Officials from the Ministry of Transport and Sustainable Mobility (MTMD) evoke “Pressures du Cabinet” by Minister Geneviève Guilbault to postpone the presentation of the results of the most recent Origin-Destination Quebec-Lévis survey. The reason? “An imminent announcement planned for the 3rde lien. »
Radio-Canada was able to consult dozens of email exchanges and documents thanks to a request for access to information addressed to MTMD.
Scheduled on May 15, 2025, the presentation of the results of the survey, whose communication actions – press release, narrated presentation and publication on social media, in particular – have been planning itself since winter, will finally have waited a little more than a month.
Carried out approximately every five years, the investigation aims to document the traffic flow in the Quebec region.
On May 2, a civil servant of MTMD evoked Pressures from the cabinet to postpone the outlet of the survey results
we read in an email included in the response to a request for access to information.
The communications team informed us yesterday that the dissemination of the protruding facts, in particular the technical session of presentation of the protruding facts to the media, was compromised by the cabinet, due to an imminent announcement provided for the 3e link (choice of the corridor selected).
Although it can be acceptable to move the technical session to the media, that of moving the outlet of the results after the announcement of a corridor choice for the 3rde link would go against our signed understanding, in addition to being poorly perceived in public opinion
add this official, adding thatin steering committee this morning [le 2 mai 2025]it was agreed to keep the course on the broadcasting calendar.
Another official then wanted to reformulate, arguing that the technical information session is not compromised by the cabinet
but he wanted simply consult the protruding facts of the Origin-Destination 2023-Quebec-Lévis region in order to confirm the ideal moment to disseminate them
.
The passages mentioning the third link were cock in at least one version of the email of this civil servant, in the 48 documents of the information access request.
Photo : Radio-Canada
Shift ride
On May 9, while the dissemination of the protruding facts of the investigation is still scheduled six days later, an official already reported by email that the presentation could very possibly be rejected after the announcement of the 3e lien
. In the email, the date of May 29 is mentioned for this announcement.
A few days later, on May 12, an official reveals that he comes to learn right now that the press conference [de l’Enquête origine-destination] Scheduled for this Thursday is postponed to a later date
. Another official maintains that it is because the cabinet must read the results
which had been available at this time for several days.
It was finally on June 12 that Minister Geneviève Guilbault presents the corridor chosen for a third link between Quebec and Lévis.
The following week, June 19, Le Journal de Québec reveals figures obtained from the most recent version of the Origin-Destination survey, which take into account the trips of 2023. The survey confirms, among other things, that the number of trips between Quebec and Lévis has decreased slightly between 2017 and 2023.
We have learned that an article will appear tomorrow on the EOD in the Quebec Journal who would have obtained data
wrote by email on June 18, the day before, another official of MTMD. We are still waiting for an orientation of the cabinet in response to this news.
The vast study was finally published on Friday June 20, around noon, the day following the leak of the first results.
When writing these lines, Geneviève Guilbault’s cabinet had still not followed up on our comments.
In collaboration with Érik Chouinard, with information from Audrey Paris and Louise Boisvert