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(Courtesy of The Montreal Gazette) :goodvibes: I remember bike riding through there practically every weekend when I was younger. Took a while, but it was a nice ride.

http://www.cnn.com/2016/03/10/travel/justin-trudeau-canada-having-a-moment-feat/ It's been years since the U.S. has looked so lovingly upon its neighbor to the north, Canada. Sure, there were Expo 67 and the 1976 Olympics, when Montreal was the center of the world. Sure, Bob and Doug McKenzie invited us to the "Great White North" in 1980 and had a big hit with their song "Take Off." But recently, the country some wags have called "America's Hat" has been more in the news than ever, thanks to its handsome prime minister and our less-than-handsome election campaign. Described by Vogue as "dashing" and "strikingly young and wavy-haired," Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is reviving the Trudeaumania inspired by his father's entry into politics. Frolicking with pandas and a knack for selfies have only deepened the younger Trudeau's appeal. As the new prime minister launches into his country's first official visit and state dinner in 19 years, here are some reasons why Canada is always in season -- even when it's underneath several feet of snow: A warm welcome Canadian radio DJ Rob Calabrese created the "Cape Breton If Trump Wins" site in late February as a joke. But a few weeks and more than 800,000 clicks later, he says that thousands of his U.S. neighbors are seriously considering a move to Canada if Donald Trump becomes president. Serene Canadian island courts Trump refugees It's actually much harder to immigrate to Canada than simply fleeing north in your packed Prius, but Trudeau has put out the welcome mat. "Cape Breton is lovely all times of the year," Trudeau said. "And if people do want to make choices that perhaps suit their lifestyles better, Canada is always welcoming." Creative exports While Canada has long provided Hollywood with a diverse collection of talent, there's a wide array to admire right now. Rachel McAdams was recently nominated for an Academy Award for her role in best-picture winner "Spotlight," Ryan Reynolds has gained a new following with "Deadpool," and Drake's "Hotline Bling" made a big splash in 2015. Ellen Page, Seth Rogan and television and movie star Michael J. Fox, whose foundation may help unlock the clues to a cure for Parkinson's disease, are also bringing Canada to Hollywood. And we always enjoy the work of that mighty fine Ryan Gosling. Gosling is always having a moment. The redheaded orphan who put Prince Edward Island on the map for young readers may be fictional, but the "Anne of Green Gables" series by Lucy Maude Montgomery has lured generations of tourists to the picturesque island. The author's birthplace is a museum, and the Green Gables Heritage Place features a house like the one Anne occupied. And yes, there are Anne tours. Natural beauty and cultural preservation Americans have the Colorado Rockies and the 59 parks of the National Park Service. But Canadians have incredible, wild protected nature as well. Ask a Canadian, and they'll tell you (politely) that they prefer the Canadian Rockies. We recommend starting with Banff National Park, Canada's oldest national park. For travelers looking for a bit of Old World charm, there's the lovely city of Montreal, where many residents don't mind if your French is terrible. Are you trying? That counts for something. Stay longer and learn how to speak the North American version of French, all the while reading all official government publications and commercial product labeling in both English and French. Bon voyage/enjoy your trip!

'Iconic' park will rise from former St-Michel dump Kevin Mio, Montreal Gazette More from Kevin Mio, Montreal Gazette Published on: August 28, 2015 | Last Updated: August 28, 2015 3:32 PM EDT What was once a quarry and garbage dump that has marred the city’s St-Michel district for decades will soon become one of Montreal’s — if not the world’s — most iconic parks, Mayor Denis Coderre said on Friday. The St-Michel Environmental Complex will be transformed into the city’s second-largest park, behind Mount Royal, beginning with several new sections that are to be opened to the public for the first time in 2017, in time for the city’s 375th birthday. The whole project is slated to be completed by 2023, Coderre said. “New York has its Central Park, Paris has its Luxembourg Gardens, London has its Hyde Park. If it is true that the major cities of the world can be recognized by their legendary green spaces, Montreal has certainly not been left out,” the mayor said as he made the announcement standing in front of what will become a 12.5 hectare wooded area and lookout in a few years. “We already have Mount Royal Park, our largest park, and in a few years we will soon have another equally iconic (park) right here,” he said. “This transformation represents one of the most ambitious environmental rehabilitation projects ever undertaken in an urban environment in North America,” Coderre said. “We are building a park out of a site that contains 40 million tonnes of garbage.” The cost of this phase of the project is $33.7 million, which the city is paying for from its capital works budget. The final price tag for the remainder of the work is not known. However, Coderre said whatever money is needed will be made available to complete the project. Once finished, the park will include thousands of trees, a lake, wooded areas, pathways, rest spots, an outdoor theatre and more. Anie Samson, the mayor of the Villeray — Saint-Michel — Park Extension borough and member of the executive committee, said the transformation shows that the impossible is possible. “Today is a big day for us and it is one more step forward toward the realization of our dreams (for St-Michel),” she said. “For the past 20 or 30 years, (residents) had a dump over there. Now it is going to be one of the biggest and nicest parks in the world,” Samson said. By 2017, just over 17 hectares of park space will be open to the public. In all, the park will occupy 153 hectares of the 192-hectare site. “A lot of people are talking about sustainable development, but what does it mean? I think we have a living proof here,” Coderre said. “We are providing today a new definition of how to revitalize an area. Frankly, at the end of the day … a lot of people are inspired by other cities. Trust me, this one will be an inspiration for the rest of the world.” Journalists were given a bus tour of the site Friday morning, which included a drive into the lowest point of the former quarry, which will eventually become the lake. It will be five times as big as Beaver Lake on Mount Royal. The lake will be filled with run-off water from the park and will be treated to make it safe to be used for boating and kayaking, but not for swimming. The second major project is a new entrance way to the park along Papineau Ave. that will include, among other things, a sliding area for winter activities, public spaces and areas where people can rest or play outdoor games such as Frisbee or flying kites. Two other sections already opened to the public will be reconfigured and new entrances constructed. There is already a pathway that rings the entire complex, but this is the first time the public will be allowed onto the landfill site. But how they will get to the park, near the corner of Papineau Ave. and Jarry St., is another question since public transit to the area is far from ideal. Coderre said they are working on a plan to address that issue. “We can have the nicest park, but it has to be accessible,” Coderre said. “We want Montrealers to be able to take advantage of the park so there will be an action plan for public transit, a mobility plan.” One challenge city officials face is how to camouflage the more than 500 wells that dot the site. They serve as monitoring stations for the biogas which is emitted by the buried garbage and the city must find a way to hide them while still allowing them to be accessible to workers for repairs. At the same time, they must prevent vandalism. The biogas is recovered and used as fuel on site by Gazmont, producing enough electricity for 2,000 homes. The company signed a new deal this year to recuperate the gas for 25 years once renovations are completed in 2016. The electricity is sold to Hydro-Québec, with the city getting 11.4 per cent of total sales per year. kmio@montrealgazette.com http://montrealgazette.com/news/local-news/iconic-park-will-rise-from-former-st-michel-dump

http://spacingmontreal.ca/2010/05/25/parc-lahaie-transformation-underway/ Résultat du parc Lahaie: C'est très laid ! deux tables dans le milieu, c'est le seul truc qu'ils ont trouvé à installer ? Je crois qu'il serait mieux de détruire la rue si ont veut vraiment la transformer en place publique. Je laisse Étienne vous présenter ses rendus qui sont extra !

City promises services for Montreal's homeless in remodelled parks MONTREAL, QUE.: APRIL 15, 2015 -- A view fence around the perimeter of Emile-Gamelin park, which is closed for renovations, in Montreal city hall in Montreal on Wednesday, April 15, 2015. (Dario Ayala / Montreal Gazette) Dario Ayala / Montreal Gazette With two months to go until Cabot Square is accessible again and the recent closing of Place Émilie-Gamelin, many of Montreal’s homeless have lost two main, relatively safe, gathering spots. But despite the upheaval, officials are promising that once reopened, the spaces will not exclude or forget the city’s most vulnerable citizens. Fences sprang up around Émilie-Gamelin park on April 7, and will remain in place until early May, when a large block party is expected to herald the park‘s rebirth as a concert venue, public garden, food court and outdoor beer garden. It’s a significant overhaul that could have a long-lasting impact on the people who live and work in the neighbourhood. That includes the homeless men and women who spend their days in the park, said Marie-Joëlle Corneau, spokesperson for the Quartier des spectacles Partnership — a not-for-profit organization that co-ordinates and manages many of Montreal’s best-known cultural offerings. Corneau promised that the new park will continue to welcome outreach workers. A food distribution point for those in need at the northern end of the park will not be moved either, she said. “We have noted over the years that in Émilie-Gamelin, and in la Place de la Paix, the homeless will stay around during outdoor performances and events,” Corneau told the Montreal Gazette in an email. “Many have told us that they appreciate the ambience that is created and the presence of other members of the public, which makes the spaces more secure — even for them.” It’s a hopeful message, but it might come as cold comfort to the people who have no roof over their heads and who rely on public parks and buildings during the day. Émilie-Gamelin is one of several spaces frequented by the homeless that has been closed off or forcibly emptied in recent months. In January, city crews dismantled a makeshift camp in Viger Square, using machinery to sweep up more than a dozen beds in the area. Cabot Square is also undergoing a major year-long renovation, and local advocacy groups have warned that its closure has displaced dozens of homeless aboriginals. “We have not noticed a huge impact yet (at Émilie-Gamelin), but I would suspect that our café that’s open during the day would be even busier now,” said Matthew Pearce, president and chief executive officer of the Old Brewery Mission, which is located just a few blocks away from the park. “It may become the kind of park where the homeless are feeling less able to stay. … I hope that those individuals will then understand that the Old Brewery Mission has open arms for them.” According to a spokesperson for the Ville-Marie borough, the city will have eight police cadets stationed in Place Émilie-Gamelin this summer who will help maintain order during public events, but they will not issue tickets to the homeless. As part of an overall intervention strategy in the park, the city has set aside $48,000 to help pay for two dedicated outreach workers through local organization Présence Compassion, along with another $8,000 to assist with needle cleanup. One of the outreach workers works year-round while the other is only employed for the summer, when traffic in the square is much greater. As for the notion of serving alcohol in a public park that has long been home to people with substance abuse issues, Pearce acknowledged that it may not seem like a great idea. “You know, my own take on that is that it won’t be pivotal because people who have substance abuse issues in Montreal, if they don’t go one place they can go to another,” he said. “The challenge is to increase the level of services for that population to help them better cope with dependencies.” Over in Cabot Square, the reopened space is expected to include a number of policing and cultural programming initiatives designed to better serve the homeless and those at risk. A café in the park’s gazebo will employ aboriginal people, and two outreach workers will be establishing a permanent office adjacent to the café. “I think we’re on track with everything,” said Rachel Deutsch, manager of the Cabot Square Project, an umbrella group helping to co-ordinate new programs and services in the park. “We’re looking at cohabitation and issues of safety for everyone. We’ve worked really closely with Ville-Marie borough and they have been very, very supportive.” While Cabot Square is closed (it is expected to reopen in July), the Old Brewery Mission has been shuttling people from that area to the mission’s facilities in the east end, and to other locations — all on the city’s dime. According to Pearce, “if the city wanted us to, we would do it for Viger Square and Émilie-Gamelin as well.” sent via Tapatalk

Via Irish America : The Point By John Kernaghan, Contributor December / January 2015 A view of Pointe St. Charles, "The Point" in the local anglophone vernacular. A visit to the McCord Museum helps uncover the history of two of Montreal’s historic Irish neighborhoods. In this tale of two Irish neighborhoods, leafy and modest Point St. Charles is in some ways unchanged from its heyday as a gritty Celtic enclave while just across the Lachine Canal, Griffintown bristles with cranes erecting a phalanx of condos from the ashes of factories and working-class residential blocks. What ties them forever is the canal, almost whimsically named after a time when many of Canada’s inland waters were probed as potential avenues to the Far East, or La Chine, China. It was the making of the Irish, and the death of some of them. The annual Christmas Bazaar at St. Gabriel’s Church. Katie Deegan is pictured on the left and her friend Pat Schell, with the red bow, is on the right. The Bazaar raised $15,000. The McCord Museum on the bucolic McGill University campus has a display of two pages of a canal pay ledger of 1822. Of the almost 50 entries, only one is French. There are Rileys, Kellys, and Cahills working for an average pay of 15 shillings for six days of work, many of them 10-hour shifts. The canal builders loved the Irish because they were strong and could work all day. The Lachine Canal they dug fostered an industrial boom as it bypassed rapids on the St. Lawrence River and provided inexpensive transport for factory goods. In 1848 it was enlarged, providing more work. According to the McCord Museum archives, Montreal grew by 54 per cent between 1852 and 1871 to 107,000 souls. Most of that growth was Irish immigration. But it was the Irish migration in 1847 and 1848 that is recalled darkly with the Immigrants Stone in Pointe St. Charles. It is erected at the foot of Victoria Bridge to mark the burial spot of 6,000 Irish who died of typhus during the famine immigration. Though many were passed as “seemingly well,” in official immigration parlance, at a quarantine station at Grosse Isle further north in the St. Lawrence, the stone’s inscription makes clear that the sickness ran wild on steamships bound for Montreal. The sick and dying overwhelmed health authorities as 20 hospital tents were erected near docks. Nuns, priests, doctors and the sitting mayor of Montreal also died as they sacrificed personal safety to minister to the wretched passengers. On the final Sunday each May, the modern Irish community gathers at St. Gabriel’s Catholic Church for the March to the Stone, a procession of a few miles that honors the dead at a grassy plot. The Stone, also known as the Black Rock, is a prodigious piece of work. Thirty tons of black granite dedicated in 1860, it now sits in a desolate area, but a recently formed group, the Montreal Irish Memorial Park Foundation, seeks support to create a new park at the Black Rock. A newspaper illustration from 1860 shows the laying of the Black Rock marking the graves of 6000 immigrants near Victoria Bridge. Image: Musée McCord. The Black Rock The Point and Griffintown were among Canada’s first bleak industrial areas with housing cheek-by-jowl with factories and rail yards.And that produced activists like Joe Beef, the publican who has a small park named after him in Point St. Charles. But Charles McKiernan, his square name, straddled both communities in Montreal’s Sud-Ouest borough. Still remembered in Restaurant Joe Beef on Notre-Dame West in Griffintown, “a drunken crawl from the historic Atwater Market,” its website notes, McKiernan was a working-class hero whose pub was the cultural center for a rollicking He printed this proclamation to the community, according to a McGill University publication: “He cares not for Pope, Priest, Parson, or King William of the Boyne; all Joe wants is the Coin. He trusts in God in summer time to keep him from all harm; when he sees the first frost and snow poor old Joe trusts to the Almighty Dollar and good old maple wood to keep his belly warm, for Churches, Chapels, Ranters, Preachers, Beechers and such stuff Montreal has already got enough.” The New York Times was not impressed, dismissing his tavern as a “den of filth.” Maybe that was because he had a menagerie of animals in house that included up to four bears, several monkeys and an alligator, noted the Quebec Anglophone Heritage Network. Its account added that one bear, Tom, was said to consume 20 pints of beer per day, seldom spilling a drop. Joe Beef claimed to refuse no one food and was a central figure in a strike by Lachine Canal workers in 1877. Charles “Joe Beef” McKiernan, a working class hero. In the case of Griffintown, the population fell to less than 1,000 in the 1960s, not enough to support St. Ann’s Church. It was razed and is now a park with benches arranged like a church setting. The Lachine Canal, which fell into disuse midway through the last century and was a dump for excavation material when building Expo ’67 and the 1976 Summer Olympics, is now reborn as a recreational route. Walkers and cyclists and kayakers enjoy the walkways and waters, many stopping at the aforementioned Atwater Market, which is hard by the canal and has an amazing array of food and produce from Quebec provisioners. Several of the clothing factories which once employed the Irish along both sides of the canal have been converted to fashionable condos, and the smart Hotel Alt has risen in the midst of the condo boom in Griffintown. Restaurants like Le Richmond on Rue Richmond now occupy former factory space offering starters like veal Carpaccio with a black pepper and fennel crust and mains like ballottine rabbit stuffed with black pudding. The elegant setting, northern Italian cuisine and professional service are a long haul from the mean meals immigrants once consumed here. For startling contrast, the Maison Saint Gabriel Museum and Historic Site in The Point showcases 17th century life in New France before the English, Scots and Irish arrived. It illustrates the progression of the homes and lands from school to farm and finally museum. But even it has an Irish touch – the magnificent grandmother clock crafted in 1763 in Quebec City by James Hanna. Time has changed much of this corner of Montreal, but the clock still ticks precisely. The times are tame now compared to then, and walks and bike rides around both communities show a much reduced Irish influence as the neighborhoods are gentrified.

Expos gone, baseball alive in Montreal Aspiring baseball players and history keep sport going By Stephen Ellsesser / Special to MLB.com MONTRÉAL -- On a Sunday morning, the corridor between Pie IX Station and Olympic Stadium is almost completely deserted. Based on some of the crowds that came out to the Big O in 2004, the final season for Major League Baseball in Quebec, it almost seems the Expos never left. After touring Olympic Stadium, it's almost as if they were never there. Montréal, the world's most truly bilingual city, is known for its tolerance, but Stade Olympique may have walked away from the Expo-dus with hard feelings. Baseball in Canada's Sin City existed long before the Expos became the Washington Nationals, and today it lives on in many different forms, some nearby and some farther away, but hardly any of it at Olympic. A catcher, a piece of meat and a glorified Muppet form an interesting picture of the ville's offerings to the sport. Catcher Russell Martin is bringing back Dodger Blue to Montréal, giving the city another Major Leaguer to support, along with Eric Gagne, who won a National League Cy Young Award with the Dodgers, but now comes out of the bullpen for the Red Sox. Both played for the same high school, and both are among the greatest offerings to come from Baseball Quebec's feeder system, which remains strong, according to Gilles Taillon, the group's administrative director. "The actual departure of the Expos had no impact whatsoever," Taillon said. "The major impact was in 1995-97, when the Expos got rid of a championship team. We experienced a decrease in our membership mainly due to the bad publicity that baseball was getting in the media." In 1994, the strike-suspended season clipped an Expos club that was cruising along, on pace to win 105 games. The ensuing firesale disenchanted the fan base. The team parted with Marquis Grissom, Larry Walker, Delino DeShields and John Wetteland after the year, and the foundation began to crumble. By the time the Expos rolled into their final season, Montréal had lost all momentum, not to mention a considerable amount of local interest. After the Expos' fate was sealed, there was no last-minute spike of support. For the opener of the final series at the Big O, a crowd of 3,923 watched the home team fall to the Florida Marlins. The worst part? That was only the fifth-smallest turnout of the year. Yikes. "You really can't blame them with some of the decisions that were made," said former third baseman Tim Wallach of the fans who stayed away. "When fans follow guys and they have no chance of staying when it's time for them to get paid, that turns people off." The Expos succumbed to a combination of economic factors, all of which, Wallach said, slowly took hold after original owner Charles Bronfman sold the team in 1991. "I feel bad because there were a lot of people who loved that team," said Wallach, who played for the Expos from 1980-92. "It was good, and it should have been good for a long time. But it went bad, and now it will never be there again." Martin remembers fondly the Expos and their days north of the border. "It was different for me because I loved baseball," he said. "I could care less how big the stadium was or how many fans were there, as long as I was at the stadium. I grew up going to that stadium and watching the Expos, so that was a big thing." Montréal, with a metro-area population of 3.6 million, is large enough to support an MLB club, but what the area baseball community is most focused on is starting smaller. "For MLB to come back, it would have to go through the Minor League route first," Taillon said. "At this point in time, efforts are being made to bring a Can-Am League team in." The Can-Am League is an independent league composed of eight U.S.- based teams, one road team and one Canadian club, based in provincial capital Québec City. "It would be nice to see baseball back up there, but they would have to give it a better venue, a smaller stadium and more fan-friendly activities," Martin said. As for the piece of meat, sometimes life is stranger than fiction. On eBay, someone (Cirque du Soleil's founder, interestingly enough) paid $2,605 Canadian for what was billed as "The Last Hot Dog of the Expos," which was -- as one might expect -- a hot dog, which was almost a month old at the time of sale. All of a sudden the $2,100 sale price of Montreal-Expos.com looks like a bargain. "It was different there because there wasn't that many fans that loved baseball," Martin said. "But those that did love baseball, they were always at the stadium." Indeed. Nothing says loving quite like a thousand-dollar piece of processed meat. But the apocalypse is not upon us yet ... proceeds went to charity. Ignoring any discussions of shelf life, the Expo with the most staying power has been mascot Youppi!, who joined the rotation at Bell Centre, home of the Canadiens, Montréal's hallowed NHL franchise. Youppi! hit the ice just more than a year after his team's departure put him out of work. His presence, along with that of a banner honoring the Expos' 1969-2004 existence and the team's retired numbers, makes Nos Amours more visible there than at the Big O. The luxury condos that stand where Labatt Park -- the proposed downtown stadium that would have helped the franchise stay put -- would have been built are only a couple blocks away from Bell Centre, so it almost makes sense for it to feel closer to home. Where the sport thrives, however, is in Baseball Québec's tight infrastructure. The organization emphasizes getting kids involved early through two main programs, Rally Cap and Winterball, which is sponsored by MLB. In Rally Cap, players ages 4-7 are taught skills and techniques, being evaluated as they meet different performance targets. With each level advanced, they get a new hat of a different color. "Winterball," Taillon said, "is designed to provide gym teachers with plans to initiate students in grades 3, 4 and 5 to baseball." Prospective players are evaluated for Baseball Québec's high-performance leagues between ages 14 and 15. From there, it is Midget AAA and the Ailes du Québec program, the province's U17 team. Those who continue play in the ABC program in the fall and winter and the Elite League in the summer. Players at this level are at the top of their game, and many are either drafted or signed to play college baseball in the United States. Martin and Gagné are veterans of the ABC program. One player hoping to follow in their footsteps is James Lavinskas, a 20-year-old third baseman for the Montréal Elites, one of the only shows in town for baseball fans. A three-sport star in football, baseball and hockey at a Connecticut prep school, Lavinskas came up through the Elite League's feeder programs, and now he is heading to the United States for college ball. Lavinskas will play for Seminole State College in Oklahoma, following once again in Gagné's footsteps. "Guys are getting drafted every year," Lavinskas said, summing up his hopes after moving on from the Elite League. With Baseball Québec's work, the sport's foundation in Montréal is stabilizing, with or without Olympic Stadium's help. Aside from a single postcard and one or two minutes of a 30-minute tour, baseball's only other fingerprint on the facility stands right out front, a statue of Jackie Robinson. After signing Robinson, Branch Rickey sent him to Triple-A Montréal. On the road, Robinson was jeered just as he would be when he was promoted, but in Montréal, fans loved their star second baseman. Robinson batted .349 with the Triple-A Royals that season, leading the team to a 100-win season. During Robinson's final game with the team, fans gave him a standing ovation, and a second curtain call, amazing support for a black athlete in 1946. "The fans just chased him after the game because they loved him and didn't want him to go," Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame president and CEO Tom Valcke said. "Rachel Robinson once said, 'That must have been one of the first times a white mob was chasing a black man for a good reason.' Don't tell me Montréal has bad baseball fans. They've always been great." Even if baseball did not live on at Olympic Stadium, at least baseball left a marker of tolerance in its place, and that is worth more than a hall of jerseys and signed balls. Stephen Ellsesser is a contributor to MLB.com. Associate reporter Jayson Addcox contributed to this report. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs. A ballpark that never was MONTREAL -- Labatt Park has had two deaths -- not bad for something that never actually existed. Condos now stand where the downtown park would have been built, and after the project was canned, the model of the park was passed to the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum. On one truly unlucky night in the Hall's archives, the model also met its destruction. "They just destroyed it, the two very troubled young men," said president and CEO Tom Valcke, recalling a day he said literally brought tears to his eyes. "It could have been a stagecoach or an old ping-pong table, but they wanted to destroy whatever got in their way that night." The 12-by-12 model, too large to be a regular fixture at the St. Marys, Ontario, museum, was in storage. Although a smaller Labatt Park model exists, the larger one (valued at $80,000 Canadian) was a sight to behold. "It was something -- one of the showstoppers in our collection," said Tom Valcke, director and CEO of the Hall. "I've never seen anything else like it, nothing before and nothing since. The detail -- individual seats, trees, all the concession stands -- it was beautiful." The model made an initial showing at the Hall, then Valcke put it away until a proper space could be created for it. Less than a month after the Expos franchise began its new life at RFK Stadium, two teenagers broke into the building where the model was kept and destroyed it, adding a bizarre and somewhat ironic twist to the life of the park that never was and never would be. Valcke said the Hall kept the pieces and that it could be reassembled, but that the task would be daunting and that it would be difficult to recapture the piece's original majesty. "We kept every single splinter of it," he said. -- Stephen Ellsesser

Voici un projet fort intéressant... qui pourrait peut-être s'appliquer pour notre fleuve. Vous savez, il y a deux options pour le l'environnement et le design : High design/Low tech Vs. Low Design/High tech.... je prèfère de loin la première! Oyster-tecture: Scape Studio Plans to Build a Park Filled with Millions of Oysters to Clean the Gowanus Canal NYC has some great oyster bars, but its most in-demand shellfish yet may soon be coming to the Gowanus Canal instead of to your favorite seafood restaurant. Scape Studio has received funding for its ambitious Oyster-tecture project – an oyster park for millions of mollusks at the mouth of Brooklyn’s Gowanus Canal. Oysters have the unique ability to ‘eat’ toxins and dirt, so the new park could be just the way to clean up what is currently one of the nation’s most polluted waterways. “We propose to nurture an active oyster culture that engages issues of water quality, rising tides, and community based development around Brooklyn’s Red Hook and Gowanus Canal,” explains Kate Orff of Scape Architecture on their website. ”An armature for the growth of native oysters and marine life is designed for the shallow waters of the Bay Ridge Flats just south of Red Hook. This living reef is constructed from a field of piles and a woven web of “fuzzy rope” that supports oyster growth and builds a rich three-dimensional landscape mosaic. A watery regional park for the New York Harbor emerges that prefigures the city’s return to the waterfront in the next century. The reef attenuates waves and cleans millions of gallons of Harbor water through harnessing the biotic processes of oysters, mussels and eelgrass, and enables neighborhood fabrics that welcome the water to develop further inland.” This ‘oyster-tecture’ has been described as a 21st-century approach to creating new waterfront infrastructures where long-gone shellfish can be brought back. Construction has already begun on the new pier area that is to host Orff’s reef. In fact, oysters are one of nature’s best cleaners as they have the ability to filter 50 gallons of water a day! Oysters were once plentiful in the waters around New York, but died out by the turn of the 19th century due to industrial waste, sewage, diseases and the dredging of the harbor to make room for shipping and development. Now, marine scientists believe that new beds of oysters could break down pollution in areas where the water temperature, currents, chemistry and other conditions are right. Of course, due to their ‘cleaning’ of toxins, these oysters will never be eaten and any poachers aiming to harvest them for profit will be prosecuted. http://inhabitat.com/nyc/oyster-tecture-scape-studio-plans-to-build-a-park-filled-with-millions-of-oysters-to-clean-the-gowanus-canal/

By Eric Moskowitz | GLOBE STAFF MAY 19, 2013 The city’s on-street bike lanes are marvels to US visitors. We had pedaled half a block from the vibrant Jeanne-Mance Park, past tennis matches, a youth league football game, and the filming of a music video, when it dawned on me: We were biking in one direction, and the cars were pointed in another. But this was no rogue move by our tour guide, leading us the wrong way down a one-way street. Pavement markings invited it. Stopping ahead, guide Martin Coutu pointed out a defining feature of the city’s residential neighborhoods: the cast-iron outdoor staircases leading to the upper floors of thousands of two- and three-story walkups, allowing the homes to achieve a gracious sidewalk setback without ceding interior space for shared entries and stairwells. Still, I couldn’t help marveling over that bike lane, beckoning two-way cycling down an otherwise one-way street. I could picture just a single block like it in Cambridge and none in Boston. But as we followed Coutu along Fitz & Follwell Co.’s ’Hoods and Hidden Gems tour, it became clear that, in Montreal, it was one of many. Coursing through the city, we followed all manner of on-street bike lanes — plain old painted lanes, two-way lanes, lanes protected from traffic by plastic rods or concrete curbs — and off-street bike paths. We even saw some bicycle-specific traffic lights. Painted markings guided us through intersections, and signs told drivers to give us the right of way. More remarkably, they obeyed. Related If you go biking in Montreal... On that four-hour tour, and again riding around the city on the bike-sharing network known as Bixi, no one honked at us, not even once. It was liberating, allowing us to follow Coutu — a cheerful character with the whippet build of a bike messenger, unafraid to give a playful squeeze to the bulbous retro horn affixed to his handlebars — without any white-knuckled worry about staying alive. “The majority of our customers are American,” Shea Mayer, Fitz & Follwell’s founder, told me later, “and they all say, ‘It’s unbelievable. I live in Boston, I live in New York’ — or California, or wherever it is — ‘and not only can I not believe the amount of lanes you have, but I can’t believe we haven’t been run off the road yet.’ ” And there was plenty to see following those bike lanes, on a tour inspired by Mayer’s idea of a perfect day off in Montreal, often ranked as the most bike-friendly city in North America. Riding a stylish set of Dutch-inspired upright bikes, we weaved through the colorful neighborhoods that fan out to the east and northeast of the verdant peak known as Mont Royal, including Mile-End, Outremont, and Petite Italie. We stopped to sample wood-fired, sesame seed-covered bagels on Rue Saint-Viateur; sip exquisitely prepared cappuccino at Café Olimpico; and explore the open-air stalls of the Jean-Talon Market, the larger, locally minded cousin to the tourist-choked Atwater Market on the waterfront. Mayer started Fitz & Follwell as a one-man outfit in 2009, soon growing it into an eight-guide business and a boutique in the hip neighborhood known as The Plateau, where he rents and sells bikes and offers locally made, bike-friendly products such as a leather crossbar holster for wine bottles. The outings now include a food tour by foot and winter toboggan and snowshoe expeditions in the city’s famed parks, but the bread and butter is still the April through October bike tour. It is designed not as a stop-and-go sightseeing tour that happens to be by bicycle, but a two-wheeled immersion in, and celebration of, a place with a deeply ingrained bike culture. Having written about Boston’s push under Mayor Thomas M. Menino to end its status as the scourge of the biking world, starting from zero to add 60 miles of bike lanes, and launching the Hubway bike-share network, I was aware of the basic facts about Montreal. It boasts hundreds of miles of bike lanes, and its Bixi system, with more than 400 stations and 5,100 bikes, is four times as extensive as Hubway. But the numbers tell only part of it. This is a rare city beyond Europe where bicycling is not just a form of daring recreation or reluctant transportation but an essential, accepted part of everyday life. It is the way urbanites get to the pub, the park, the office, the grocery store. I saw bikes as fashion statements and bikes outnumbering cars, three or four fastened to every parking-meter post on the bar-, cafe-, and boutique-laden Saint-Laurent and Saint-Denis avenues. Not that I had come to Montreal intent on geeking out on the bike infrastructure and scene. My girlfriend, Hannah, and I had been drawn by the city’s traditional allures: food, culture, architectural charm, and proximity to Boston. Before we went, Hannah made a Facebook appeal for suggestions, and a friend in New York quickly responded, declaring Fitz & Follwell “the best thing I’ve ever done as a tourist” — anywhere. A Google search yielded similar superlatives on TripAdvisor, where the company holds the top ranking among all manner of Montreal tour providers, so we booked. What distinguishes Fitz & Follwell was never clearer than at the end of the tour, after we had admired more outdoor staircases and followed Coutu through a world tourists rarely see: the intricate network of back alleys that were once the unremarkable setting for so many anonymous coal deliveries and trash collections, but that have been enlivened recently with lush gardens, ivy-draped terraces, and candy-colored murals. Winding down, we ducked into a boulangerie and pedaled behind Coutu to Parc La Fontaine, where he laid a blanket on a rare stretch of unoccupied grass and we sat down to a spread of ripe strawberries and cherry tomatoes from Jean-Talon Market, made-to-order sandwiches from the boulangerie, and ice-cold craft beers. As we sipped, ate, and laughed, another group biked into view on the far side of the lawn, gathering around a leader. Not only were they not enjoying a picnic, but they were clad in matching fluorescent vests, like members of a prison road crew. “That’s the other bike tour,” Coutu said, grinning impishly. “They’re people who get lost easily.” Watching them, it was easy to forget we weren’t locals ourselves — or, at least, visitors being shown around by a savvy friend. When we got back to the shop, we lingered, reluctant to let go of the leather grips on those Dutch-inspired bikes. So we did the next best thing, renting Bixis to explore places suggested by Coutu as we had buzzed by — only so many eating stops can be squeezed into one tour. Undaunted by intermittent rain, we rode in the evening along part of the Canal-de-Lachine, a 35-year-old bike path that traces a canal abandoned after the 1959 opening of a shipping channel in the mighty St. Lawrence River, and followed another bike path along part of the city’s active industrial port and over the low-slung Pont de la Concorde bridge, reaching Île Sainte-Hélène, the leafy epicenter of Expo ’67, still anchored by the Biosphere and an amusement park. Darkness settling in, we followed a path to the other side of the island and found a trail leading to the Jacques Cartier Bridge, an 11,000-foot steel truss span that rises 162 feet above the St. Lawrence, similar in size and design to Boston’s Tobin Bridge. However crazy the idea of biking the Tobin might sound, here we found an inviting bike lane — and an exhilarating one, high above the jet-black water — running along one side of the Cartier, protected from traffic. Pedaling back to downtown, I thought about something Coutu had said: Montreal wasn’t always so bike-friendly, it just had an earlier start. I considered Boston, where bicycle counts are rising, and new lanes, albeit unprotected ones, are striped every year. As the city lights came closer, I realized I wasn’t just pedaling toward the most bikeable city on the continent. I was seeing a vision of Boston’s future. http://www.bostonglobe.com/lifestyle/travel/2013/05/18/bike-tour-montreal/Q7r2F3g6TIuwiiITu0ypGL/story.html

Source: Houzz (Le copier-Coller est tellement long, ça ne me tente pas de l'éditer, allez voir l'article pour une lecture plus facile) Residents of Montreal didn't UNESCO's crowning it the City of Design in 2006 to reaffirm their love affair with their city. Referred to as Canada's cultural capital, Montreal can claim bragging rights to a summer full of international festivals along with world-renowned architecture and stylish bars and restaurants. As you read through this guide, put together by myself and fellow Montreal native Laura Garner, visualize yourself admiring the unique art installations of each metro station, walking through more than 32 kilometers (20 miles) of tunnels in the Underground City or riding in a horse-drawn carriage through the cobblestone streets in the very European area of Old Montreal. No matter how you choose to get somewhere in the city, Montreal always has a way of surprising you along the way. More city guides for design junkies This view of the St. Lawrence river shows off the beauty of the Montreal skyline at night and includes the Bell Center (where the Montreal Canadiens play hockey). This photo was taken from one of the bridges that connects Cité du Havre (a strip of land where the Habitat 67 community is located; see below) to the Île Sainte-Hélène, which houses La Ronde amusement park and is home to the popular indie music festival Osheaga and the Formula 1 racetrack. A couple notes on the information that follows: We have included the nearest metro stop and have highlighted design destinations by neighborhood. Must-Sees Mount Royal Park: A 200-hectare (about 500-acre) park in the heart of the city Location: From Côte-de-Neiges Road to Park Avenue, between avenue des Pins and Voie Camillien Houde (metro: Mont-Royal) Noteworthy: Lookout points throughout the park offer the best views of the city, day or night. Designed by Frederick Law Olmsted (the designer of New York's iconic Central Park), Mount Royal is a year-round congregating spot for residents and tourists alike. Summertime brings long walks around the pond and picnics under the trees, while winter offers ice skating. If you're in Montreal on a Sunday in the summertime, head to the Sir George-Étienne Cartier monument to see the free, unofficial event known as the Tam-Tams, where hundreds of people gather to drum and dance under the sun. by Laura Garner » Habitat 67: A stunning 12-story apartment complex designed by architect Moshe Safdie Location: 2600 avenue Pierre-Dupuy (near the casino) Noteworthy: The apartments are designed with lots of privacy, terrace gardens and multiple levels that face the St. Lawrence river. Designed in 1967 by Montreal architect Moshe Safdie for his master thesis, and debuting at the Expo 67 world's fair, the revolutionary 146-residence housing complex places single-family dwellings in an urban environment. More info: Habitat 67 by Laura Garner » Palais de Congres: Montreal's convention center Location: 159 rue St. Antoine West (metro: Place-D'Armes) Noteworthy: Located between the downtown core and Old Montreal, the Palais features 113 rooms and venues. Its multicolored glass facade is made up of 332 colored glass panels and 58 transparent panels. More info: Palais de Congress by Laura Garner » Grande Bibliothèque: Montreal's largest public library Location: 475 boulevard de Maisonneuve East (metro: Berri-UQAM) Noteworthy: Built in 2005 and located in the bustling Latin Quarter downtown, with direct access to the metro and Underground City, this contemporary six-story building has large horizontal plates of glass running along the complete exterior. The space includes an exhibition hall, a theater and a complete floor for children as well as top-of-the line audiovisual equipment. More info: Grande Bibliothèque by Laura Garner » Notre Dame Basilica: Centuries-old basilica Location: 110 Notre-Dame Street West, corner of Saint Sulpice Street (metro: Place D'Armes) Cost: $5 Canadian (about U.S.$5) for adults; $4 for ages 7 to 17; free for children 6 and under Noteworthy: Its opulent and colorful interior hosts about 100 weddings each year, with Celine Dion being among those who have tied the knot here. This is a beautiful example of the Gothic revival style of architecture; it was the first of its kind to be built in Canada. The basilica displays stained glass windows that feature the history of religion in Montreal, which is not typically done. More info: Notre Dame Basilica by Esther Hershcovich » Must-Eats Le Confessionnal: Trendy bar Location: 431 rue McGill in Old Montreal (metro: Square Victoria) Cost: From $9 Canadian (about U.S.$9) per cocktail Noteworthy: Seductive red decor and dim lighting from chandeliers make for a moody atmosphere After a few drinks, Old Montreal doesn't disappoint for foodies. The area is a design lover's paradise. Try the three-course lunch menu for $28 Canadian within the black-painted walls of the popular Les 400 Coups (400 Notre Dame Est). If you're lucky enough to get a reservation, make sure to eat dinner at Garde Manger (408 rue St. François Xavier), owned by celebrity chef Chuck Hughes. Besides bar Le Confessionnal, try an after-dinner drink at the Philemon Bar (111 rue St. Paul Ouest), known for its laid-back yet trendy ambience. Don't forget to admire its decor, done by Montreal interior designer Zébulon Perron. More info: Le Confessional, Les 400 Coups, Garde Manger, Philemon Bar by Amielle Clouatre » Bar Pullman: Upscale bar Location: 3424 avenue du Parc, corner of Sherbrooke downtown (metro: Place des Arts) Cost: From $4.50 Canadian for a 2-ounce glass of wine to $5 Canadian for tapas Noteworthy: Upscale yet understated ambience This wine bar is something of a hidden gem in the downtown core of Montreal, offering wine samplers and delicious tapas to accompany them (try the foie gras). If you want a casual meal, check out Lola Rosa (545 rue Milton), a cozy vegetarian eatery in the McGill ghetto that is very popular with university students. Across the city are several locations of the crisp white tea shops called David's Tea, recently lauded by Oprah. Be sure to smell them all. More info: Pullman, Lola Rosa, David's Tea by Laura Garner » L'Ambroisie: A popular French restaurant Location: 4020 St. Ambroise, in the historic Chateau St.-Ambroise, Little Burgundy and St. Henri (Sud-Ouest) neighborhood (metro: Place St. Henri) Cost: From $19 Canadian for a table d'hôte dinner Noteworthy: The hallway of the building leading to the entrance displays quirky antique items such as suits of armor and a circus caravan. Housed in the Chateau St.-Ambroise along the Lachine Canal, this charming restaurant displays an eclectic mix of industrial architectural elements combined with Greco-Roman features. Offering French cuisine, this restaurant is something you have to try at least once. Other noteworthy suggestions for a gourmet meal in the neighboring areas of Montreal include Joe Beef and Tuck Shop — make sure to make a reservation. If you're in the mood for a picnic, be sure to stop by the Atwater Market farmer's market to pick up fresh fruits, meats and cheeses. More info: L'Ambroisie, Joe Beef, Tuck Shop, Atwater Market by Esther Hershcovich » Baldwin Barmacie: A design-minded bar Location: 115 avenue Laurier Ouest in Plateau and Mile End (metro: Laurier) Cost: Drinks start at $7 Canadian Noteworthy: The design evokes a contemporary pharmacy theme. If you want to feel transported back to the Mad Men era, the decor and drink list at Baldwin Barmacie are sure to please. Midcentury modern decor gets an update with neutral colors and clean lines. If you're a fan of cocktails, a must-try is the hip bar Distillerie (with three locations in central Montreal). The biggest hit? Delicious and creative cocktails presented in mason jars. If you're on the hunt for a breakfast spot in the Plateau, look no farther than Resto Fabergé, a breakfast place with a lounge atmosphere. The interior design, done by the architects at laroche et gagné, is bright and fun and worth a look. Try the breakfast poutine. More info: Baldwin Barmacie, La Distillerie, Resto Fabergé by Les Enfants Terribles Brasserie » Les Enfants Terribles: Restaurant and bar Location: 1257 Bernard Ouest in Mile End/Outremont Cost: Cocktails start at $10 Canadian, tartare plates start at $14 Canadian Noteworthy: Rustic wood, chalkboards and murals all add charm to this brasseries and its terrace, designed by architect Louis-Joseph Papineau. If you're up for rich French pastries, a walk up the block will take you to Boulangerie Cheskie. On the must-try list is the chocolate babka. St.-Viateur Bagel is another classic stop in the area. Open 24/7, this legendary shop has been mentioned in various books and films. More info: Les Enfants Terribles, St.-Viateur Bagel Must-Dos Place des Arts: A performing arts center Location: 175 rue St. Catherine Ouest (metro: Place des Arts) Noteworthy: The center holds festivals throughout the year, including the Jazz Festival, Just for Laughs and Montreal's Nuit Blanche. Want to see Marie-Antoinette performed by les Grands Ballets Canadiennes? Head to one of Place des Arts' 10 halls. The Symphony Hall, with an interior made almost completely of light beech, is the most recent addition to the complex. A metro ride away, on St. Laurent, is the Society for Arts and Technology (SAT), a nonprofit center featuring cutting-edge audiovisual experiences for everyone. More info: Place des Arts, SAT by Laura Garner » Canadian Center for Architecture Location: 1920 rue Baile, downtown (Rene-Levesque Boulevard and rue Saint Marc), (metro: Georges Vanier) Cost: $10 Canadian for adults; $7 Canadian for seniors; free for students and children; free for all on Thursday evenings Noteworthy: The Canadian Center for Architecture (CCA) was built in 1979 with the goal of raising awareness of the role of architecture in society. Across the street you can find the CCA Garden, a public sculpture installation by Montreal architect Melvin Charney. More info: Canadian Center for Architecture by Esther Hershcovich » Architectural Bike Tour: A guided four-hour adventure through the streets of Old Montreal Location: 27 rue de la Commune Est (metro: Champ de Mars) Cost: Rentals starting at $6.50 Canadian Noteworthy: You can also see it on your own by downloading the Architecture Walking Tour app. Relax after a long day of exploring at Spa Bota Bota, a serene five-deck boat anchored on the St. Lawrence river. More info: Architectural Bike Tour, Spa Bota Bota by Esther Hershcovich » Must-Stays Hotel Gault Location: 449 rue St. Helene (metro: Square Victoria) Cost: From $178 Canadian Noteworthy: Minimalistic design contrasted by large French windows on a corner located steps away from the downtown area. This luxurious 1871 hotel has 30 suites and a restaurant. Spend some quiet time in its library, complete with a warm fireplace for the cold nights. More info: Hotel Gault by Laura Garner » LHotel Location: 262 St. Jacques West in Old Montreal (metro: Square Victoria) Cost: From $135 Canadian Noteworthy: The collection of artwork on display is fit for a museum. This boutique hotel is in the heart of Old Montreal. Owned by Georges Marciano of clothing brand Guess, the LHotel has become the permanent home for Marciano's extensive personal pop art collection, including works by Andy Warhol, Roy Lichtenstein and Damien Hirst. More info: LHotel by Hotel St. Paul » Hôtel St. Paul Location: 355 McGill Street in Old Montreal (metro: Square Victoria) Cost: From $195 Canadian Noteworthy: This was Old Montreal's first boutique hotel. Using the four elements of fire, ice, earth and ocean as inspiration, this Old Montreal boutique hotel has a monochromatic color palette and natural textures that give the decor a soft, ethereal feeling. More info: Hôtel St. Paul by Laura Garner » Loft Hotel Location: 334-336 Terasse St. Denis in the Plateau (metro: Sherbrooke) Cost: From $125 Canadian Noteworthy: The building was once used as storage space for Canadian Armed Forces tanks. Completed in 1920 by prominent Montreal architect Ernest Cormier, the building that houses the Loft Hotel is one of Montreal's enduring art deco landmarks. The building was recently converted into loft-style hotel rooms, which are as spacious as they are trendy. More info: Loft Hotel by Esther Hershcovich » Must-Visit Shops Les Touilleurs: Cooking supply store Location: 152 avenue Laurier Ouest in the Mile End (metro: Laurier) Noteworthy: Pick up a free recipe-of-the-week card. The large, open chalet-style kitchen is where you'll find the top cooking supplies for your culinary needs. It was designed by architect Luce Lafontaine with large, open cabinetry to make you feel at home. Classes are offered onsite three nights a week by local chefs. A walk around the corner will take you to Jamais Assez, where you'll find a large selection of locally made furniture and creative accessories. Le Boutique Artisanal Une Monde is a warehouse on a side street that carries a selection of Asian-inspired and restored furniture at affordable prices. If you want to scout for some more boho home accents, Buk&Nola will have what you're looking for. This shop is known for its casual chic decor. The owners offer a decorating service as well. More info: Les Touilleurs, Jamais Assez, Buk&Nola by Esther Hershcovich » L'Affichiste: Vintage poster gallery Location: 471 rue Saint François Xavier in Old Montreal (metro: Place D'armes) Noteworthy: The largest collection of original vintage posters in Montreal is housed in this gallery, attached by underground tunnels to the Notre Dame Basilica. A storage room is housed in a walk-in vault. If you're still looking for that perfect piece of art, take a walk down to La Rue des Artistes. It might be where you'll find that coup de coeur, French for "favorite find." Keep walking and you'll arrive at the large indoor Marché Bonsecours market, where local artisans sell everything from furniture to clothing and unique umbrellas. More info: L'Affichiste, Marché Bonsecours by Esther Hershcovich » Style Labo: Shop selling vintage and new items Location: 5765 St. Laurent Blvd in Plateau/Mile End (metro: Rosemont) Noteworthy: The antique lights collection If you're looking for a large collection of industrial-style vintage and new items, this is the place to visit. The store's decor transports you to a different time. If you're looking for a design experience, Les Commissaires doubles as a gallery and boutique, selling bold designer pieces from around the world. It is constantly restocked with a mix of innovative, sometimes provocative items attesting to the city's flair for the mix offered in its design. Monastiraki is another vintage shop; it also serves as a community art center. Search through its cabinets for vintage and locally made prints. More info: Style Labo, Les Commissaires, Monastiraki by Surface Jalouse » Surface Jalouse: Print shop Location: 2672 rue Notre-Dame West in Little Burgundy (metro: Lionel Groulx) Noteworthy: Surface Jalouse is able to print images (the shop's or your own) onto virtually any surface — including furniture. Part furniture store and part studio, this boutique offers funky and highly unique home decor items. While you're on Notre Dame street, head west to explore the strip of antiques stores and curiosity shops. More info: Surface Jalouse by Esther Gibbons » Hidden Gems Gibeau Orange Julep: Landmark and fast-food restaurant Location: 7700 Decarie Boulevard (metro: Namur) Noteworthy: On Wednesday nights during the summer, the lot fills with classic vintage cars and motorbike enthusiasts. Since the 1960s the Julep has been one of the city's most recognizable landmarks, with its distinct fiberglass orange shape and colored party flags hanging off the side. Roller skating waitresses originally brought food to the cars, but they have been replaced by a top fast-food service. The Gibeau Orange Julep (an orange drink), offered when the shop opened in 1932, is still what attracts most customers. More info: Gibeau Orange Julep Réne Lévesque Park: Sculpture park Location: 1 chemin de Musee, (metro: Angrignon) Noteworthy: Admire 22 monumental sculptures at this park, located off the Lachine Canal bike path and offering panoramic views of the Saint Lawrence and Saint Louis rivers. Enjoy a picnic with your family, rent a kayak or enjoy the open and green 4 kilometers of walking trails. More info: Parc René-Lévesque by Esther Hershcovich » Spazio: Antiques shop Location: 8405 boulevard St. Laurent (metro: Jarry) Noteworthy: Architectural detailing from various time periods can be easily found in this two-story shop that was once a well-known tavern. It's divided into neat sections, so you can discover a room filled with antique doors or sections for stained glass windows, vintage handles or knobs. The owner is continually expanding as the collection grows. More info: Spazio Tell us: What are your favorite places for soaking up design in Montreal?

I contributed this so I reserve the right to delete it. Signed, MTLskyline

MONTREAL - When James Essaris looks out over his flat concrete kingdom of 20 downtown parking lots that he started collecting in 1956, he sees a precious urban resource where others see ugliness. The much-maligned parking lot, long considered an urban eyesore and enemy of public transit, is becoming an increasingly rare feature on the downtown streetscape. Essaris, longtime owner of Stationnement Métropolitain, sees his barren concrete as more than just a chance for him to pocket some cash on the barrelhead: he believes in the good that parking lots do and considers the spaces to be the lungs of downtown commerce. “The City of Montreal should give free parking to come downtown. We’re chasing people out to the shopping centres,” he said. The new parking lot tax was adopted in 2010 and brings in $19 million a year to fund public transit. The tax is determined by a complicated formula that Essaris says in practice makes city taxes about twice as expensive on a surface lot as it would for another type of structure. The city held public hearings on the issue this spring and response to the surface parking eradication campaign — through the new parking tax and allowing larger-scale buildings on the empty lots — was greeted positively, according to City of Montreal Executive Committee member Alan DeSousa. “It brings more money into the city coffers and removes the scars in the downtown area,” he said. He said that some of lost parking spaces have been replaced by indoor parking in the various projects. But after seeing his taxes double in recent years, Essaris is now doing what many other parking-lot owners have done: He has started sacrificing his supply of parking spaces for housing, most recently building a 38-storey Icône condo tower at de la Montagne St. and René Lévesque Blvd. He has some misgivings, however, knowing that those spots will be sorely missed. “We cannot survive without parking in the city. I wish everybody could take the bus and métro, it’d make things easier, but you cannot force people onto the métro when they have a car,” he said. Urban retailers have long begged their merchants associations to create more places to park, perhaps no more than on the Main where about half of all members regularly plead for more parking, according to Bruno Ricciardi-Rigault, president of the SDBSL. “It would be really nice if we had a few more parking lots,” he said. However, the dearth of spaces is only going to intensify as the few remaining parking lots near St. Laurent Blvd. are slated to be redeveloped. Ricciardi-Rigault is bracing for more complaints from restauranteurs who have lost customers because their motorist clientele was fed up with circling the block. “Some people want to spend the whole afternoon, shop, go to Jeanne Mance Park, come back for a beer. Paying $20 to park on the street, that‘s asking a lot,” he said. Condo towers have been replacing lots in the downtown core at an impressive pace and the result is higher prices at indoor garages, reflected in a recent Colliers study that ranks Montreal as having the second-highest parking prices of any big Canadian city. Rates have risen an eye-opening 11 per cent since last year, as the average monthly price for an unreserved spot in a downtown underground commercial lot was $330.96 — $88 above the national average. The proliferation of private parking lots once inspired many to liken Montreal to a bombed-out city, but that is no longer the case. “We were spoiled by having tons of parking lots, now Montrealers will have to get used to much higher parking costs,” said Colliers representative Andrew Maravita. He credits a lower commercial vacancy rate for pushing prices higher. Up until the 1960s, Montreal tacitly allowed even historic buildings to be demolished and replaced by parking lots and until recently turned a blind eye to the countless rogue illegal lots that dotted the downtown core. For ages, Montreal surface parking lots were fly-by-night operations, changing ownership to avoid bylaw restrictions ordering them to be paved, landscaped. The city always said they couldn’t chase every owner down. But in recent years, authorities have increased taxes and cracked down on illegal lots, combining the stick of punishment with the carrot of juicy rezoning booty. In the past, many property owners failed to see the point of building on their parking lots, as the zoning frequently only allowed for small buildings. Those restrictions have been lifted on many of those properties, resulting in a bonanza for parking-lot owners whose land increased in value. The strategy was put into place with input from architect and former Equality Party leader Robert Libman, who previously served on the city’s Executive Committee. “A lot of projects going on now, on streets like Crescent and Bishop and that area, were previously zoned for two or three storeys. The urban plan capped those at a minimal height. The rezoning has made it more alluring for owners to build instead of leaving it vacant,” he says. Libman’s war against above-ground parking lots is personal. “They’re ugly and they undermine the downtown urban fabric,” Libman said. But he concedes that commerce relies on people being able to drive to a business. “You’ve got to find that careful balance between offering too much parking, making it too easy vs. your objective of discouraging people to take their car downtown and using public transit, that’s the fine line you have to find between the two,” he said. Developers are required to include parking in new projects, but the amount varies from place to place. In Laval, many projects are required to have two parking spaces per condo unit, while in the Plateau it’s close to zero spaces, although a typical recipe calls for one spot per two units. The one part of the city perhaps most challenged by a dearth of parking facilities is the booming Old Montreal area. The issue has long been considered such an urgent problem that one proposal from a decade ago even suggested that the massive silos in the Old Port be used to park cars. More recently, Old Montreal planners have installed an electronic billboard indicating where spaces could be found, but the pressure on parking endures, according to Georges Coulombe, whose real-estate company has been snapping up properties in the area for the last four decades. Coulombe concedes that area commerce has been hurt by a lack of space for cars. “People from places like Longueuil want to come shop on the weekend, but they can’t do it anymore, it’s too expensive to park, they end up going to malls closer to home.” He attempted to address the problem through a plan to build a high-tech robotic parking facility that could accommodate twice as many cars as a regular indoor lot. However, he did the math and found that it wouldn’t make sense because of city taxes. “I had a small 3,000-foot terrain that I would have turned into 300 spaces, but the city wanted to tax not just the building but the machinery inside. It made it impossible.” Much-hyped futuristic robotic parking systems are seen by some as a potential solution to parking woes and have actually been around for quite some time. The city has had at least three pigeon-hole parking systems as the earlier incarnations were known; one was opened on de la Montagne St. in the 1950s and another on Mansfield, where a worker was crushed by an elevator. A third more recent one was in operation at St. Jean and Notre Dame until a decade ago. Authorities frequently cite the fear of being unable to put out a car blaze in their opposition to such facilities. And although a few such high-tech robotic lots could elegantly alleviate parking pressures, one expert says that the standalone dedicated parking buildings will probably never get built. Chris Mulvihill, the New Jersey-based President of Boomerang Systems, a high-tech car-stacking parking lot system, notes that any landowner would most probably opt for a different sort of project. “Take any place where it’s very hard to get a parking spot,” Mulvihill says. “You’d think building a garage and charging for parking would be a good business model, but the economics dictate that if there’s a high demand for parking in that area, it’s because it’s a hot, happening place, so there are real-estate developers who want to build on that land. The demand makes it uber-expensive. A landowner could make a lot more money doing something other than parking on it.” © Copyright © The Montreal Gazette Read more: http://www.montrealgazette.com/Parking+squeeze+Downtown+businesses+feeling/7453989/story.html#ixzz2ASqBCwJE

MONTREAL – The central-city administration didn’t open the door any further Monday night to preserving the 57-hectare Meadowbrook green space. But Alan DeSousa, vice-chairman of the city executive committee, didn’t slam it shut, either – not with about 375 anti-development protesters who converged on city hall trying to save the West End site hanging onto his words. “We’re ready to see what we can do to support a local community consensus” on Meadowbrook’s future, he told Patrick Asch of the Les Amis de Meadowbrook citizens’ coalition, which wants the entire site preserved as a public park. A Miami Beach condo developer, Michael Bedzow of Pacific Group Canada, wants to build 1,500 housing units on the site, which has been a private golf course for about a century. Meadowbrook hosts a broad range of wildlife, including foxes, rabbits and birds. It straddles the Lachine borough and Côte St. Luc, and is located near rail yards. Asch and other questioners tried repeatedly to get Mayor Gérald Tremblay to commit to preservation. But the mayor left it to DeSousa to do all the talking on his behalf. The site is already partly zoned for development. Last night’s occasionally loud crowd demonstrates broad support for the site’s preservation, Asch said. The site is “irreplaceable and one of the few natural green spaces left in Montreal,” he added. “Residents across the island will not accept the destruction of Meadowbrook.” Tremblay’s continuing silence on the issue is “deafening – and very suspicious,” Asch said. The site’s preservation is part of a May 2009 report that is to be voted on Thursday by Montreal Island’s agglomeration council. DeSousa said that report doesn’t deal with golf courses. On April 15, Karel Mayrand, Quebec executive director of the David Suzuki Foundation, wrote to Tremblay asking him to act “to preserve all of Meadowbrook as a nature park.” The Pacific Group housing plan – which features Plateau Mont Royal density levels – would represent “destruction for short-term private gain,” Mayrand added. Projet Montréal has already endorsed Meadowbrook’s preservation in full as a public park, said party leader Richard Bergeron. janr@thegazette.canwest.com © Copyright © The Montreal Gazette Read more: http://www.montrealgazette.com/technology/City+commit+Meadowbrook/2926786/story.html#ixzz0leaaJ97g

Read more: http://www.montrealgazette.com/technology/Municipal+noise+limits+imposed+Parc+Jean+Drapeau/4839778/story.html#ixzz1NPXKEnKy :eek:

(Courtesy of Mercury News)

Mordecai Richler's Montreal Ten years after Mordecai Richler's death, Sian Griffiths goes on a literary crawl of the novelist's old neighbourhood as well as some of his downtown drinking haunts Sian Griffiths guardian.co.uk, Tuesday 11 January 2011 11.27 GMT Article history Schwartz's Montreal Hebrew Delicatessen ... Richler was a big fan of their famous smoked meat sandwich. Photograph: Sian Griffiths Nearly 10 years after his death, there is again great interest in the award-winning author Mordecai Richler and his vision of Montreal. A new Golden Globe-nominated film based on his book Barney's Version, starring Paul Giamatti and Minnie Driver, is being released in the UK at the end of this month. In Montreal, there is a movement to commemorate Richler by naming a street or place after him - which is meeting with strong resistance from Quebec nationalists who still resent how he poked fun at their cause and what he saw as their draconian language laws, especially in his book Oh Canada! Oh Quebec! Requiem for a Divided Country. Mordecai Richler. Photograph: Steve Russell/AP But Richler will always be remembered for using his biting wit and vivid imagery to evoke the experience of the "minority within a minority" - Montreal's Jewish immigrants - in classics such as The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz. Richler grew up on Rue St Urbain in the historic Mile End district, a 15-minute ride on the 55 bus from downtown Montreal. In its heyday, during the early 1950s, this district was home to a 25,000-strong Jewish working-class community. Yiddish was the language of the street and small home-grown businesses, bakeries and factories flourished. The new arrivals settled mostly around Boulevard St-Laurent. "The Main", as it came to be known, was the unofficial demarcation line between the city's anglophones and francophones. The Jewish neighbourhood effectively became the buffer zone between Montreal's English-speaking and French-speaking communities. Today the area has lost much of its Jewish character as the earlier immigrants became more affluent and moved to more well-heeled anglophone neighbourhoods, such as Westmount. Spanish, Portuguese and Italian immigrants have since moved in, and the area is now more hip, arty and gentrified, with the factories having been converted into trendy lofts. But there are still charming reminders that celebrate an important chapter in Montreal's history. St Viateur Bagel Shop Open 24 hours a day, St Viateur - now run by an Italian - is one of Montreal's institutions and a mainstay of Mile End. Richler's fictional students stop for bagels in the opening scenes of The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz. Enjoy the aroma and the show as the cheeky, cheerful staff prepare fresh bagels (35p and up) in a wood-fired oven. Assorted spreads are available separately (£1.90 and up + tax). • 263, Rue Saint-Viateur Ouest, stviateurbagel.com, +1 514 276 8044. Rue St Urbain Richler grew up at the northern end of Rue St Urbain between Avenue du Parc and Boulevard St Laurent. The street, which was immortalised in Richler's St Urbain's Horseman, was to influence the author's work for a lifetime: "One street would have seemed as squalid as the next. On each corner a cigar store, a grocery, and a fruit man. Outside staircases everywhere," he wrote in The Apprenticeship of Duddy Kravitz. That vision is largely gone, along with the old Jewish immigrant community. Richler's own home at number 5257 is opposite a yoga centre, evidence of the area's gentrification. He attended Baron Byng High School at number 4251. Now a community centre, its students were largely working-class Jewish kids - many of whom, like Richler, became very successful: William "Captain Kirk" Shatner and Nobel Chemistry Prize winner Rudolph Marcus are among the alumni. Duddy fans will recognise Baron Byng as "Fletcher's Field" High School. Wilensky's Light Lunch Ruth Wilensky and daughter A few moments from the Richler home is Wilensky's, which was a favourite hangout for young Mordecai and his mates - and remains virtually unchanged since it was founded by Moe Wilensky in 1932. Newspaper clippings on the wall proudly attest their Duddy Kravitz connection. The signature dish is a grilled roll of beef salami, bologna, Swiss cheese with a liberal dash of mustard (£3), served up by family members, including Moe's spritely 90-year-old widow Ruth Wilensky. • 34 Fairmount Street West and Clark , +1 514 271 0247. Schwartz's Montreal Hebrew Delicatessen Richler indulged his fondness for smoked meats at this world-famous deli. The boulevard is bursting with energy, trendy bars, restaurants and vintage shops. He paid tribute to Schwartz's in Barney's Version, describing their smoked meat as a "maddening aphrodisiac". In his children's book, Jacob Two Two and the Dinosaur, Richler subjected one of his characters to the "Smoked Meat Torture". The deli has the air of a 50s diner. Their most popular dishes are, of course, the smoked meat sandwich (£3.70 + tax) and "the Schwartz combo platter" (steak with smoked meat on the side, salad and chips, £10.60). Celebrity fans include Angelina Jolie, the Rolling Stones, Halle Berry and Celine Dion. • 3895 Boul St Laurent, schwartzsdeli.com, + 1 514 842 4813. Mount Royal The 233m-high "mountain", home to Mount Royal Park, is an important physical divide between Westmount, (traditionally the affluent English-speaking neighbourhood) and Outremont or "other side of the mountain" (the traditionally French-speaking area), which now has a significant Hassidic Jewish community. The park, one of Montreal's greatest green spaces, was designed by New York Central Park architect Frederick Law Olmstead. It's a stunning year-round outdoor playground for hikers, joggers and cyclists and offers a wide range of winter activities including skating on the Lac aux Castors. All winter equipment can be rented from the pavilion (inner-tube £3 per day; skates £5 for two hours; cross country skis from £7.50 for three hours). There are also guided showshoeing tours (£9.50). On a clear day, the Kondiaronk Belvedere offers spectacular views across Montreal. Smith House serves tasty homemade food (soup £1.50, sandwiches from £4.00). All within walking distance of the number 11 bus route . • Smith House, 1260 Remembrance Road, lemontroyal.qc.ca, +1 514 843 8240. Mount Royal Cemetery Mordecai Richler's grave Richler's final resting place is in the vast, beautiful, 19th-century graveyard on the northern slope of Mount Royal. You can access the cemetery via the rear entrance across from Mount Royal Park on the Voie Camillien Houde (also on the 11 bus route) - although the main entrance and office are on the north side on Chemin de la Foret. It is Montreal's answer to London's Highgate cemetery, with many notable people buried here. Richler's grave overlooks his beloved St Urbain neighbourhood. Other "permanent residents" include beer baron John Molson Sr, the 18th-century explorer David Thompson, railway tycoon and Titanic victim Charles Melville Hays and, curiously, Anna Leonowens of The King and I fame. From spring to autumn there are with walking tours (free) and it occasionally stages Shakespeare in the Park. It was used for a key scene in the film Barney's Version. • Open all year around (check winter road conditions before travel). Main entrance: 1297 Chemin de la Foret. Organised Walks and Shakespeare in the Park: check website for details, mountroyalcem.com. Ritz Carlton Hotel Montreal's historic Golden Square Mile - home to high-end stores, boutiques, restaurants, the Musee des Beaux Arts and McGill University - sits on the southern slope of Mount Royal. Bounded by Chemin de la Côte des Neiges to the west, Boulevard René-Lévesque to the south and Rue University to the east, this prestigious district got its name from the well-heeled Anglo-Scottish Victorian movers and shakers who lived here around the turn of the century. The neo-classical Ritz Carlton is a vestige of this era and one of the chicest addresses in Montreal, although it's currently under renovation. Designed by Warren & Wetmore, the architects behind New York's Ritz Hotel and Grand Central Station, it's about as far from Richler's St Urbain as you can get. Its Maritime Bar was one of the author's favourites before it shut down. The wedding scenes for Barney's Version were filmed at the hotel. • 1228 Rue Sherbrooke Ouest, ritzmontreal.com, +1 514 842 4212. Grumpy's The drinking holes Richler liked to frequent, like Grumpy's, are also situated in the Golden Square Mile, just south of Rue Sherbrooke. The bar appears as Dink's in the Barney's Version film. There is a framed photograph of the writer opposite the chair he used to occupy at the end of the wooden bar. Grumpy's is known for its sociable atmosphere - although since Richler's day, it has become more popular with students, particularly McGill University's "jazz rats" drawn by the live music. Every night there is a theme, including the popular Bluegrass night on Thursday. • 1242 Rue Bishop, grumpysbar.ca, +1 514 866 9010. Winnie's Bar One street over you'll find upmarket Winnie's bar-restaurant, another favourite Richler haunt, which gets a nod in Barney's Version. Occupying the mid-section of the large Sir Winston Churchill Pub complex, it offers a warm ambiance with its marble, wood and leather decor. Many employees and regulars alike have been loyal to Winnie's for 30 years. It specialises in alcoholic coffees (Irish, Brazilian: £5.30) while the restaurant offers three-course lunch specials from £6.20. • 1455-1459 Rue Crescent, winniesbar.com, +1 514 288 3814. Ziggy's Across the street from Winnie's and down the stairs is Ziggy's, a cosy sports pub favoured by Richler, hockey fans and players. Richler liked to smoke his trademark cigars outside on the terrace. This end of Rue Crescent was closed for a street party when Richler passed away, so that regulars of Winnie's and Ziggy's could join together to celebrate the author. The emphasis at Ziggy's - where the crowd tends to be a little older - is on drinking and socialising. There is no food which is perhaps why Richler sent a taxi to pick up smoked meat sandwiches from Schwartz's. • 1470 Rue Crescent, ziggyspub.ca, +1 514 285 8855. Photographs by Sian Griffiths http://www.guardian.co.uk/travel/2011/jan/11/montreal-mordecai-richler-literary-guide

yep. 10 000 le pi2. Believe it. http://ny.curbed.com/archives/2010/11/15/another_15_central_park_west_apartment_reaches_for_10kfoot.php

I was thinking: only $2 million in fees!?

Read more: http://www.montrealgazette.com/entertainment/Lambert+shouts+enough/3317503/story.html#ixzz0uhaLT8LV

http://www.montrealgazette.com/news/monument+defaced/3012787/story.html Whoever did this should be sent to Guantanamo.

West Island green space sale raises concern The wooded area extends from Cap-Saint-Jacques nature park in Pierrefonds alongside the l'Anse-a-l'Orme Park to Angell Woods in Beaconsfield. (CBC)A call for tenders for green space on Montreal's West Island has caught both environmental activists and government officials by surprise. Quebec's industrial development corporation, the Société générale de financement, which owns the land, has published ads in local papers seeking bids for the 98 hectares of land. The ads announce opportunities for residential and industrial construction. The wooded area extends from Cap-Saint-Jacques nature park in Pierrefonds alongside the l'Anse-a-l'Orme Park to Angell Woods in Beaconsfield. David Fletcher of the Green Coalition said he's worried the land - home to beavers, a herd of deer and rare species of plants and trees - will be spoiled. "We already have enough development," said Fletcher. "We already have enough strip malls. We don't have enough areas conserved." Local environmental groups and officials at the city of Sainte-Anne-de-Bellevue said they had been told at one time the land would be turned into a conservation area. "When we saw the ad in the paper, we thought, obviously we've been lied to perhaps," said Sainte-Anne-de-Bellevue Coun. Ryan Young.David Fletcher of the Green Coalition says the land should be preserved.David Fletcher of the Green Coalition says the land should be preserved. (CBC) The city had been planning to change zoning bylaws on its portion of the land this fall, said Young. But some worry it could be too late. A spokesperson for Quebec Environment Minister Line Beauchamp confirmed the ministry had hoped to turn the land into a conservation area. He said she is not happy about the decision to sell it. "I think that speaks volumes," said Young. "I've been speaking to activists inside Sainte-Anne-de-Bellevue and there's a move afoot to demonstrate … public support [to save the land]. Read more: http://www.cbc.ca/canada/montreal/story/2010/06/16/mtl-west-island-woods.html#ixzz0r77Ccrlu

http://www.thestar.com/travel/northamerica/article/805447--echoes-of-montreal-in-louisville

Surfing a River When the Wave Doesn’t Move Source: nytimes TO the uninitiated, the scene on a recent morning along the St. Lawrence River in Montreal might have inspired confusion. Behind the striking modular apartment complex known as Habitat 67, a crowd of surfers slipped into wet suits and waxed up their boards, 500 miles from the nearest ocean beach. They were preparing to surf a standing river wave in the St. Lawrence, where high-velocity water roars over a steep river-bottom depression, pitches back and upward, and creates a waist-to-overhead breaker. Surfers paddle into it or swing out by rope to catch the green-faced wedge, rewarded by a seemingly endless ride. “Once you’re carving, it’s exactly the same feel as on an ocean wave,” said Chris Dutton, the founder of the Web site SurfMontreal.com, “except that instead of going straight down the line, you carve a little bit, flip around, carve back, and can go all day.” Modern river surfing on standing waves evolved on the Eisbach River in Germany in the mid-1970s. Tidal bores have been ridden for years on the Severn in England; in Bordeaux, France; and on the Amazon. New standing waves are being pioneered almost daily in rivers in places like Colorado, and in Ontario and Alberta in Canada. Corran Addison, an Olympic kayaker and three-time world freestyle kayak champion, was the first to tackle the Habitat wave with a surfboard, in 2002. Mr. Addison’s river-surfing school, Imagine Surfboards, has taught 3,500 students since 2005, and has expanded to include a surf shop and board line. A second Montreal river-surfing school, KSF, has hosted 1,500 students a year since 2003. From fewer than 10 original surfers, Mr. Addison estimates the current participants to number around 500. The wave quality was low on my first day at Habitat 67, Mr. Addison, my instructor that day, explained. Instead of the usual method of getting into the wave — starting upstream and allowing the current to draw me into place — I would start downstream from the wave lying flat on the board, and use a rope to counter the river’s flow, swinging out into position, popping up into a surf stance, and then making my way into the wave. After scrambling down a steep embankment to the edge of the river, I got my first close-up look at the wave; a humplike wall of water surrounded by a torrent of rapids, with a lone surfer rocking back and forth just below the peak. The locals made the approach look fluid and easy. Of course, it wasn’t. Even with a wide, seven-foot-long “fun shape” board, all the forces — raging waters, the tension of the rope, my own weight — conspired against gaining balance and stability, and I lost the rope and was flushed down the rapids, repeatedly. Still, unlike at the ocean, where I would have faced a battering shore break and a lineup of experienced surfers anxious for the next set, all I had to do to try again was climb the riverbank and walk up the path. “In the river you’re going against the current — that dynamic itself makes it more complex,” said Costas Kanellos, a Montreal native who started river surfing in 2005 and has since taken to ocean surfing in Maine and Florida. “But having a consistent wave allows a lot of people to improve at a quicker rate than they would in the ocean.” Mr. Dutton was my instructor for my second crack at Habitat 67. First he demonstrated how to maximize the rope with body positioning: like a water skier angling far out from behind the boat, I had to remain upright to leverage the strength and weight of the torso as a counter to the force of the rope. In the water, Mr. Dutton had me start out on my knees, so I didn’t have to get up from a prone position. Despite the fatigue in my arms, I stood up, leaned with all my body weight, and carved away from the riverbank. Nearing the wave, I turned the board upstream and released the rope when I was inside the wave. A dense, solid but fluidly dynamic water surface rushed beneath my board. It was a moment of mild vertigo, depth and perspective hard to pinpoint in such an alien environment. I lasted a few fleeting seconds before washing out the back, long enough to feel the potential. When we left at 6 p.m., there was a five-person lineup forming, with a parking lot full of more surfers, off work and getting geared up. Though river surfing is in its infancy, the familiar complaints of overcrowding are already being heard. On a peak summer weekend with ideal river conditions and good weather, Mr. Addison said, the lineup can grow to 50 people. “The bad thing would be if surfing continues to grow in popularity,” he said, “and you show up in March to a 50-person lineup, never mind August.” Mr. Addison and others have turned to creating their own river waves using artificial obstacles. In 1997, he helped design a wave park in Valley Field, Quebec, now an Olympic kayak-training center. A similar whitewater park on the Arkansas River in Pueblo, Colo., has become a destination for river surfers. Mr. Addison proposes to use sunken concrete blocks to engineer four more standing waves in Montreal, at an estimated cost of 40,000 Canadian dollars each, though he has so far received little governmental or corporate support. “Ultimately,” he said, “we need more waves.” IF YOU GO Habitat 67 is at 2600 Avenue Pierre-Dupuy in Montreal. From Autoroute Bonaventure 10, take Avenue Pierre-Dupuy north. Park in the pull-off to the right, just past the street address. Walk behind tennis courts and down a dirt path; the wave itself is easy to spot, just down the embankment. Some information is online at http://www.surfmtl.com and http://www.surfmontreal.com. SURF SCHOOLS Imagine Surfboard, (514) 583-3386; http://www.imaginesurfboards.com/eng/surfschool.html. KSF School of River Surfing and Kayaking, (514) 595-7873; http://www.ksf.ca (in French).

Feb. 26 (Bloomberg) -- New York’s biggest banks and securities firms may relinquish 8 million square feet of office space this year, deepening the worst commercial property slump in more than a decade as they abandon a record amount of property. JPMorgan Chase & Co., Citigroup Inc., bankrupt Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. and industry rivals have vacated 4.6 million feet, a figure that may climb by another 4 million as businesses leave or sublet space they no longer need, according CB Richard Ellis Group Inc., the largest commercial property broker. Banks, brokers and insurers have fired more than 177,000 employees in the Americas as the recession and credit crisis battered balance sheets. Financial services firms occupy about a quarter of Manhattan’s 362 million square feet of office space and account for almost 40 percent now available for sublease, CB Richard Ellis data show. “Entire segments of the industry are gone,” said Marisa Di Natale, a senior economist at Moody’s Economy.com in West Chester, Pennsylvania. “We’re talking about the end of 2012 before things actually start to turn up again for the New York office market.” The amount of available space may reach 15.6 percent by the end of the year, the most since 1996, according to Los Angeles- based CB Richard Ellis. Vacancies are already the highest since 2004 and rents are down 5 percent, the biggest drop in at least two decades. In 2003, the city had 14.8 million square feet available for sublease. If financial firms give up as much as CB Richard Ellis expects, that record will be broken. ‘Wild Card’ CB Richard Ellis’s figures don’t include any space Bank of America may relinquish at the World Financial Center in lower Manhattan, where Merrill Lynch & Co., the securities firm it acquired last month, occupies 2.8 million square feet. Brookfield Properties Inc., the second-biggest owner of U.S. office buildings by square footage, owns the Financial Center. Merrill “is a wild card right now,” said Robert Stella, principal at Boston-based real estate brokerage CresaPartners. Manhattan’s availability rate -- vacancies plus occupied space that is on the market -- was 12.3 percent at the end of January, up more than 50 percent compared with a year earlier and almost 9 percent from December, according to CB Richard Ellis. Commercial real estate prices dropped almost 15 percent last year, more than U.S. house prices, Moody’s Investors Service said in a Feb. 19 report. The decline returned values to 2005 levels, according to the Moody’s/REAL Commercial Property Price Indexes. SL Green The Bloomberg Office REIT Index fell 25 percent since the start of January, with SL Green Realty, the biggest owner of Manhattan skyscrapers, slumping 50 percent. Vornado Realty Trust, whose buildings include One and Two Penn Plaza in Midtown, has fallen 36 percent. SL Green of New York gets 41 percent of its revenue from financial firms, including 13 percent from Citigroup, according to its Web site. Bank of America plans to give up 530,000 square feet at 9 West 57th St. as it completes a move to 1 Bryant Park. New York- based Goldman Sachs Group Inc. is leaving 1.3 million square feet of offices at 1 New York Plaza and 77 Water St. as it prepares to move to new headquarters near the World Trade Center site. JPMorgan put 320,000 square feet of Park Avenue offices on the market after scooping up rival Bear Stearns Cos. last year along with the company’s 45-story headquarters tower at 383 Madison Ave. Citigroup has put 11 floors, or 326,000 square feet, on the market at the 59-story Citigroup Center at Lexington Avenue and 53rd Street, bank spokesman Jon Diat said in an e-mail. The tower is owned by Mortimer Zuckerman’s Boston Properties Inc. Moving Out “We’ve been having conversations for two and a half years with Citigroup, and it’s been very clear to us that for the right economic transaction, they would move out of virtually any space in midtown Manhattan that they have,” Boston Properties President Douglas Linde said on a conference call last month. Boston Properties is also expecting to receive about 490,000 square feet back from Lehman Brothers at 399 Park Ave. as part of the bank’s liquidation. That space “will be a monumental challenge” to fill, said Michael Knott, senior analyst at Newport Beach, California-based Green Street Advisors. “They’re going to have to really bend over backwards on rate, or make the strategic decision to sit on it for an extended period of time.” Zuckerman said in an interview he doesn’t expect the increase in sublets to be a long-term problem for landlords. “You’re not going to be able to get for the space what you were able to get a year ago,” he said. “But in a year or two, in my judgment, the space will be absorbed.” Future Forecast Landlords must be prepared for a slow recovery, said Di Natale of Moody’s Economy.com. Commercial vacancy rates climbed for almost a year and a half after the last recession ended in late 2001. Still, CB Richard Ellis Tri-State Chairman Robert Alexander said New York’s financial community will regenerate. “In the late ‘80s, we lost Drexel Burnham Lambert and we lost Salomon Brothers, and we lost Thomson McKinnon,” Alexander said. “New York City survived.”

L'avertissement des banques à l'Ontario Mise à jour le mercredi 17 décembre 2008, 15 h 25 . Les grandes banques canadiennes affirment que l'Ontario perdra des emplois si le gouvernement n'abaisse pas son impôt aux sociétés. Dans un document présenté dans le cadre des consultations prébudgétaires, l'Association des banquiers canadiens (ABC) réclame que le taux d'imposition passe de 14 % à 10 %. Une baisse de quatre points de pourcentage représenterait 6 milliards de dollars de moins dans les coffres de la province. La présidente de l'ABC, Nancy Hughes Anthony, évoque le manque supposé de compétitivité de la province et laisse entendre que des emplois dans le domaine des affaires pourraient être perdus si Queen's Park ne se conforme pas à sa prescription. Interrogé à ce sujet mercredi matin à Saskatoon, le ministre des Finances de l'Ontario, Dwight Duncan, bouillait de rage. « Je rappellerai aux grandes banques que nous éliminons la taxe sur le capital et que des gens perdent leurs emplois tous les jours. Je ne crois pas que les menaces soient la bonne façon de faire des affaires. - Dwight Duncan, ministre des Finances de l'Ontario » Le premier ministre Dalton McGuinty a réagi plus posément en suggérant aux banques de recommencer à accorder des prêts financiers aux entreprises si elles souhaitent réellement aider l'économie. M. McGuinty ajoute que si l'Ontario envoyait moins d'argent à Ottawa, sa province pourrait accélérer les diminutions d'impôts aux entreprises. À Queen's Park, seuls les conservateurs croient que le gouvernement devrait réduire son impôt aux sociétés. Mais ils ajoutent que les grandes banques pourraient contribuer à stimuler l'économie si elles refilaient en entier à leurs clients les baisses de taux décrétées par la Banque du Canada. Extrait vidéoAppel aux banques pour faciliter le passage de la crise, explique Christian Grégoire.