In 1702 a parish municipality was founded, and dedicated to Saint-François de Sales (not to be confused with the modern-day Saint-François-de-Sales in Saguenay–Lac-Saint-Jean).

The only built-up area on the island, Sainte-Rose, was incorporated as a village in 1850, and it remained the main community for the remainder of the century.

[6] Laval was named after the first owner of Île Jésus, François de Montmorency-Laval, the first Roman Catholic Bishop of Quebec.

[7] The 14 municipalities, which existed prior to the incorporation of the amalgamated City of Laval on 6 August 1965, were: The island has developed over time, with most of the urban area in the central region and along the south and west river banks.

The 2011 census found that French was the sole mother tongue of 60.8% of the population, and was spoken most often at home by 65.2% of residents.

The next most common mother tongues were English (7.0%), Arabic (5.6%), Italian (4.2%), Greek (3.5%), Spanish (2.9%), Armenian (1.7%), Creoles (1.6%), Romanian (1.3%) and Portuguese (1.3%).

[20] The first is Industrial Park Centre, in the heart of Laval at the corner of St. Martin West and Industriel Blvd.

It is an internationally renowned science campus that houses the Biotech City and the Information Technology Development Centre (ITDC).

The Laval Science and High Technology Park is a beacon of the metropolitan economy, in an environment befitting the best technopolises in the world.

The Biotech City spans the entire territory of the Laval Science and High Technology Park and is a unique concept in Canada in that its residents comprise both universities and companies.

[23] Laval was the host-city of the "Jeux du Québec" held in summer 1991 and of the Canadian Hockey League's 1994 Memorial Cup.

[24] The city's longtime mayor, Gilles Vaillancourt, resigned on 9 November 2012, following allegations of corruption made against him in hearings of the provincial Charbonneau Commission.

[25] City councillor Basile Angelopoulos served as acting mayor[26] until Alexandre Duplessis was selected in a council vote on 23 November.

While the PQ held every Laval riding except Chomedey (which voted overwhelmingly to not separate in the 1995 Quebec referendum) during their second stint in government between 1994 and 2003.

The long-awaited stations were begun in 2003 and completed in April 2007, two months ahead of the revised schedule, at a cost of C$803 million, funded entirely by the Quebec government.

[37] The Exo public transit agency's Saint-Jérôme commuter train line traverses the island, connecting Laval to downtown Montreal.

The Deux-Montagnes commuter train line served the western tip of Laval until it was closed on 31 December 2020.

Work is underway to replace it with the Réseau express métropolitain (REM) light metro system.

There are reserved lanes for buses and taxis on Chomedey Blvd between Le Carrefour Blvd and the Des Prairies River (Lachapelle Bridge) and beyond as well as along boulevard des Laurentides between rue Proulx and boulevard Cartier (the reserved lane, in this case for buses only, continues onto the Pont Viau bridge into Montreal until the Terminus Laval at the Henri-Bourassa Metro station).

The AMT and the City of Laval have developed reserved bus and taxi lanes on Notre-Dame Boulevard between Vincent Massey Street and Place Alton-Goldbloom and another on De la Concorde Blvd between De l'Avenir and Laval Blvds, as well as between Ampere Ave and Roanne St.

These reserved lanes (Notre-Dame and De la Concorde are the same boulevard but change name where they meet under Autoroute 15) opened shortly after 31 October 2007.