Port of Pointe-au-Père

Pointe-au-Père (Rimouski), QC · Transport Canada · Transport Canada · St. Lawrence Estuary

Pointe-au-Père is a Transport Canada local/regional port facility on the south shore of the St. Lawrence Estuary, about 10 km east of Rimouski; TC classifies it among Quebec "local/regional port facilities" that serve communities with commercial activities, and it is listed as available for transfer under the Ports Asset Transfer Program (PATP). The original 1902 wharf was built to test acetylene gas lighting for lighthouses; a winter port and goods-transport installations were added in 1959-60, and the company Nord-Sud ran icebreaker car-ferry service (the Père-Nouvel, then the Manic) to Baie-Comeau on the North Shore from 1962, but the ferry service was permanently abandoned in 1970. A new public jetty was completed in 2008 to replace the deteriorating old wharf and restore public access to the sea; current use is public/recreational (parking, sea access, fishing) rather than active commercial cargo handling. As of the most recent sources, Pointe-au-Père remained in Transport Canada's port inventory and was not among the four nearby St. Lawrence ports (Matane, Gros-Cacouna, Rimouski, Gaspé) transferred to the Quebec government in 2015.