Montréal–Mirabel International Airport

Montréal–Mirabel International Airport, about 55 km northwest of downtown, was conceived in the early 1970s as the largest airport in the world — a flagship project meant to handle Canada's projected transatlantic passenger growth for decades to come. To build it, the federal government expropriated over 97,000 hectares from roughly 12,000 farming families, far more land than was ever developed. Passenger numbers never came close to forecasts, and scheduled service was permanently terminated in 2004. Mirabel has since become a textbook case in failed infrastructure policy: its terminals sit largely empty, the site is used mainly for cargo and aircraft maintenance, and much of the expropriated farmland was never returned to its original owners.