Quinchien River

InnEAUvation project of the
Quinchien River

The MRC has initiated the InnEAUvation project aimed at co-constructing with the community resilient solutions to climate change to reduce the vulnerability of residents in the MRC of Vaudreuil-Soulanges. This project, which runs from 2021 to 2024, seeks to improve the condition of the waterways connected to the Quinchien River watershed by considering different ways to manage them, in particular to strengthen the services they provide to the community.

L’étude hydrogéomorphologique du bassin versant, réalisée en 2020, a permis de cibler des zones prioritaires.

Le bassin versant de la rivière Quinchien se situe dans les municipalités des Cèdres, de Saint-Lazare et de Vaudreuil-Dorion et son exutoire se déverse dans la rivière des Outaouais.

Map of the Quinchien River

A collective project

This collective watershed project aims to mobilize the community and provide support in order to design solutions built with the stakeholders. Water management methods are part of the collective reflection. The project is divided into 3 main steps.

Step 1 – Riparian mobilization

Workshops held for local stakeholders to reflect on the issues of the watershed and possible solutions.

Step 2 – Implementation

Workshops are planned to find solutions with local residents and implement various forms of development related to climate change.

Co-creation workshop (December 9th)

Training
As part of the InnEAUvation project, municipal councillors and mayors from the Quinchien River watershed participated in a free one-hour virtual training session on basic stream concepts and hydrogeomorphology. The training allows to understand the thoughts of the riparians and the issues of the watercourses. Mr. Simon Tremblay, geographer and planner, from the Laboratoire de géographie appliquée of the Université du Québec à Chicoutimi (UQAC), popularized these complex notions.

Training

Step 3 – Dissemination of the results with a webinar at the end of the project

Project objectives

Use a citizen mobilization approach to build socially accepted solutions and engage local actors towards the solutions in order to allow an appropriation of these collectively imagined solutions;
Think about new ways of intervening in waterways to reduce vulnerability to flooding and erosion and, at the same time, have a positive impact on water quality;
Designing interventions at the source with the watershed approach in order to reduce the problems caused by the water hazards of climate change;
Disseminate the experience and results to a wide audience.

Steering Committee

The steering committee helps to guide the project’s steps and prioritize certain aspects. This project is made possible thanks to the financial and technical support of our many partners:

MRC de Vaudreuil-Soulanges
Ville de Vaudreuil-Dorion,
Ville de Saint-Lazare,
Municipalité des Cèdres,
COBAVER-VS,
Nature Action Québec;
Communauté métropolitaine de Montréal (CMM);
Ministère de l’Agriculture, des Pêcheries et de l’Alimentation;
Ministère des Affaires municipales et de l’Habitation;
Ministère des Transports;
Ministère des Forêts, de la Faune et des Parcs;
Ministère de l’Environnement et de la Lutte contre les changements climatiques;
UPA Vaudreuil-Soulanges;
UPA Montérégie

For more information, or to participate, please contact the watercourses department by email at coursdeau@mrcvs.ca.

Nature-Action Québec has been mandated to coordinate the InnEAUvation project.

The InnEAUvation project benefits from financial assistance from the gouvernement du Québec for the programme Climat municipalités – Phase 2 and is consistent with the objectives of the Plan pour une économie verte 2030.