Yes, we have a winner. This is an image of the glorious Church Avenue gateway to what was long Quebec's third largest city - proud Verdun Quebec - which brings passersby over the delightful sparkling waters of Montreal's aqueduct.
And yet the architecture that lines this route is not - as one might expect - lined with buttery-sugar'n'spice cottages and steeplejack beanstalk coddlehouses, but instead, this hallowed road towards the dreamy urban riverside suburb of Verdun has descended into a hellish gasoline alley where decades of carburetor drippings and air conditioner spray fluid goes to fall and infect and soil god's green earth.
The pink zone on the map above displays the troubling over-concentration of gas stations that line that begrimed byway. The map doesn't even include the other waterside garage perched on the bike path (top of the image, just right of center) which would make an alluring terrace for creative class wannabes.
Recent hopeful signs that the car repair shop was being demolished were premature. It is, in fact being rebuilt bigger and greasier than ever.
Gas stations have diminished from the local landscape over the last few decades. For example over the last 8 or so years, at the corner of Bannantyne and Sixth Avenue, three of the gassy lots have been transformed into attractive housing.
galt & de l'eglise bridges over the aqueduct at de la verendrye.
ReplyDeleteno idea about the pink zones...
Looks like the aqueduct at de l'Eglise. No clue what the pink zones are though.
ReplyDeleteThat's the Canal de L'Aqueduc at the de L'Eglise and Galt bridges. I don't know what those pink zones are. Water pumping stations maybe?
ReplyDeleteThey're all gas stations.
ReplyDeleteBut no idea why that would be interesting.
Odd, isn't it, that the only entrance to Verdun where they've done anything pleasant is at the Jolicoeur Bridge.
ReplyDeleteIt's actually Bannantyne and Fifth where the service stations have been replaced.
Now, what's up with the Ville de Verdun flag that's been flying at the community centre on Bannantyne for the past several months?
Excellent point.
ReplyDeleteJolicoeur and Champlain has the fancy little garden that you can gaze at while waiting for the interminable red light to change.
Whereas Galt and Champlain offers nothing but visual oppression before you get to pass the F high school fittingly across from the busy welfare office which you get to cruise by at 18 miles an hour strictly enforced.
I'll try to post a photo of that.
I owned a sixplex on Bannantyne near Desmarchais from about 2001 to 2008 and the transformation of Western Verdun (well the section east of Woodland) were staggering. The transformation of those empty lots was a big part of the improvement. The gas station owner somehow owned all corners, hats off to him for making those good things happen.