The station was constructed in open cut as part of the enlargement of Saint Helen's Island to host Expo 67. The official opening of the station took place on April 1, 1967.[5] In the first four weeks, it served only the construction workers of the Expo site.[6]Île Sainte-Hélène station finally opened to the public on April 28, 1967, the day after the official opening of Expo 67.[6][7]
The station was designed to handle large crowds, with a side platform design and large staircases to a ground level concourse. During Expo 67, the station handled over 60,000 passengers an hour.[8]
In May 2001,[a] the station was renamed Jean-Drapeau after Jean Drapeau, mayor of Montreal from 1954 to 1957 and 1960 to 1986, who is often given credit for the construction of the Metro, and for securing both Expo 67 and the 1976 Summer Olympics.[9][10] The park in which the station sits had been renamed Parc Jean-Drapeau in 1999.
Accessibility
The station was made accessible in November 2019 with the construction of two elevators. Despite being one of the lesser used stations on the network, elevators were installed due to low technical complexity and low cost of installation.[11] As of 2022[update], none of the other stations on the Yellow line are accessible.[12] This effectively negates the elevator’s purpose. However, construction work is currently underway at Berri-UQAM to allow accessible access to the Yellow line platforms,[13] and in turn, the rest of the system.
Painted concrete murals by the station architect Jean Dumontier depict the mythological TitanAtlas holding up the roof of the station.[8] Dumontier was the first architect of the metro to create his own artworks for stations of his own design.[14]
In 1997, the operator of the Lisbon Metro gifted a granite sculpture by Portuguese artist João Charters de Almeida [pt] to the STM, to commemorate 30 years since the opening of the Montreal Metro and Expo 67, as well as the Portuguese community in the city.[15][16] However, the 19 m (62 ft 4 in) high artwork was too large for any metro station. The artwork was installed instead in Parc Jean-Drapeau, located close to the station on Île Sainte-Hélène.[17]
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