Process: Dead lake

The Turcot interchange is often on my mind these days as it is a daily topic in the news. I live only a couple of blocks away: ducking nervously under its towering structure when cycling, and passing by the yards during my Montreal-Ottawa commute. Upon entering and departing the downtown core by train, one is faced with an industrial landscape for the most part, which calls up Montreal’s industrial heritage and the South West's reputation as Canada’s “cradle of industrialization”. The Turcot yards appear like a desolate wasteland with mounds of cement scattered about, dusty barren fields and crumbling overpasses. No lake to be found.

Having grown up in Sudbury in the 70s, I have seen the results first hand of massive regreening efforts. Greater Sudbury's land reclamation project transformed what was once lauded as a moonscape, because of the exposed blackened bedrock ravaged by acid rain and unregulated logging, into an environmental success story. Near the downtown core is Ramsey lake —long considered a “dead lake’— which was part of this environmental reclamation project. On the east part of the lake is a scenic natural area with 950 hectares of protected green space. While the Lake Laurentian Conservation Area offers multi-usage trails for cyclists, skiers and snowshoers, I find the trail system lacking in that it is not fully integrated with a developed urban cycling infrastructure due in part to the rocky terrain of the Cambrian shield.

This is where the South-West of Montreal differs as the infrastructure already exists because of the Lachine canal. In fact, the Pôle des rapides area boasts 21 km of urban trails. The city has already invested 9.9 million dollars into Montreal's cycling trails and plans on creating another 50 km into the trail network this year alone for a total of 552 km (Métro, May 7). Each of the three Turcot reconstruction proposals include a network of cycling trails and for just cause. The current economic climate is leading some city planners to think in the short term and simply promulgate the car culture of the 60s with a straight-forward reconstruction of the aging interchange, when more thought needs to be given to the ecological footprint on the area and the quality of life of its citizens in the long term.

Indeed, the South West mayor, Benoit Dorais, sees the Turcot reconstruction as an opportunity to improve the economic development in the area. He affirms that there is not merely a need for assuring traffic flow through the South West with an improved road infrastructure, but a social and economic need to develop the area itself in conjunction with the modernization of its roadways. (La Voix Pop, André Desroches, May 27, 2010).

Web 2.0 has create a climate for lively exchange on this topic. The South West borough launched its own Facebook page in April, and not surprisingly the going ons of the Turcot reconstruction project appear front and centre. I can’t think of another topic that can benefit more from going viral these days. It’s not to say that this digital medium takes the place of local community papers like La Voix Pop. It is a complement to the weekly paper with its ability to provide links to related information, incorporate multimedia and leverage Web 2.0 tools to help build community.

There are two frontrunners in opposition to the Quebec Ministry of Transport’s reconstruction plan for the Turcot: Turcot 375 and the City of Montreal. Though the Turcot 375 plan to increase public transport and create a 75 hectares urban park at the foot of the Saint-Jacques escarpment seems promising, I admit to being a little underwhelmed by the video.

 

The City of Montreal’s plan won me over however with the construction of a new tramway linking downtown to Lachine and LaSalle, a new park to “preserve and enhance the Saint-Jacques escarpment” and a residential area which will “favour quality architecture, given the high visibility of both sites”. The artist rendering of Parc de la falaise presented a less abstract vision than the futuristic video. I can simply see myself living in this area: it brought it down to human scale — the pedestrian, the cyclist. Montreal 2025 successfully used the picturesque and the lure of green spaces as a strategy.

Montréal 2025

As an entry point into the city, the City of Montreal’s plan shapes that first impression of the cityscape. A major regreening effort paired with the Turcot reconstruction would invariably promote active communities by way of cycling and walking trails and encourage public transport. By its placement, it would also create a green corridor that links Atwater market to Lachine. Montreal often boasts of its green spaces in tourism brochures, but the reality is that the ratio of green spaces on the island is quite low. One just needs to look at satellite view in Google maps to see the small isolated parcels of green. Like with the Sudbury scenario, planting trees and protecting wetlands can not only help improve air and water quality it can lead to improved quality of life for its residents.

I can't speak with the authority of an urban planner or an environmentalist. I speak simply as a citizen with visions of what my neighbourhood and city could become. Knowing the history of the South West's own "dead lake"or ghost lake, could the city's proposed Parc de la falaise mean a re-appearance of the Lac aux loutres?