Rue Prince-Arthur Est

After reading about this lovely pedestrian street in Montréal, my family and I wanted to come check out when we were visiting. Everything was very rundown and most of the store fronts were empty. The restaurants and stores that were there all seemed pretty cheesy. There was some street art on the walls but not enough to make me recommend going to this area to anyone. You can skip this when visiting Montréal.

Dead street, don’t come here ! So sad ! One of the only pedestrian streets in Montréal is almost dead ! I’ve been living for the past 15 years near Prince Arthur street and I walk here everyday. But, let’s be honest here, it’s no more the ’80 with all the BYOW greek restaurants all over with their terrasses, now 90% of the restaurants/​shops are now closed, so sad. You got left only 2 french restaurants, 2 greek restaurants, 2 convenience stores, 1 supermarket, 1 bar, 1 pizza stand, 1 shoes store & Café Campus and that’s about it. The City of Montréal should start thinking or planning something to improve the business here, decrease taxes or replan this street with new urban planning or arts, I don’t know… It’s very depressing but it’s the reality of many ”once” popular street like St-​Laurent or St-​Denis, people don’t come here anymore, because there is no space to park, new ”hot” neighborhoods in town and people from the suburs prefer to go to DIX-​30 or elsewhere. On the top, the city of Montréal plans to reconvert Ste-​Catherine into a street pedestrian in the future…

During my recent trip to Montréal, Rue Prince-​Arthur Est was one of my favourite destinations. This little strip is pedestrian only in the summertime and offers tourists (and maybe even locals alike) a nice stroll with restaurants and shops all in one location.
They may not be the fanciest of places, but they are certainly better than heading down to the tourist traps of Old Montréal. Another interesting tidbit about Rue Prince-​Arthur Est is that most restaurants are BYOB (Bring your own bottle). You will see myriads of people walking along from the convenience shops with bottles wrapped up in brown paper taking them to the restaurants. Makes it nice to save a bit of money and get your favourite libation in the process!