Chambly

Chambly

Chambly, Qué, City, pop 22 608 (2006c), 20 342 (2001c), inc 1965. Chambly is situated within the South Shore suburb area 25 km southeast of MONTRÉAL and is the centre of the rural Montérégie Region. The community fans out around Bassin de Chambly, a widening in the RIVIÈRE RICHELIEU. FORT CHAMBLY was erected nearby in 1665 as one of several outposts defending the French colony against IROQUOIS, and later American, raids. It was named for Jacques de Chambly, an army captain who held the first seigneury here. Millet flour and textile mills dominated the Chambly economy from 1806 to 1911. The Chambly Canal, completed in 1843, was a key shipping link to the US-Lac CHAMPLAIN region until 1901.

Today a diverse manufacturing sector is the centre of Chambly's economy. Its longstanding shoe, clothing and food processing industries are now rivalled by a large range of metal fabricators and growing pharmaceutical and electronic outputs. In 1993 an industrial wastes treatment plant in Chambly became the first of its kind in Québec. Tourism has been growing in importance with the redevelopment of the Chambly Canal for recreational purposes; the restoration of Fort Chambly (1983); and waterfront development for boating and shoreline recreational activities since the early 1990s.