The Mirabel airport, once a bold and ambitious infrastructure project near Montreal, has been completely demolished after decades of underuse, marking the end of a long-forgotten chapter in Canadian development. Built in 1975 with a budget of $500 million, the airport was intended to be the world's largest, capable of handling 40 million passengers annually by the year 2000. The project was initiated during the federal government of Pierre Elliott Trudeau and required the expropriation of agricultural land in the Lower Laurentides region. Despite being completed on time and opening in 1976 for the Montreal Olympics, the airport never achieved the success its planners had envisioned. One of the main issues the airport faced was its remote location, about 55 kilometers from downtown Montreal. This distance made it less attractive for both travelers and airlines, especially without a reliable railway link to the city. As a result, the airport failed to attract the expected volume of passengers. By 1997, regular international flights were moved back to the nearby Dorval airport, and Mirabel officially closed in 2004. The site remained largely empty and costly to maintain for years, with redevelopment efforts stalling due to its isolated location. In 2014, the decision was made to demolish the terminal building, a massive five-level structure made of steel and reinforced concrete. The process, which included the careful removal of asbestos, took until 2016 to complete. The cost of the demolition remains uncertain, with estimates ranging between $15 million and $35 million. Over the years, some of the land originally taken for the airport has been returned to its former owners. In 2006, then-Prime Minister Stephen Harper announced the return of 4,450 hectares of agricultural land, acknowledging what he called a "historical injustice." Today, the former Mirabel airport site has been repurposed as the International Mirabel Aerospace City, home to companies like Airbus, Pratt & Whitney, and FedEx. The runways still serve cargo and charter flights to northern Quebec, but the legacy of the original project remains complex. Some local families affected by the land expropriation still feel that their sacrifices were in vain, as the airport never fulfilled its grand ambitions. The former airport hotel, which closed in the early 2000s, now stands as a reminder of a time when public funds were used to build for the future, with results that were far from what was hoped.