It’s hard to believe that it was once that monstrosity — all that concrete for so little function, actually.
On espère qu’on reprendra la photo en quelques ans pour exposer une nouvelle ligne de tramway!
Ce serait intéressant de mettre un “avant” pour faire la comparaison avec la nouvelle intersection.
So much better than the horrible échangeur but still a bit “nude”. It needs more trees, but I think some built areas and windbreaks would not be a bad idea in cold or rainy weather.
Guillaume, la prise est de la tour Air Transat?
C’est clairement mieux que l’échangeur des Pins. Le gros problème, selon moi, c’est la diagonale de Parc vers des Pins. Pourquoi? Pour rendre la vie plus facile aux automobilistes et rendre le passage à vélo dangereux, épeurant et suicidaire?
Ah oui, j’oubliais, il y a une «piste cyclable». Une des pires pistes en ville, en fait. Et j’suis pas le seul à le penser: http://bit.ly/6dzfbl
En gros, c’est un excellent changement, mais ils auraient pu penser aux cyclistes.
Definitely out Grandest thoroughfare. Needs to be dressed up a bit more for sure: trees, gardens, etc..
I still think a roundabout (with an art piece or a newly commissioned monument of some kind) would have been brilliant here, given that they decided on that huge exit to Pine Ave West, it wouldn’t have been such a stretch.
I don’t know, I still would have preferred the symmetry and neatness of a regular old right angle intersection. To me, this looks like spaghetti junction-lite.
Riding a bicycle from the bottom of Olmstead road continuously to the top of the Mountain is now longer because of these renovations. The road now starts at Pine-Park intersection.
25 minutes is a good baseline time, but remember to share the road and don’t run down pedestrians.
The amazing ski trail that travels on some of this road is now open for the winter. Start at Parc avenue and Rachel and ski to the summit. It is the best urban cross-country ski on eastern north america.
And, it is done best during a winter storm! 45 minutes uphill, then a 30 minute all-downhill superfantastic fun-fest.
The bike path up parc avenue is missing a connection to Pine avenue from the east (Plateau) side.
Cyclists ride along pine ave and then hop on to the pedestrian path to go north. Then there is no way they can connect from this pedestian path onto the parc avenue path farther along. There needs to be bicycle-pedestrian separated path from pine avenue/plateau area.
The new mayor of the Plateau Mont Royal has spoken of the need of a bike path along pine avenue. A safe east-west route through the southern Plateau area is MISSING, and must be a major priority.
The city has a lot of work to do in creating a network of safe “active-transport” transportation corridors for cyclists.
“this looks like spaghetti junction-lite.”
The essential characteristics of a car-centred space with lots of grass around it (nature band-aid) remain unchanged.
The official PR term for this is a “green space”, but they may as well have just painted it green — less CO2 required for the upkeep.
Well, it may still be a car centred space (how could it not be? Downtown is nestled at the foot of an impassable hill, er, mountain, gotta go around it you know), but I was so used to the ugly concrete structure that I marvel at the wide open space and simplicity that replaced it.
I think a roundabout would have worked marvellously, too, but we don’t seem to like those here, do we?
I do think we must remember how much better this is than what was there before.
Yes, I’d eliminate the side road and put something nice there in its place. I enjoyed cycling through Parc Jeanne-Mance but then it just cuts off and I had to simply cross at the intersection (I was going to Alternatives).
The main way to make this space less car-centred is to bring the tram in on avenue du Parc. Oh, avenue des Pins would be nice too, but it isn’t as important a priority. And plant trees. I do also think there should be some built elements, especially in light of our weather.
L’idée d’un parc permettant les rassemblements publics me semble une idée intéressante. Une extension du Parc Jeanne-Mance vers le sud pourrait être considérée.
Il faut surtout penser à long terme puisque l’Hôtel-Dieu changera de vocation lorsque le personnel sera déménagé au nouvel hôpital. De nombreux espaces de stationnements pourraient être reconvertis et l’immeuble a une certaine valeur architecturale.
Toutefois, la mairie d’arrondissement devra assumer son leadership dans ce cas-ci. Lors des consultations publiques, il a été impossible de s’entendre sur l’utilisation de l’espace, coin sud-est. Il en résulte qu’on y retrouve un terrain gazonné vide aujourd’hui. Ces consultations sont utiles si la population en arrive à une conclusion, ne produire aucune solution rend les débats inutiles.
Has a picture of the area, pre-1962 interchange, ever been uncovered? Love to see that!
Pictures of the whole project from Ville de Montréal.
Edward, here’s a photo of the intersection in 1956:
Here’s one from 1932:
Love those elms.
Cool. Thanks for posting.
I’ve seen those old pics before. Look at the 1950s one: there are multi-storey buildings on the southern side of Avenue des Pins.
Something like that would sure beat what’s there now. Some city uses in the city.
There’s too much park in one place, and suspiciously near the cars. Why not split up that acreage in smaller bits and distribute it around the city where it’s needed? As it stands, it looks a bit too much like “Towers in the park”.
What we have here is an expressway on the ground.
Now all we have to do is synchronize the traffic lights. Have you ever taken a northbound bus from Milton and Park? There is invariably a long delay waiting for traffic lights to change (assuming a normal number of embarking/disembarking passengers). If you catch the end of the green light cycle at Pine – you get a red at he next intersection, and then another red at Duluth.
21 comments
Sure as hell beats Drapeau’s spaghetti junction.
It’s hard to believe that it was once that monstrosity — all that concrete for so little function, actually.
On espère qu’on reprendra la photo en quelques ans pour exposer une nouvelle ligne de tramway!
Ce serait intéressant de mettre un “avant” pour faire la comparaison avec la nouvelle intersection.
So much better than the horrible échangeur but still a bit “nude”. It needs more trees, but I think some built areas and windbreaks would not be a bad idea in cold or rainy weather.
Guillaume, la prise est de la tour Air Transat?
C’est clairement mieux que l’échangeur des Pins. Le gros problème, selon moi, c’est la diagonale de Parc vers des Pins. Pourquoi? Pour rendre la vie plus facile aux automobilistes et rendre le passage à vélo dangereux, épeurant et suicidaire?
Ah oui, j’oubliais, il y a une «piste cyclable». Une des pires pistes en ville, en fait. Et j’suis pas le seul à le penser: http://bit.ly/6dzfbl
En gros, c’est un excellent changement, mais ils auraient pu penser aux cyclistes.
PS: Très belle photo!
Le montage avant-après, depuis la tour Transat, fut publié l’an dernier : https://spacing.ca/montreal/2008/08/22/montage-du-jour-lintersection-de-lavenue-du-parc-et-des-pins/
Definitely out Grandest thoroughfare. Needs to be dressed up a bit more for sure: trees, gardens, etc..
I still think a roundabout (with an art piece or a newly commissioned monument of some kind) would have been brilliant here, given that they decided on that huge exit to Pine Ave West, it wouldn’t have been such a stretch.
I don’t know, I still would have preferred the symmetry and neatness of a regular old right angle intersection. To me, this looks like spaghetti junction-lite.
Riding a bicycle from the bottom of Olmstead road continuously to the top of the Mountain is now longer because of these renovations. The road now starts at Pine-Park intersection.
25 minutes is a good baseline time, but remember to share the road and don’t run down pedestrians.
The amazing ski trail that travels on some of this road is now open for the winter. Start at Parc avenue and Rachel and ski to the summit. It is the best urban cross-country ski on eastern north america.
And, it is done best during a winter storm! 45 minutes uphill, then a 30 minute all-downhill superfantastic fun-fest.
The bike path up parc avenue is missing a connection to Pine avenue from the east (Plateau) side.
Cyclists ride along pine ave and then hop on to the pedestrian path to go north. Then there is no way they can connect from this pedestian path onto the parc avenue path farther along. There needs to be bicycle-pedestrian separated path from pine avenue/plateau area.
The new mayor of the Plateau Mont Royal has spoken of the need of a bike path along pine avenue. A safe east-west route through the southern Plateau area is MISSING, and must be a major priority.
The city has a lot of work to do in creating a network of safe “active-transport” transportation corridors for cyclists.
“this looks like spaghetti junction-lite.”
The essential characteristics of a car-centred space with lots of grass around it (nature band-aid) remain unchanged.
The official PR term for this is a “green space”, but they may as well have just painted it green — less CO2 required for the upkeep.
Well, it may still be a car centred space (how could it not be? Downtown is nestled at the foot of an impassable hill, er, mountain, gotta go around it you know), but I was so used to the ugly concrete structure that I marvel at the wide open space and simplicity that replaced it.
I think a roundabout would have worked marvellously, too, but we don’t seem to like those here, do we?
I do think we must remember how much better this is than what was there before.
Yes, I’d eliminate the side road and put something nice there in its place. I enjoyed cycling through Parc Jeanne-Mance but then it just cuts off and I had to simply cross at the intersection (I was going to Alternatives).
The main way to make this space less car-centred is to bring the tram in on avenue du Parc. Oh, avenue des Pins would be nice too, but it isn’t as important a priority. And plant trees. I do also think there should be some built elements, especially in light of our weather.
L’idée d’un parc permettant les rassemblements publics me semble une idée intéressante. Une extension du Parc Jeanne-Mance vers le sud pourrait être considérée.
Il faut surtout penser à long terme puisque l’Hôtel-Dieu changera de vocation lorsque le personnel sera déménagé au nouvel hôpital. De nombreux espaces de stationnements pourraient être reconvertis et l’immeuble a une certaine valeur architecturale.
Toutefois, la mairie d’arrondissement devra assumer son leadership dans ce cas-ci. Lors des consultations publiques, il a été impossible de s’entendre sur l’utilisation de l’espace, coin sud-est. Il en résulte qu’on y retrouve un terrain gazonné vide aujourd’hui. Ces consultations sont utiles si la population en arrive à une conclusion, ne produire aucune solution rend les débats inutiles.
Has a picture of the area, pre-1962 interchange, ever been uncovered? Love to see that!
Pictures of the whole project from Ville de Montréal.
http://ville.montreal.qc.ca/portal/page?_pageid=901,1445676&_dad=portal&_schema=PORTAL
Edward, here’s a photo of the intersection in 1956:
Here’s one from 1932:
Love those elms.
Cool. Thanks for posting.
I’ve seen those old pics before. Look at the 1950s one: there are multi-storey buildings on the southern side of Avenue des Pins.
Something like that would sure beat what’s there now. Some city uses in the city.
There’s too much park in one place, and suspiciously near the cars. Why not split up that acreage in smaller bits and distribute it around the city where it’s needed? As it stands, it looks a bit too much like “Towers in the park”.
What we have here is an expressway on the ground.
Now all we have to do is synchronize the traffic lights. Have you ever taken a northbound bus from Milton and Park? There is invariably a long delay waiting for traffic lights to change (assuming a normal number of embarking/disembarking passengers). If you catch the end of the green light cycle at Pine – you get a red at he next intersection, and then another red at Duluth.