Montage du jour : L’académie commerciale

3 comments

1. Seems to me an enlightened, truly creative plan for Place des Arts would have been to integrate wonderful, whimsical buildings like this is to the design. But I guess that just wasn’t the thinking back then.

2. What is with that side plaza of cracked 30 year old asphalt?? So bizarre that such an important civic complex could be so neglected.

   I often find that the land-use for PDA was always poorly executed. That and the MDCM should not have been built there – that should have been the new MSO concert hall.

   I fear that the site chosen for the new MSO hall is a mistake, merely an afterthought….

3. I think they needed some space for parking, but I agree that was probably the worst place. What I don’t understand now is that they use that space, cracked as it is, for the Jazz Fest. Is it even legal to let people walk in the night on a surface where you can fall in a hole and never be found?

   I like Montreal a lot, but if you compare with the rest of Canada, only here an important touristic area is so neglected for so long. Only here asphalt is saved as if it was gold, and concrete even more (look at how they patch sidewalks with asphalt, the ugliest patch is at Ste Catherine and Jeanne-Mance in case you haven’t seen it).

   Now, I understand Quebec is not the richest province and there are other more important infrastructure issues to solve. However, seeing all the huge investment that goes on in Montreal for unnecessary projects, I wonder if they could use some of this money to beautify eyesores like this, or to fix up some of the sidewalks that look like they have been through a war. Yes I know about the whole water issues and the need to make holes everywhere and stuff, maybe I’m simplifying things too much, but maybe there are solutions to these problems that would make everyone happy… or maybe I’m talking nonsense.