hkskyline
January 27th, 2006, 04:55 AM
Universities' urban sprawl shows no signs of slowing down
UQAM project includes bus station facelift
Universite de Montreal eyes Outremont site
PEGGY CURRAN
14 January 2006
Montreal Gazette
Derek Drummond calls it his "This Land Was Our Land" lecture.
An architecture professor who has been at McGill University for 42 years, Drummond traces the university's pivotal role in the evolution of Montreal's downtown core, taking wistful delight in ticking off those juicy chunks of real estate that got away.
Central Station and the Queen Elizabeth Hotel, the Peel and McGill metros, Place Ville Marie, the McCord Museum and shops along the busiest stretch of Ste. Catherine St. - all stand on land that once belonged to McGill.
"When McGill set up, we were alone in the field - the city really did grow up around us," Drummond says of the rambling Burnside estate James McGill bequeathed to the college that would bear his name.
"The university sold off a lot of the land for virtually nothing - and now it's the highest valued land in the city."
Still, that sprawling balliwick of elegant Montreal greystone and red brick sweeping up through the Roddick Gates isn't exactly shabby, either. And it's a fair bet that early, desperate need for cash to finance construction is a key reason why McGill still stands in the thick of downtown action.
With three universities in the central core - and Universite de Montreal just over the ridge of Mount Royal - higher education has spread its tentacles from one end of the island to the other, with satellite campuses and branch operations across the river, over the sea and in cyberspace.
And universities - and the research centres and student ghettos they spawn - aren't done throwing their weight around. Fuelled by gifts from newly minted philanthropists keen to plaster their names on posterity, the groves of academe sprout concert halls and science centres and state-of-the-art chicken coops.
In the western core, Concordia University's recent building boom is largely credited with the resurgence of an ugly patch of Ste. Catherine St. that had pretty much been given up for a dead a decade ago. Now the university has laid claim to the Grey Nuns' mother house. It plans to build the new John Molson School of Business on the empty lot on the northwest corner of Guy St. and de Maisonneuve Blvd. W. Even buildings it doesn't own have been colonized, with Concordia classrooms squeezed above Jean Coutu and students using the food fair in Faubourg Ste. Catherine as an informal study hall.
To the east, Universite du Quebec a Montreal has announced a $320-million complex on Berri St. across from the glittering Bibliotheque nationale du Quebec.
The three-year project, bounded by de Maisonneuve Blvd. E., Berri, Ontario and St. Hubert Sts., will house classrooms, language studios, and an art gallery. In addition, it will provide housing for 1,225 students in a scheme that also provides for a much-needed facelift for the city's grotty inter-city bus terminal.
With 55,000 students, Universite de Montreal is already the biggest school in the province, with 49 buildings in Montreal and a few dozen more at campuses in St. Hyacinthe, St. Hippolyte, Megantic, Laval, Longueuil and Lanaudiere. A blitz of construction over the past five years - most of the new towers are monuments to the stars of Quebec's business elite - hasn't curbed an insatiable appetite for research labs, classrooms and student dorms. Now U de M is angling to build a "campus for the 21st century" on the old Canadian Pacific railway yard in Outremont.
Though the $20-million land deal has yet to receive formal approval, the city has only good things to say about a scheme that would provide a mix of student housing and private homes, keep fresh university projects on the island and eliminate a hazardous eyesore.
UQAM project includes bus station facelift
Universite de Montreal eyes Outremont site
PEGGY CURRAN
14 January 2006
Montreal Gazette
Derek Drummond calls it his "This Land Was Our Land" lecture.
An architecture professor who has been at McGill University for 42 years, Drummond traces the university's pivotal role in the evolution of Montreal's downtown core, taking wistful delight in ticking off those juicy chunks of real estate that got away.
Central Station and the Queen Elizabeth Hotel, the Peel and McGill metros, Place Ville Marie, the McCord Museum and shops along the busiest stretch of Ste. Catherine St. - all stand on land that once belonged to McGill.
"When McGill set up, we were alone in the field - the city really did grow up around us," Drummond says of the rambling Burnside estate James McGill bequeathed to the college that would bear his name.
"The university sold off a lot of the land for virtually nothing - and now it's the highest valued land in the city."
Still, that sprawling balliwick of elegant Montreal greystone and red brick sweeping up through the Roddick Gates isn't exactly shabby, either. And it's a fair bet that early, desperate need for cash to finance construction is a key reason why McGill still stands in the thick of downtown action.
With three universities in the central core - and Universite de Montreal just over the ridge of Mount Royal - higher education has spread its tentacles from one end of the island to the other, with satellite campuses and branch operations across the river, over the sea and in cyberspace.
And universities - and the research centres and student ghettos they spawn - aren't done throwing their weight around. Fuelled by gifts from newly minted philanthropists keen to plaster their names on posterity, the groves of academe sprout concert halls and science centres and state-of-the-art chicken coops.
In the western core, Concordia University's recent building boom is largely credited with the resurgence of an ugly patch of Ste. Catherine St. that had pretty much been given up for a dead a decade ago. Now the university has laid claim to the Grey Nuns' mother house. It plans to build the new John Molson School of Business on the empty lot on the northwest corner of Guy St. and de Maisonneuve Blvd. W. Even buildings it doesn't own have been colonized, with Concordia classrooms squeezed above Jean Coutu and students using the food fair in Faubourg Ste. Catherine as an informal study hall.
To the east, Universite du Quebec a Montreal has announced a $320-million complex on Berri St. across from the glittering Bibliotheque nationale du Quebec.
The three-year project, bounded by de Maisonneuve Blvd. E., Berri, Ontario and St. Hubert Sts., will house classrooms, language studios, and an art gallery. In addition, it will provide housing for 1,225 students in a scheme that also provides for a much-needed facelift for the city's grotty inter-city bus terminal.
With 55,000 students, Universite de Montreal is already the biggest school in the province, with 49 buildings in Montreal and a few dozen more at campuses in St. Hyacinthe, St. Hippolyte, Megantic, Laval, Longueuil and Lanaudiere. A blitz of construction over the past five years - most of the new towers are monuments to the stars of Quebec's business elite - hasn't curbed an insatiable appetite for research labs, classrooms and student dorms. Now U de M is angling to build a "campus for the 21st century" on the old Canadian Pacific railway yard in Outremont.
Though the $20-million land deal has yet to receive formal approval, the city has only good things to say about a scheme that would provide a mix of student housing and private homes, keep fresh university projects on the island and eliminate a hazardous eyesore.