Gilford is one of my favourite Montreal streets. It just looks so out of place. Every intersection an urban planner’s nightmare. You know if they could they’d just get rid of it.
I love Gilford too. It was such a wonderful surprise the first time I happened upon it and I love it every time I go back. Does anyone know why/how it exists as it does amid the grid of the rest of the Plateau?
Gilford predates the grid. It was once a road that led from the village of Saint-Jean-Baptiste to the quarry at what is now Laurier Park.
I just love how the “ruelle” (alley? :P) south joins with the parc on Henri-Julien, nicest alley i’ve found recently :-)
It even predates the village of Saint-Jean-Baptiste!
Early 19th century: a country road from Mile End to Côte-Saint-Louis and beyond.
It was likely there in some form before the conquest, and possibly even before the Europeans arrived.
(The straight part of Gilford east from Laurier metro dates from 1876. The historic road forks north from there along Berri to Saint-Grégoire, then crosses the railway east of Saint-Hubert and joins rue des Carrières. The name rue des Carrières was used for the whole thing, from Henri-Julien to Rosemont, until the 1930s.)
There’s a similar explanation for that given somewhere in the book The Walkable City by Mary Soderstrom. It just came out, and I’d recommend that book to everyone interested in how urban planning affects sociology.
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Gilford is one of my favourite Montreal streets. It just looks so out of place. Every intersection an urban planner’s nightmare. You know if they could they’d just get rid of it.
I love Gilford too. It was such a wonderful surprise the first time I happened upon it and I love it every time I go back. Does anyone know why/how it exists as it does amid the grid of the rest of the Plateau?
Gilford predates the grid. It was once a road that led from the village of Saint-Jean-Baptiste to the quarry at what is now Laurier Park.
I just love how the “ruelle” (alley? :P) south joins with the parc on Henri-Julien, nicest alley i’ve found recently :-)
It even predates the village of Saint-Jean-Baptiste!
Early 19th century: a country road from Mile End to Côte-Saint-Louis and beyond.
It was likely there in some form before the conquest, and possibly even before the Europeans arrived.
(The straight part of Gilford east from Laurier metro dates from 1876. The historic road forks north from there along Berri to Saint-Grégoire, then crosses the railway east of Saint-Hubert and joins rue des Carrières. The name rue des Carrières was used for the whole thing, from Henri-Julien to Rosemont, until the 1930s.)
There’s a similar explanation for that given somewhere in the book The Walkable City by Mary Soderstrom. It just came out, and I’d recommend that book to everyone interested in how urban planning affects sociology.