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Area · City of Bois-des-Filion, Basses-Laurentides

Bois-des-Filion

A former beach village turned suburb, avenues that slope down to the river, and a city you can bike across before supper. Here's my top 10, the neighbour's version, not the brochure version.

Let's talk about this area

Bois-des-Filion fits into 4.9 square kilometres between the Rivière des Mille Îles and Highway 640, with just over 10,000 residents. It's one of the smallest cities on the North Shore, and also one of the easiest to figure out: the library, the pool, the two schools and city hall are all a few minutes from each other. I drive up from Verdun by the 15 then the 640, and every time I'm struck by the contrast between the traffic on Boulevard Adolphe-Chapleau and the calm of the numbered avenues sloping down toward the water.

I put this top 10 together for a simple reason: when you buy or sell, you're not just shopping for a property, you're shopping for a neighbourhood life. Every point comes with an opening for a conversation. Use it.

Maxime Laforest, residential and commercial real estate broker · Équipe Loiselle, RE/MAX Dynamique

The area's top 10

What makes Bois-des-Filion's heart beat.

Ten reasons a small town on the Rivière des Mille Îles keeps the people who land here.

01 A public bench facing the Rivière des Mille Îles
Waterfront

The Rivière des Mille Îles at the end of the avenues

The whole southern edge of the city runs along the river. It's what gave birth to the village: in the 1940s, the beaches drew so many Montrealers that by the time of incorporation, in 1949, there were 342 permanent families and about 800 seasonal families who came back every summer. The cottage gave way to the bungalow, but the waterfront culture stuck around.

Ask me about it: ask me which avenues actually touch the water and which ones only get a view corridor. The difference carries real weight, and it can come down to a single street.
02 Rabaska canoes moored among the water lilies on the Rivière des Mille Îles
Outdoors

Parc Riverain and its boats

Between 56th and 58th Avenue, the City built a riverside park with a rental centre for canoes, kayaks and paddleboards, set up with the Communauté métropolitaine de Montréal and the organization Éco-Nature. From there, a 7.5-kilometre paddle heads down to Terrebonne's Parc de la Rivière, organized in summer by Groupe Plein Air Terrebonne. An hour and fifteen minutes on the water, without ever leaving the suburbs.

Ask me about it: ask me how walkable the areas you're interested in are to Parc Riverain. Over a full summer, that changes a family's day-to-day.
03 Sign for the Rivière des Mille Îles fishing sanctuary by the water
Nature

A fishing sanctuary and a wildlife refuge

The Rivière des Mille Îles is home to the largest urban wildlife refuge in Quebec, expanded in 2022. Certain areas are protected as a fishing sanctuary from April 1 to June 30, giving the fish time to spawn undisturbed. Herons, turtles and ducks are part of the everyday scenery for those living near the water, and the Parc de la Rivière-des-Mille-Îles offers self-guided observation routes along the entire length of the waterway.

Ask me about it: ask me what it actually means to buy along a protected river. There are rules worth knowing before you submit a promise to purchase, not after.
04 Highway 19 seen looking north from an overpass in Laval
Access

Highway 19, ending right here

Coming up from Laval, the 19 stops at the river and turns into Route 335, Boulevard Adolphe-Chapleau. Everyone knows this bottleneck. The ministère des Transports is completing the highway between the 440 in Laval and the 640 in Bois-des-Filion: a new bridge east of the Pont Athanase-David, three lanes per direction and a lane reserved for buses, carpooling and electric vehicles. The work has been going on since 2023 and leaves streets closed in sections.

Ask me about it: ask me what this project changes depending on the address. Living right next to a future ramp and living ten minutes from that same ramp are two very different files.
05 The platform at the Rosemère station, on the exo Saint-Jérôme line
Transit

The train next door, the bus at the corner

exo secteur Laurentides serves the city. Line 22 connects Bois-des-Filion to Gare Sainte-Thérèse, and the T12 shared taxi reaches Gare Rosemère by reservation. Both stations are on the Saint-Jérôme line, which runs down toward downtown. The buses carry bike racks, the MRC Thérèse-De Blainville offers a carpooling platform, and the Highway 19 project includes a bus terminus with a park-and-ride lot in the northeast quadrant of the 19/640 interchange.

Ask me about it: ask me how a round trip downtown works from here. A lot of buyers underestimate the bus-plus-train combo, and others overestimate it.
06 A residential avenue lined with tall trees in Bois-des-Filion
The Neighbourhoods

Numbered avenues and two old roads

Around here, people give their address in numbers: 33rd, 37th, 49th, 57th. Boulevard Adolphe-Chapleau runs through the city and concentrates the shops, while Montée Gagnon follows the old path that once separated the Seigneurie de Blainville from that of Terrebonne. In the 1990s, the City bought back land from the ministère des Transports and National Defence, which gave it its industrial park and the Place du Parc neighbourhood.

Ask me about it: ask me how the low-numbered avenues near the river compare to the streets of Place du Parc. Two different vibes, two different types of buyers.
07 Aerial view of the wooded islands of the Rivière des Mille Îles
The Territory

Five square kilometres, and that's it

At 4.9 square kilometres, you can drive around Bois-des-Filion quickly, and its neighbours sit right next door: Lorraine, Rosemère, Terrebonne and, across the river, Laval. You get North Shore services without the distances that usually come with them. For a lot of buyers coming from the island, it's exactly the compromise they were looking for without knowing how to name it.

Ask me about it: ask me what you gain and what you lose by choosing a small town over a big suburb. I'll give you the straight answer, even when it doesn't work in my favour.
08
Heritage

Maison Limoges-Perron and the old Pont David

Five houses of traditional Quebec architecture survive in the city, including Maison Limoges-Perron, built before 1852 and restored by the City in the early 2000s to become an arts and culture venue. At the end of 37th Avenue, a belvedere was rebuilt on the last remains of the old Pont Athanase-David, opened in 1934, which gave the municipality its first name: Saint-Maurice de Pont-David. The MRC Thérèse-De Blainville has catalogued 32 heritage properties across the territory.

Ask me about it: ask me whether the address you're eyeing is on the MRC's heritage inventory. It can affect what renovations are allowed and how you present the property.
09
Family Life

Two schools holding the village together

École primaire Le Rucher, at 100 33rd Avenue, welcomes about 700 students with its Félix-Leclerc pavilion and offers a music program in the upper grades. École secondaire Rive-Nord, opened in 1995 on Rue Joseph-Paquette, takes in more than a thousand students from Bois-des-Filion, Lorraine, Rosemère and Terrebonne-Ouest, with an international education program alongside the regular one. Add the municipal pool, the outdoor rinks, day camp and the library, and the picture is complete.

Ask me about it: ask me which school zone the address you're interested in falls under. It's worth checking before the offer, and I've seen buyers get disappointed for skipping that step.
10
Local Life

Sundays at the park, and the projects that follow

In summer, free shows are held on Sundays at Parc Paul-Perron, and an outdoor cinema screens family films on a giant screen. Journées de la culture, the Fête nationale and the Fête de la famille come back every year, and the city marked its 75th anniversary in 2024 with exhibits on its people and its buildings. On the construction side, the City is running several projects at once: renovating the citizens' chalet, a multi-purpose hall, the Érablière rental building and the Altitude II collective housing project.

Ask me about it: ask me where these projects sit relative to the residential areas. That's the kind of detail we look at together on a map, not over the phone.
Let's talk

Thinking about buying or selling in Bois-des-Filion? Let's start with a conversation.

A free evaluation of your property, a picture of the local market, or simply answers to your questions. No strings attached, and a straight answer.

Start my real estate project

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