Saint-Honoré

Saint-Honoré

 Saint-Honoré, Qué, Municipality, pop 4727 (2006c), 4752 (2001cA) inc 1972. Saint-Honoré, located about 10 km northeast of Chicoutimi, was first settled in the 1870s. The first colonization effort was not successful, however. A second attempt at the beginning of the 20th century led to Saint-Honoré being set up as a municipality in 1914. It became 2 autonomous entities (village and parish municipality) in 1953, only to be merged anew in 1972.

Saint-Honoré, still rural in character, is best known for its flying school, Centre québécois deformation aéronautique of the CÉGEP de Chicoutimi, and for Niobec Inc, one of the world's main producers of COLUMBIUM, a mineral used in the manufacture of steel alloys. Niobec's underground mining operation opened in 1974. It built its own ferroniobium concentration plant in 1994 and is Saint-Honoré's main employer. The flying school, the only one of its kind in Québec, was set up in 1968 at Saint-Honoré's airport, built in 1942 as a Second World War training facility for pilots from all over the British Commonwealth. The airport is also a key centre in the fight against forest fires and insects that plague Québec's timber stands.

Sportfishing and other outdoor pursuits are popular at nearby Parc des Monts-Valin and the 2 tributaries of Rivière Saguenay, Shipshaw and Valin, which constitute parts of the municipality's eastern and western boundaries.