When we launched our Spacing Montreal blog in September 2007, our venue was on Saint Laurent and the street was going through a major streetscape reconstruction. While I was in Montreal again a few weeks ago to celebrate Spacing Montreal’s one year anniversary I spent some time wandering along the completed redesign of Saint Laurent and came away rather impressed.
Probably my favourite feature was a small detail on the sidewalk: all the way up and down the street, a thin, metal strip extends outward toward the curb from a building’s property line. At the tip of the metal strip is a metal plate indicating when the building was first erected. When a building was renovated or modified the date was also noted. It is a nice touch since most building construction dates are not displayed or placed in not-so-obvious spaces.
The other feature I liked was the tree pits (read about my fascination with tree pits in a previous post). The design is modern and elegant. Though, my only quibble is that the side of the tree pit that receives the greatest amount of foot traffic is the one side that is unprotected. I can only surmise that this has to do more with protecting the street-side part of the tree’s base from road salt.
The last piece of this streetscape that impressed me was that the sidewalk’s rectangular bricks, which grace the side of the tree pits and benches, also extend out into the road in the form of painted strips instead of bricks (see photo below). Even better, the strips are used to help delineate parking spots.
Bravo, Montreal!
photos by Matthew Blackett
2 comments
The stripes are great – a visual extension of the sidewalk into the roadway. In the future: a woonerf style street without a curb?
those tree pit things are slippery in rain 🙁