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Mirabel Airport in Montreal, Canada (Image: Gamma-Rapho via Getty Images)
An airport that displaced thousands of locals and was touted to be the world's largest was ultimately abandoned and left to decay following a series of setbacks.
In 1969, the Canadian government cleared approximately 324 square kilometres of farmland, uprooting around 10,000 local residents, to construct Mirabel International Airport. The dream was to create a mega-hub that would serve Montreal and beyond, featuring six terminals and six runways.
The airport was inaugurated in October 1975, just in time for the Montreal Olympics, with planners predicting as many as 60 million passengers annually by 2010.
However, instead of thriving, airlines began to pull out and vital transport links were never established. A proposed high-speed rail link between downtown Montreal and Mirabel never came to fruition, leaving the airport isolated and distant from the city.
Despite public efforts to increase capacity, Mirabel never surpassed three million passengers per year - a stark contrast to the grand scale initially anticipated, reports <a href="https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/abandoned-airport-meant-worlds-biggest-36304871" rel="Follow" target="_self">the Mirror</a>.
Experts said it was always destined to fail (Image: Gamma-Rapho via Getty Images)
With domestic flights persistently favouring the older Dorval (now Trudeau) Airport and airlines deterred by Mirabel's remoteness, passenger numbers dwindled. The end was in sight.
On 31 October 2004, Mirabel witnessed its last commercial passenger flight, a final departure by Air Transat to Paris. With no more passengers, the terminal lost its function and was left to decay.
A demolition company was brought in and by 2016 the enormous structure was pulled down. Unlike some disused airports, Mirabel didn't disappear completely - it continued operating as a cargo facility, aerospace testing site, and aircraft-assembly location.
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The last passenger flight left more than a decade ago (Image: Wikipedia/Yvan leduc)
One of the most haunting remnants of Mirabel's passenger era is the abandoned Château de l'Aéroport-Mirabel, a 344-room hotel constructed next to the terminal in the 1970s. By 2002 it had closed its doors, destroyed by the airport's downturn.
For residents, the unsuccessful venture still stands as a chilling symbol of unfulfilled expectations. The initial blueprint featured six runways and several terminals, but only one terminal was actually constructed.
Describing the colossal failure, Benoit Labonté, the president of Montreal's chamber of commerce, said: "It was a catastrophe for Montreal. There was no point in any passenger coming into Canada to make a transfer at Montreal."
He argued that Montreal's inability to offer robust air links was amongst the factors why the city was overtaken by Toronto as Canada's business hub. Mr Labonté stated: "Building Mirabel was a very sad decision for Montreal. From that moment, many businesses decided to shift westward to Toronto."
James Cherry, president of Aéroports de Montréal, told the Toronto Star: "it was a project that was doomed to fail".
He added: "The access to that site is a real problem. A lot of times it takes an hour and a half to get here, and the majority of air travellers these days are looking at flights of less than 2 1/2 hours."
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