Four Montreal boroughs are moving to bi-weekly household garbage collection instead of weekly this fall, according to the Ville de Montréal. If you live in one of these areas, your collection schedule is about to change.
The change doesn't take effect everywhere on the same day, or in the same way. In Ahuntsic-Cartierville, it starts October 1, 2026, but only for single-family homes and buildings with eight or fewer dwellings in the Ahuntsic and Sault-au-Récollet districts — the rest of the borough follows a different schedule. In Villeray–Saint-Michel–Parc-Extension, October 1 also marks the start, but only for one sector of the François-Perrault district. For L'Île-Bizard–Sainte-Geneviève and Pierrefonds-Roxboro, the change applies borough-wide starting November 2 — except the Coopérative Village Cloverdale sector in Pierrefonds-Roxboro, which is excluded.
The city explains the change through operational, environmental and regulatory issues. Spacing out collections encourages better sorting, since a large proportion of what currently ends up in garbage bins could be recycled, composted or reused. Montreal is also among the 82 municipalities in the Communauté métropolitaine de Montréal that must comply with a limit of 26 household waste collections per year by December 2027.
Good to know for newcomers. If you're moving into one of these areas this fall, don't assume your old collection schedule still applies — check your exact address on the city's website, since the boundaries sometimes run street by street within the same borough. Two weeks between collections is also a good time to revisit how you sort: what goes into the brown bin (compost) and the green bin (recycling) reduces what has to wait for the next garbage collection. Our guide to recycling and garbage in Montreal explains which bin to use for what.
