Why Montreal is so charming

[Nite]

• Video Link

[kingkirbythe....]

Looks like a nice place to live and to visit.

[isaidso]

Decent video with a misleading title. Montreal's livability has NOTHING to do with being European and everything to do with those parts of Montreal being built/laid out before WW2. Back then North Americans built cities for people. After WW2, we built them for cars.

His comment 'a Canadian city with very European roots' is off the mark. All Canadian cities have very European roots. What he's really trying to say is that Montreal has lots of colonial architecture because it was already a substantial city 150 years ago. It's no more European than Boston, Manhattan, or Philadelphia except the primary European country of influence was England instead of France.

The old parts of cities (that weren't destroyed) all over North America have very similar features.

[Obadno]

Im going to go with "Because French"

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by isaidso

Decent video with a misleading title. Montreal's livability has NOTHING to do with being European and everything to do with those parts of Montreal being built/laid out before WW2. Back then North Americans built cities for people. After WW2, we built them for cars.

Furthermore, Montreal was the city of Canada's old money as it was the cultural and economic capital of Canada until the 1960s. This gave it great architecture. Its francophone character and history also gave it a distinctive flavour not found in other North American cities other than Quebec City.

Montreal rotted when the separatists were in power from the 1970s to the 1990s but following the 1995 scare, Montrealers ended their linguistic wars that allowed the city to greatly rebound and experience a new boom which is now welcoming a wide variety of cultures, making it more cosmopolitan than ever before.

It also continues to enjoy the legacy of Expo 67 when the Metro first opened. Then Mayor Jean Drapeau was a visionary and he accomplished a lot for the city. The subway has enabled downtown Montreal to be a pedestrian oriented place as shown in the video. This will be re-enforced when the new REM rail project opens, the biggest expansion of rail transit in decades. This really points out that other large North American cities that fail to build extensive rail networks are doomed to a sterile, weak and car oriented downtown.

[Doady]

Originally Posted by lrt's friend

It also continues to enjoy the legacy of Expo 67 when the Metro first opened. Then Mayor Jean Drapeau was a visionary and he accomplished a lot for the city. The subway has enabled downtown Montreal to be a pedestrian oriented place as shown in the video. This will be re-enforced when the new REM rail project opens, the biggest expansion of rail transit in decades. This really points out that other large North American cities that fail to build extensive rail networks are doomed to a sterile, weak and car oriented downtown.

Yeah, it's sad how car-oriented cities like Ottawa became and how much their downtown declined compared to its peers (in this case, Calgary and Edmonton). But at least Ottawa had that small O-Train line (now Trillium Line) to save it's downtown from being completely devastated by the car. Other cities like Winnipeg haven't learned from Ottawa's mistake it seems, so the car is poised to completely take over there and the future of Winnipeg's downtown is not exactly bright.

You can see this contrast in the US as well, downtowns like Dallas flourishing thanks to the largest light rail network in the country, while Seattle got taken over by the car and it's downtown suffered continuously decline for decades until the city finally decided to build light rail of its own.

As forward thinking as Montreal has been, it's still not even close to Toronto, because Toronto still has its old streetcar system. The charm of Montreal will never match Toronto unless it brings back streetcars. Streetcars are the key.

A typical STM bus route might have a net operating cost of around $2 million CAD annually to operate with 20 buses. One bus might be worth around $300,000 CAD. Eliminating 10 bus routes would immediately yield $60 million in revenue and $20 million savings annually, or over $200 million savings over a decade, enough to start construction on one streetcar line downtown for sure.

In recent years, you can see cities all over the USA cut funding to their bus systems, taking buses off routes or eliminating bus routes altogether, in order to fund streetcar loops in their downtowns. Cincinnati, Kansas City, Oklahoma City, Detroit, the list goes on. I think it's time for Canada to follow the lead of the USA: stop cities building for the car, start building cities for rail instead, bring back the charm to Canadian downtowns.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by Doady

Yeah, it's sad how car-oriented cities like Ottawa became and how much their downtown declined compared to its peers (in this case, Calgary and Edmonton). But at least Ottawa had that small O-Train line (now Trillium Line) to save it's downtown from being completely devastated by the car. Other cities like Winnipeg haven't learned from Ottawa's mistake it seems, so the car is poised to completely take over there and the future of Winnipeg's downtown is not exactly bright.

You can see this contrast in the US as well, downtowns like Dallas flourishing thanks to the largest light rail network in the country, while Seattle got taken over by the car and it's downtown suffered continuously decline for decades until the city finally decided to build light rail of its own.

As forward thinking as Montreal has been, it's still not even close to Toronto, because Toronto still has its old streetcar system. The charm of Montreal will never match Toronto unless it brings back streetcars. Streetcars are the key.

A typical STM bus route might have a net operating cost of around $2 million CAD annually to operate with 20 buses. One bus might be worth around $300,000 CAD. Eliminating 10 bus routes would immediately yield $60 million in revenue and $20 million savings annually, or over $200 million savings over a decade, enough to start construction on one streetcar line downtown for sure.

In recent years, you can see cities all over the USA cut funding to their bus systems, taking buses off routes or eliminating bus routes altogether, in order to fund streetcar loops in their downtowns. Cincinnati, Kansas City, Oklahoma City, Detroit, the list goes on. I think it's time for Canada to follow the lead of the USA: stop cities building for the car, start building cities for rail instead, bring back the charm to Canadian downtowns.

How can anyone even respond to this when it's half-silly, half-serious?

[lrt's friend]

Originally Posted by Acajack

How can anyone even respond to this when it's half-silly, half-serious?

You are right.

Ottawa's downtown is far from ideal but it's not worse than Calgary and Ottawa's Transitways did facilitate people to come downtown from a wide part of the city. The Transitways may have been flawed mainly because they had reached beyond capacity downtown. Further growth was impossible and the wall of buses was not desirable. I would say that Ottawa's downtown is very urban, and the number of surface parking lots is very limited.

Frankly, rebuilding streetcar networks in Ottawa or Montreal is something we need to think twice about. Both cities are subject to heavy snow and freezing rain storms (Toronto's winter weather is less severe), that could leave streetcars immobilized and there is a youtube video of one such storm from the 1940s that left Ottawa's entire streetcar network closed and frozen in for several days, something that rubber tired buses could easily have navigated.

Ottawa's new LRT has shown some vulnerability to severe winter weather, although most of the problems have not been weather related. We will have to see the longer-term results of how weather exposed LRT trains function in this climate, and likewise with Montreal's REM, before modern streetcars should ever be implemented.

Here is a video of Ottawa's streetcars frozen to the tracks in December 1942. Notice how regular vehicles are having no problems negotiating the roads while all streetcars are unable to move.

• Video Link

edit: not sure what I did wrong with the youtube video but the video link works.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by isaidso

Decent video with a misleading title. Montreal's livability has NOTHING to do with being European and everything to do with those parts of Montreal being built/laid out before WW2. Back then North Americans built cities for people. After WW2, we built them for cars.

Yep.

Places built for people are typically much more charming than places built for cars.

[The North One]

It's cool, it's cheap, it's kinda French, it's old, great culture, great architecture.

Whats not to like?

[mrnyc]

^ exactly! and they got good eats. and i got a frenchy auntie from there. who doesnt like montreal?

[jmecklenborg]

Montreal did not make a big impression on me. The waterfront is more industrial than I expected and many neighborhoods reminded me of Chicago neighborhoods. Overall it has much more of a Great Lakes city feel than a river city feel, in my opinion.

The subway is laid out so logically on that map that it sort-of feels made-up.

[hipster duck]

Montreal is a very interesting city and unique as a French-speaking American-style metropolis. That alone makes it worth visiting.

But people - both Montrealers and non-Montrealers - tend to sing its praises a bit too much. It's still a city with some serious shortcomings, including in the urbanism department.

Its infrastructure is in poor shape and, despite the fact that roads are always under construction, things don't seem to get better. Home prices have been appreciating faster than any other Canadian city - which is really saying something - so Montreal's days of being a cheap, bohemian city might be numbered. In general, its urbanness is a product of its great pre-war bones, but its more recent developments are nothing to write home about: it has very little TOD, it still expands highways and low density sprawl in the suburbs more than anywhere else in Canada, and while it's building an ambitious rail project, that follows over 30 years of building practically no new rapid transit.

[CivicBlues]

Originally Posted by jmecklenborg

Montreal did not make a big impression on me. The waterfront is more industrial than I expected and many neighborhoods reminded me of Chicago neighborhoods. Overall it has much more of a Great Lakes city feel than a river city feel, in my opinion.

The subway is laid out so logically on that map that it sort-of feels made-up.

As opposed to subways that are organically grown?

[JHikka]

Montreal's a great city to visit and party in for a few days before quickly escaping. Aside from a few select neighbourhoods it's lacking cohesive urban character outside of its immediate core, has crumbling infrastructure everywhere you look, and is still expanding and sprawling despite its island confines. Fun for a night out or three but it's a headache living there.

[Acajack]

Originally Posted by JHikka

Montreal's a great city to visit and party in for a few days before quickly escaping. Aside from a few select neighbourhoods it's lacking cohesive urban character outside of its immediate core, has crumbling infrastructure everywhere you look, and is still expanding and sprawling despite its island confines. Fun for a night out or three but it's a headache living there.

Living in a big city always has challenges for the % of the population that is used to the burbs and small towns and therefore driving and parking everywhere. Beyond that I don't see how living in Montreal is any more of a practical pain in the ass than living in Toronto, New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, Boston, etc. would be.

If anything, it's probably more user-friendly than a number of those cities on at least some levels.

I am seen by some on here as a big Montreal fanboy but I don't really find the city especially pretty. I suppose it's OK looking and I'll admit has gotten better as gentrification has taken root in so much of the city proper at this point.

It does have oodles of character (certainly by North American standards) and I suppose "charm" follows along with that.

[Rico Rommheim]

Originally Posted by JHikka

but it's a headache living there.

It really isn't.

[Zeej]

Originally Posted by JHikka

Montreal's a great city to visit and party in for a few days before quickly escaping. Aside from a few select neighbourhoods it's lacking cohesive urban character outside of its immediate core, has crumbling infrastructure everywhere you look, and is still expanding and sprawling despite its island confines. Fun for a night out or three but it's a headache living there.

We've left Toronto for Montreal and are quite pleased with our decision - headaches, crumbling infrastructure, lack of cohesive urban character in the non-core and all.

[Steely Dan]

One big takeaway from spending two decades on SSP as an American:

Do not give any credence to Torontonians and Montrealers when it comes their opinions about their respective rival cities.

[hipster duck]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

One big takeaway from spending two decades on SSP as an American:

Do not give any credence to Torontonians and Montrealers when it comes their opinions about their respective rival cities.

The rivalry between the two has softened in the past two decades; I think both cities have found their respective groove and don't really compete with each other for the same audience, so to speak. Peak rivalry was probably in the 50s when Montreal was a much more English-speaking city and there was a high chance that both cities would face off against each other in the Stanley Cup finals (no chance of that now!).

Montrealers and Torontonians are also probably going to be the people with the most experience with the other city, at least among cities that are on the same plane (so not places like Hamilton or Quebec City or even Ottawa), so they'd be able to give a somewhat informed viewpoint, and not that of a one-time tourist. It's kind of like how I'd weight an opinion about Dallas more from a Houstonian than from a Vancouverite.

In the grander scheme of things, Toronto and Montreal aren't that different from one another. The cities have a different personality and look different at street level, but a lot of "life" is kind of the same in both cities. Montreal has more in common with Toronto than it does with a city that it might look like on a superficial level like Philadelphia.