Port of Cap-aux-Meules

Cap-aux-Meules (Îles-de-la-Madeleine), QC · Transport Canada · Transport Canada · Gulf of St. Lawrence

The Port of Cap-aux-Meules is a Transport Canada-owned public port and the main port of the Magdalen Islands, a remote archipelago of about 13,000 residents in the Gulf of St. Lawrence. The sheltered harbour is organized into three sectors — a commercial sector, a ferry sector, and a fishers' wharf — and accommodates ferries, cruise ships, tankers, tugboats, barges, semi-offshore commercial fishing vessels and cargo ships. The fishers' wharf primarily serves the semi-offshore fishing fleet (crab fishing being a key economic driver), while ferry and cargo operations are run by the cooperative CTMA, which links the islands to Souris (PEI) and to Matane and Montreal. Transport Canada restricted access to portions of the deteriorating fishers' wharf in 2021 and installed a temporary wharf in 2022; a roughly $40 million reconstruction of the fishers' wharf is planned, with work expected to run from the mid-2020s into the late 2020s.