nonetheless, this was insufficient to woo back international airlines who had already switched their eastern Canadian gateway to Toronto Pearson a decade ago.
Starting as Dorval Airport, then Montréal–Dorval International Airport, the airport was renamed Montréal–Pierre Elliott Trudeau International Airport in Trudeau's honour on January 1, 2004, by the federal government. The renaming had been announced in September 2003 by then Minister of Transport David Collenette. This move provoked some opposition, especially Quebec sovereigntists opposed to Trudeau's staunchly federalist policies. The renaming also provoked opposition from many aviation historians and enthusiasts who recalled Trudeau's role in the effort to shutter Dorval in favour of the much larger and modern Mirabel Airport, of which he was the greatest instigator of its construction. Many Montrealers still refer to Trudeau airport as "Dorval," or "Dorval Airport."
Operation Yellow Ribbon After the September 11 attacks, Dorval Airport participated in Operation Yellow Ribbon, taking in seven diverted flights that had been bound for the closed airspace over the United States, even though pilots were asked to avoid the airport as a security measure . Mirabel International Airport also took in 10 other diverted flights totalling 17 diverted flight in the Montreal area bound for American cities.
75th anniversary In 2016, Montréal-Trudeau celebrated its 75th anniversary. Under the theme Service, Destinations, Passion since 1941, various activities and contests were planned throughout the year. In partnership with the Canada Aviation and Space Museum, the airport hosted the Travelling Through Time exhibition in the public hall of the US Departures area. Exhibits showcasing important milestones in the airport's history were incorporated throughout the terminal.
Expansion Terminal expansion (2000–2007) Montréal–Trudeau underwent a major expansion and modernization designed to increase the terminal's capacity and substantially enhance the level of passenger service. In February 2000, with a budget of CAD 716 million, ADM announced plans for an extensive expansion plan that would bring Montréal–Trudeau up to standard with other North American airports its size. The airport terminal had for the most part remained the same, with the exception of minor renovations, since its opening in 1960. With increased passenger volume resulting from the transfer of international scheduled passengers from Mirabel Airport in 1997, as well as Air Canada's intentions to make Montréal–Trudeau its Eastern Canada hub, there was a strong need to greatly expand the terminal, whose capacity of roughly 7 million passengers per year had been exceeded.
The expansion program included the construction of several brand-new facilities, including a jetty for flights to the United States (US Preclearance Terminal), another for other international destinations (International Terminal) and a huge international arrivals complex. An 18-gate Transborder Concourse opened in 2003, an 11-gate International Concourse opened in 2004, new customs hall and baggage claim area for non-domestic flights and an expanded parking garage opened in 2005. Additionally, sections of the domestic area were renovated and expanded in 2007, accompanied with additional retail space. The International part of the Aeroquay satellite was demolished in 2008, leaving the domestic part for regional carriers. The completion of the CAD 716 million expansion gives Montréal–Trudeau the ability to serve 15 million passengers a year. This ironically accomplished one of the goals that was to be met with the construction of Mirabel. (In the 1970s, the federal government projected that 20 million passengers would be passing through Montreal's airports annually by 1985, with 17 million through Mirabel). Aéroports de Montréal financed all of these improvements itself, with no government grants. By the end of 2007, CAD 1.5 billion had been spent to upgrade Montréal–Trudeau.