"Not too tall that you need an elevator to reach the ground, nor too spread out that you need a car to reach the grocery store." What a quote! Perfect description of the missing middle and human-scale housing. Great video.
My whole life I knew I liked neighborhoods with dense 2-4 story buildings. I never knew why. I always just assumed it was a preference, like a favorite color. But it's not. There is a real reason behind it. And that sentence explains it perfectly!!! When I heard it, that was a mind-blowing moment haha.
@@reviewguy12 of this is something you have to discover in your life, I recommend moving to somewhere more natural and human+environment friendly (well meant advice my friend)
I lived in Montreal for 4 years to attend university. It has absolutely spoiled me for all other cities. The afforable-ish rent, the all-hours transit, and the bike lanes.... it was a paradise that I took for granted.
It depends on the point of view: I lived in Montréal for five years before moving to Munich, Germany, just before COVID-19. If you exclude affordable rent (unfortunately house market in Munich is really crazy), the services are way better here, the city is smaller but you have a really dense transportation system, with several lines of metro, trains, trams, buses and bike lanes spread all over the city and even outside in the countryside (almost everyone rides a bike for commuting and free time). Even if I have wonderful memories of Montréal, the quality of life is way better in many cities in central Europe.
@@SomeDudeQC yes, I totally understand. As a matter of fact North Americans told me that Montreal was considered the most "European" city in North America. The transportation system (4 metro lines and buses) is still one of the best you can find in North America.
you all live a lifestyle too dependent on transit for my liking. i prefer the flexibility of driving with ample parking. this is probably why i would never visit or live in cities where owning a car is troublesome. also, one has to consider grocery shopping. i buy my meats by the 10s of kilos and it would be daunting to travel with that on transit.
@@asadb1990 I still see a lot of drivers in Montreal, and a lot of cars at the grocery stores that have parking. People still drive to costco and buy in bulk... But if you live in an area with a grocery store, you could (before pandemic) be used to shopping every few days for fresh stuff to eat. It was a big adjustment for my parents early on in the pandemic to be limited to only shopping for groceries once a week.
I dream of living in a neighborhood like this! I just want to own a home that’s dense, but human scale, where I can have my own space, be connected with my neighborhood, and safely walk and bike around. I hope we make more neighborhoods like this in North America!
It makes me smile that visitors talk positively about the place I live. I was born in Montreal and lived there ever since. Some of the pictures you showed are actually from my neighbourhood. Thanks for an interesting and positive video. I'm happy if you enjoyed your stay.
We really do have such a beautiful city. It makes me smile when I travel and people talk to me about their time in montreal. They always speak fondly about it.
I moved to Montréal back in 2012 (From France), lived in Calgary and Vancouver, Visited Toronto, and as much as I enjoyed these cities for other unrelated reasons, I could not picture myself living elsewhere permanently that Montreal. For that exact reason. And even if I wanted to live in Toronto or Van, I could never afford it. Let alone buying. Im not a millionaire. Montreal gets more and more expensive over the years unfortunately, but it is still nowhere near renting in Van or To. Calgary is not that bad tho.
soon you'll be priced out everywhere in the country as well as most western countries around the world. canadian politicians for example plan to raise canadas population to 100 million extremely quickly, mainly through mass immigration. how do you think that's gonna affect housing prices?
One of the reasons explaining this type of housing and the number of rooms and all is the fact that, at the time of their construction, the plexes were often rented to (and built for) large working class families needing a lot of space to live. Also this type of compact lowrise wooden building made it affordable to build for small business owners and small investors. Many companies would offer to build these blocks with components and shapes to choose from a catalogue making them often share a lot of similarities without looking the same and keeping the building costs low.
This is why I love Philly. There's very few apartment buildings compared to houses. The majority of houses are townhouses and keeps things relatively dense while still allowing people to own an entire house instead of just an apartment.
@@OhTheUrbanity No problem! As an anglophone from the west end of the city I was even more impressed that you went further into depth about the distinct architectural styles in the west end, neighbourhoods that are equally beautiful and historic, but definitely different. Not a lot of visitors venture out of the Plateau and the Old Port, physically or mentally haha. You even mentioned the west island burbs. Montreal really is a super unique city with a super diversified urban fabric for a North American context.
I don't understand why there seem to be literally zero new plexes being constructed. All new developments in the city, even small ones, are condos. The hippodrome site for example would be an excellent place to add a new neighborhood based on plexes instead of handing it over to mega-developers to put up condo towers and give us another Griffintown.
@@realpostmillennial that’s not true. The real reason is there is no zonage regulation do the promotors can build as high as they want and make more profit.
As far as I know there are very few developments being built specifically as rental units. Most new ones are condos that are then rented out by their owners (if not turned into Airbnb units). Might be an area where municipal + provincial government could invest in 'new old buildings' as a way to increase rental availability, particularly for families.
@@spiguy Not a native speaker, pero,si yo hablo Espanol! I worked in Guatemala for a year. I did travel through Mexico too, before it got crazy. Monterray was cool, I could see my self living there. Merrida was nice as well, but the heat and humidity was too much for my nordic blood
Being originally from Montreal myself and now living in Toronto, I always felt that the Montreal approach would help solve some of the housing problems here. There is a lot of resistance to high rises being built in local neighbourhoods and multiplexes seem to be the ideal alternative solution if local politicians were willing to change their zoning bylaws.
There are not many cities in which I could live in North America. Maybe only Montreal and New York in fact. It only occured to me recently that livable cities are cities where you can walk to do everything. Cities where you dont need a car. Car dependancy is a cancer in America. People who complain about the trafic are usually living in suburbia. They would say they dont like cities because of the trafic, not realizing that they are the trafic, and the people walking on the sidewalk live in the city. Funnyvenough, the same suburbian people always come back from their holidays in Europe saying how nice was Paris, or Rome, or Madrid. The thing is, they walked those cities ! Because they were not stuck in their cars, the walk Paris, from store to store, from bakery to wine shop, from one park to another... they dont even realize that Paris in itself is not that nice, its just that they were able to enjoy a walkable city, for once, not stuck in trafic. I love Montreal. I lived in Tokyo, Hong Kong and some European cities... but you will never convince me to move in a city where I need a SUV to get milk on a Saturday morning, or where I need to find a parking spot on my way to have a drink after work with friends or colleagues.
I remember when my family was shopping for their house in the 1979/1980, the huge triplex on the Plateau Mont-Royal are listed at 45k. My aunt bought one and she still had it. Today, a triplex in that area (not renovated) is around 1.2M$.
One large downside to these buildings are the external metal staircases. While they save indoor space, they can be very hazardous during the long, brutal Montréal winters. One of your photos shows these stairs covered in snow, which hardens to ice in the deep cold. This will be a problem from late October until mid-April most years. They can be pretty precarious if you are bringing in groceries, your baby, or furniture.
I've been living with them all my life and find it a minor inconvenience. All one has to do is remove the snow once in a while. Also, though backstairs are often all metal, I have never seen entrance steps made of metal.
Climate change has changed that. These past couple of years, you don't really get any significant snow until latest December or even early January, and late spring isn't as cold as it used to be.
Yes yes yes! I live in Vancouver and it's frustrating to look around and see the lost potential. I visited Montreal for a month about a decade ago and I loved it, especially for its affordability, culture, and housing.
My aunt and uncle lived in NDG when I was a teenager. The variety of housing on just their street amazed me. They had story and a half, 2 story, split level houses and concrete apartment buildings all in the same block!❤️🇨🇦
You should look at the Paris style of 4-7 floor buildings with courtyards. They still allow sunlight and neighbourhoods have a strong sense of community and plenty of character. There are very few high rises in the city center, they are found in some of the suburbs, such as La Defense.
Yeah! We've spent a bit of time in Paris, mostly exploring random neighbourhoods on foot, and we found it fascinating. It wasn't all great (the Champs-Élysées was a traffic-filled disappointment) but so many of the neighbourhoods just felt lively and full of character. We'd love to go back with more of an eye for the housing.
@@OhTheUrbanity That's mostly the "globalization" and mass international tourism that turned the Champs-Elysées into a huge international brands shopping and chain food alley. It used to be one of the Parisian cultural life main center (cinemas, books and records) but almost of it is gone now and even Parisians don't venture there anymore. Just another place for international non-francophone hords of tourists to be served in English and buy perfume stuff... You know that the more information is written in English on shop windows the more unauthentic and boring the place is. PARIS RESTE UNE TRES BELLE VILLE, SURTOUT QUAND ON Y PARLE FRANCAIS
As a former resident of Montreal, who was dragged away my parents in the 1960's, I am enjoying this series on one of my favorite topics, urban design and geography. This particular one, brings me back to the Montreal of my youth, where we lived in NDG, in a Plex near McDonald and Monkland. My old grade school (now a school for recent immigrants) and the park, brings back warm memories. Thank you for this unique view of a very memorable city!
I have this to add: the reason these units are low rise is because developers want to avoid the costs associated with having to include an elevator once a certain number of floors is reached
Also the building codes stop at three floors in most places. Regardless needing a elevator is determined by if someone who has disabilities lives there.
You've just gained a subscriber. Good job on the video, we need more videos and channels about urbanism in Montréal. Also, to clarify for people who don't know Montréal, we have a lot of low density-single family suburbs around the Island of Montréal. About half of the population of the Great Montréal (2 millions people) live in the suburbs.
As someone currently visiting Montréal from Toronto, this (like your other videos) was very well researched and narrated! Goes to show another quirk that makes this beautiful city so unique and amazing!
True. I've lived in high rises downtown and they don't give you a feeling of being connected to the city the way plexes do. It feels more like a fortress where getting in and out is time consuming and hectic.
Recently visited Montréal this summer and suffice to say it is my favorite city in North America. The urbanism and culture make it a truly great city. As a Francophile I would love to live there.
Montreal reminds me of the older parts of my home town of St. Louis Missouri, mostly built when the city still had a large French population (I'm sure that's not a coincidence). See: Lafayette Square, Benton Park, & Soulard neighborhoods (among others). Sadly, many other neighborhoods like these were lost to 1st urban renewal & later neglect & blight.
I just watched this video for like the fourth time. This is such a GREAT model for livable, personalized, leafy, walkable, bikeable, amenity-rich neighborhoods (as you point out). Thank you for the excellent analysis.
@@OhTheUrbanity - I would have been interested in reading Fearsome Fawkes' answer to your question. :) As for myself, I live on a large top-floor apartment in a 3-storey house close to the heritage district of Kitchener. The houses in Kitchener have a particular charm and character - due in large measure to the strong German cultural influence. However, once you leave Kitchener's central district, the housing takes on the characteristics you noted for much of anglophone Canada - single-family detached houses surrounded by wastelands of strip malls and high-rise buildings. The features that you describe in Montreal housing remind me a lot of those I encountered while living in a medium-sized town in SW France. The one advantage I'd say that my current housing situation in Kitchener has over Montreal is the sense of space I have here. Throughout the pandemic and lockdown I've NEVER felt closed in or restricted.
J'ai écouté au complet, c'était vrm intéressant! Cool les références à la fin, je me demandais justement si ça s'appliquait à d'autres villes au Québec! Merci :)
Loving those external staircases! I recognise the concept of mid rise multiplex neighborhoods where a each building would be owned by a family which lived in one of the units and rented the other ones out. Unfortunately, in this era of cheap money, it's become impossible for anyone who works for a salary to be able to buy a whole building, so new development is done exclusively by big investors and everyone is forced to pay their ever increasing rents. The old developments are also bought up one bx one by investors who throw the tenants out in order to renovate and rent out to new tenants for much higher prices.
It is really strange when you live most of your life in Montreal and move to another city. I am now west of Toronto in Hamilton. The lack of good reasonable public transit was a shocker getting here, lack of affordable housing and man I miss the food... I come home with a cooler full when ever I visit. Miss you Montreal
@@injectideas7760 employment, spouse had dream job offer. I am able to find employment here being bilingual in a heart beat at twice the pay. People leave for a lot of reasons not having to do with the city.
@@injectideas7760 Hamilton is fairly dense compared to other cities outside of Toronto it was mostly built before cars but lack of reliable public transit amazes me especially in the former street car industrial neighbourhoods idk how mid century city planning ideals ruined so many places in North America
As someone who has been lived in Montreal for 10 years, I still learn a lot from your video! One thing I'd like to add, the old plexes usually have poorer sound insulation compared to concrete apartment builds, due to duplex's wooden structure.
Yup as a guy from trois-rivières living in Québec, I really agree with you ending. But you can still have cool plex in trois-rivières old working class neiborhood, mostly sainte-cecile and le bas du cap.
Thank you very much for this comprehensive look at housing in Montreal, the review dwelling size vs other cities confirms my experience .I grew up in Montreal then moved out west in 1977. My sister stayed and lived in a walk up apartment in Lachine. When I returned for a month long visit in 1980 I was shocked at how big it was. It was huge, with hardwood floors. It was L shaped .You opened the door to a short hallway then an enormous living room swept 30 feet or more to a balcony. This was the short side of the L. To the left was the hallway to 3 bedrooms and a washroom with the same hardwood flooring ; built c. 1950 - 1960. 6 people could live there without feeling cramped. Many parts of Montreal still have a very small British Style pub or a " depanneur" who sells basics and beer & wines, often from a house converted retail space in which they still live. My sister would buy 2 pints of beer for hockey games in the 80s from the depanneur on her corner - at this time , alcohol was fully regulated from government agencies in other provinces ie the ALCB - " Alberta Liquor Control Board". There is a certain charm of the aforementioned European architecture that Montreal exudes that other Canadian, while still very attractive cities , they do not give that sense of history beneath the feet.
Wow love this, wish there was more of this in the GTA, and especially Toronto itself. (And especially in our housing crisis /r/canadahousing) I live just off Bloor in Toronto in one of the 6 unit older apartments, and there's a token amount of them on my street while the majority are single or duplexes. And this is all within 5 minute walking distance to the subway station. We need to ease up on the zoning and make more human centered population density like these
Thank you for these wonderful videos. It's encouraging others in Canada are thinking about better density and walkable cities. I am encouraging my small town in Southern Ontario to build less for cars. Not only because it leads to better livability, but it's also more economical for the urban areas.
I love this video. Some streets in the video reminds me of parts of Brooklyn. I live in the East Village in Manhattan on a street with townhouses and small apartment buildings, not more than 4 or 5 stories. Most things are in walking distance, including the park and library, and there are a lot of bike lanes. I look forward to visiting Montreal.
@@fergusfraser8641 Yes, but I do think newer construction has been about private houses or high rises for a while. And a lot of the really livable neighborhoods have become trendy and overpriced.
A lot of movie scenes that are set in NY are actually filmed in MTL. It cost way less to block a street here thant it would cost to block a street in NY to film a car chase or just a car scene between buildings.
Originally, the triplex were designed for one family occupancy. The grandparents lived on one floor, and parents with small children on another floor, and other family members the last floor. People had huge families until the 1960s. Occupying one floor and renting the other 2 are a new phenomena that started 30 years ago ish.
Ah now I really want to visit! Looks like my kind of place. Oh and your videos are really well done. Alternating narrators keeps it even more interesting than it would be already. Great visuals. BTW I originally subscribed partly because of the channel's clever name.
4:07 This issue can be subverted through the replacement of garbage days with public bins to place garbage, compost and the different types of recycling in as is done in cities in the Netherlands
I agree, great video. Suggestions for further topics: elderly and disabled options in Montreal planning, traffic planning on the island as a whole and why it's such a disaster and fight, Green space planning here and how it's different, the new REM discussion and motivations, and high rise options in Montreal. Personally of the places I've rented/owned in Montreal i most preferred the high-rise where i could walk to shops and had my vintage weekend car in the basement garage.
Thanks for your video! Cities built before the car was king have lots to teach us. Loved living in our humble but charming 4 story walk-up on St. Marc in Montreal in the 80s. We live a side-by-side in the historic Thomas Sq district of downtown Savannah, Georgia now and for all the great reasons you listed in your video (as well as the great year round weather).
I find that all East-coast's big cities in Canada and United State has the same urbanism but not the culture. Mtl has more a Happy land culture where people enjoy there city but. Montreal, Boston, New York, Washinton, Philadelphia urbanism are almost identical. Toronto and Chicago are identical Vancouver- Seattle are identical.
I miss going to Montreal every summer. I hope to be back this year. I stayed in an Airbnb not far from Atwater Market and it looked just like the triplex in your video. It was very close to a grocery and even had a cool 50s style diner around the corner.
Working my way through your excellent videos . Being right of center (Canadian version) its refreshing to see the clarity, without blinders that you bring to urban housing . I would like to point out that a lot of Montreal's livability is a direct consequence of hard times . Like Pittsburg or St. Augustine a city's economic
my plan on retiring was to move back to Mtl. I basically grew up in the city, but I hadn't lived there for 30 years. I did a couple of exploratory trips to get the feel of the city again, and they were great, but... I have been living in a small touristy town in SWOntario, lots of good restos and shops, and I realized that I no longer had the right frame of mind for big city living...much as I have a great affection for Mtl...I can always visit... (if they would just do something about the embarrassing trains in this country) btw liked and subbed
Well there seems to be plans to vastly improve the trains you would take to Montreal. . . I sure hope the Toronto to Quebec corridor gets dedicated high speed passenger rail in my lifetime.
Going through all your videos and they are great. One city that I've lived in that has quite a bit of medium-density housing is Boston, especially in the Backbay and Alston neighbourhoods. Like in Montreal, these are older parts of the city.
I lived in Montreal from 89 - 92 and lived with three others in a 4 bedroom 2 bathroom with hardwood floors and brick walls washer and dryer and right across from Parc La Fontaine all for 800$! Those were the days...
Having to choose between single family homes and high rise condos is very depressing. North America needs more cozy, mixed use neighbourhoods with mid-rise buildings. It also needs more pedestrianised streets.
@@urbanistgod that’s wonderful if you prefer those. What’s depressing is, not having a third choice, as in most cases they are outlawed by North American zoning laws.
@@urbanistgod Are you on crack or something? I'm curious exactly which part you fail to understand. I don't care about which type of housing you prefer and neither should you care about which type I do. My problem is mid-rise / high density / mixed use neighborhoods being extremely limited due to absurd zoning restrictions in North America. To make it clear, I'm not saying there's anything wrong with high rise condos or single family homes. I'm saying the third option is way too limited and it's a problem. End of.
I lived in MTL for 7 years in a walkup triplex like the ones shown in this video. It makes perfect sense for city-living. I had good light, livability and connection to the neighborhood and with some buildings with cafes, depannerus(corner store), fruiteries directly downstairs, it was amazing! I am back in my hometown of Vancouver and it feels like a dump; a very expensive dump. I really miss the deciduous trees spilling on to my balcony. Montreal is a beautiful place!
Wow! Montreal's architecture looks beautiful! It has a more historical European feel but the multiplex houses are something that I've not really encountered in the Netherlands, Germany, Belgium or France. Seems like a great and comfortable way to house lots of people in not a lot of space.
There is also a fair amount of plexes built around the city center of reazonable sized Québec cities such as Sherbrooke, Saint-Hyacinthe, Shawinigan, Victoriaville, Chicoutimi and Trois-Rivières (as you mentioned at the end). Some of them are as dense as the ones in Montréal. Such a nice video by the way.
I’ve visited Montreal a few times. Fell in love with it! I think it’s the most livable city I’ve ever been to. I’d love to move there except for one thing…I fear their winters! 🥶 I’m not sure I could take it. Anyway, I intend to visit more in the future.
I lived in Montreal for 20 years - and am back again now - before going to Japan to teach English at the university level, and during our long summer holidays I came back to Montreal every year. One summer I was in a shop looking at post cards for some reason and saw some showing the triplexes typical of the city under winter snow. They gave me a catch in the throat and a stifled sob because winter in the Tokyo area has none of the beauty of Montreal after a fresh snowfall when the big old trees along the residential streets are laced with snow and those spiral staircases turn into ephemeral sculptures that are still beautiful even after the first set of footprints, and the cars parked along the streets look like loaves of bread waiting to be baked.in some kind of gigantic assembly line. There's always a Metro station nearby and heating our apartments is worth the modest rates paid to Quebec's massive hydro-electric power system. A young Italian woman studying in Montreal recently posted something on Instagram where she expressed amazement that people actually hang around at home in T-shirts during winter when in Italy you have to bundle up inside. People still go out to the bars & restaurants in the evening, and the conviviality that's so ingrained in Montrealers does not hibernate even in the awful depths of February.
Indeed. Montreal is the most lively winter city I know. Where else has giant outdoor snow raves, an outdoor arts festival in February, so many ice skating rinks, sledding hills, etc. People throw the best house parties in the winter. I love walking by a house or small bar, hearing the music and barely being able to make out human forms in tank tops and giant winter boots through the condensation on the windows. When 70cm of snow falls in one night everyone just shovels out and continues life as normal, that would cripple most cities. The joie de vivre ici is all the warmth you need.
Thank you for a great video. In this relatively frenzied Montreal housing market, I bought a unit in a low-rise 12 unit condominium spread across two buildings in Lachine. I'm 150 M from the Lachine canal, the marina, and the various parks along St Lawrence River, as well the strip of restaurants along the Lakeshore. I'd be interested in your take on urban development patterns here versus in other parts of Montreal. Your Channel has very interesting and well-produced videos. Keep up the good work!
i actually found this video by accident as i was looking at/for montreal canadiens hockey videos. that said i really appreciate your guys legwork to explain some of the unique neighborhoods in montreal. great learning experience, and imo, a template that in ways, many other canadian cities should actually emulate. while i am fortunate to afford a car, i still will always remember depending on the bus and my bike. in saying that, the bus should be accessible just on grounds of employment opportunities alone.
I don't think it's about affordability. People in large cities can typically afford a car, but often have no need for it. It's just a waste of money and time, standing in the garage except for a couple of days per year when you need to transport your grandparents to the country house.
I love this..the living ability in medium dense is all for me! I despise elevators and hallways..this type of building helps with privacy and neighborhood living… 💜
We were going to move to Montreal, then covid happened. We love the style of living, being able to walk or metro. Here in London you need a car, and the sprawl is brutal.
One big accessibility issue is snow removal. It is very hard for disabled or elderly people to be on the top floor of outside staircase buildings. My mom loved living in a duplex but had to go to en elevator high rise when she got older. That said, I love swirly staircases and the walkability of neighbourhoods is phenomenal.
Yeah, it's hard to get bored of walking in Montreal! We've often thought about how tricky it could be to age here because of uncleared/steep/inaccessible staircases like you mention but also because of some exceptionally slippery areas on sidewalks; we've taken quite a few spills since moving here.
Actually I remember reading in a newspaper history column that these buildings were supposedly made for families. The young family would own the property and live in one of the units while renting out the rest to tenants. As the kids got older, they would move into the upper units and the parents would occupy the 1st floor unit. This is how many of my co-workers whose families bought buildings in the plateau use it. One of the apocryphal stories of why the staircases are outside is because the Catholic Church had so much influence in QC society and they deemed dark hallways an "invitation to sin" so the exterior walk-up was created so the parents on the 1st floor could see who was coming to visit their daughters. 😛
Gr8 video, keep up the good work 2 other points, both on densification. 1) The units without basements or 1/2 basements, have crawl spaces, cellars, or part cellars that would have contained large coal boilers & coal storage room too. These spaces can be dugout deeper to full basements. 2) the majority of the 'Plexes have flat roofs that can easily house a prefab light steel addition. These carry all load across to brick walls. & since units are so long they can be set back at both front & back to create there balconies on the existing roof. The setbacks would ensure the new top floors would be invisible from the street & alley, & cause no more shading than rare existinting buildings with a peaked roof. This windfall density bonus allowing 3 floors to effectively become 5 & 4 6 should have higher developmentment fees, unless these are social housing, restricted rate rentals, or "mother-in-law suites" for family. Another benefit to the city besides development fees is to address the Montreal's heat Island effect. The new set back roof balconies should have green cover & the new roof of the added story should have either solar cells or a green roof or both.
LOL @ ''This isn't going to turn Edmonton into Montreal...'' If ever Edmonton is transformed into Montreal, somebody should please advise Mordecai Richler. He said Edmonton was so breathtakingly ugly, the whole city looks like Montreal's Decarie boulevard. Since it's not a compliment, an Edmonton newspaper published Richler's home phone number.
@@evano5635 Edmonton is expensive AF too. A lot of these nice houses are 300k or 400k. Do yourself a favor and fly to Europe. Find a smaller house in a gorgeous medium city with lots of historical sites, beautiful landscapes for a fraction of the cost and enjoy the nice mild weather.
@@urbanistgod Just go to Eastern or Northern France between the French and German or Belgian border. It's like Canada but cheaper and better. You'll see many quaint little villages with dirt cheap land. You'll also see gorgeous medium sized cities like Besancon or Lille with tons of space for pedestrians and parks. I'm afraid that any Canadian city doesn't come close and costs more $$$ to live in with shittier climate.
Glad you liked it! Quebec City is wonderful, we'd definitely enjoy visiting again and getting some footage. As for parks in Montreal, we'll give it some thought and see what we can do.
If you understand French, check out the series 'Montreal dans ta pipe' by Ugo Bergeron aka CapitaineMontreal. (I wouldn't mind if OTU redid some of them en anglais for a wider audience though!)
Amazing channel ! Just discovered you and I can guarantee that I'll be watching a lot more. Hopefully your coverage can also increase visibility on Life-Sized city planning that makes a difference on day to day for the citizens but that are less sexy to make headlines on the newspapers (yes, I'm talking about the upcoming elections...! :) )
Glad you like it! As outsiders it's definitely interesting that some people in Montreal don't quite realize how special their city is, and why it's important for Montreal to embrace that instead of becoming a generic North American suburban city.
"Not too tall that you need an elevator to reach the ground, nor too spread out that you need a car to reach the grocery store." What a quote! Perfect description of the missing middle and human-scale housing. Great video.
My whole life I knew I liked neighborhoods with dense 2-4 story buildings. I never knew why. I always just assumed it was a preference, like a favorite color. But it's not. There is a real reason behind it. And that sentence explains it perfectly!!! When I heard it, that was a mind-blowing moment haha.
I live in Europe hahahaha
@@reviewguy12 of this is something you have to discover in your life, I recommend moving to somewhere more natural and human+environment friendly (well meant advice my friend)
And amazing quote indeed
as a born and raised French-speaking Montrealer, I’m comfortable to say you guys did a great job, keep up the good work!
We appreciate that a lot, thank you!
I'm a non-French-speaking Montrealer. Moved to US at ~5 years old!
I loved visiting my cousins, and Montreal!
@I am the Owl hahahahaha OH NO! I have to read a sign in french. Let's move to US before they invade the rest of canada. Great video by the way
@Zop3 how much of Montreal is francophone to Anglophone? And can the english speaking people also speak Quebecois?
I lived in Montreal for 4 years to attend university. It has absolutely spoiled me for all other cities. The afforable-ish rent, the all-hours transit, and the bike lanes.... it was a paradise that I took for granted.
It depends on the point of view: I lived in Montréal for five years before moving to Munich, Germany, just before COVID-19. If you exclude affordable rent (unfortunately house market in Munich is really crazy), the services are way better here, the city is smaller but you have a really dense transportation system, with several lines of metro, trains, trams, buses and bike lanes spread all over the city and even outside in the countryside (almost everyone rides a bike for commuting and free time).
Even if I have wonderful memories of Montréal, the quality of life is way better in many cities in central Europe.
@@IntiFloyd That's a good point but I think in North America, Montreal stands as one of the best cities in terms of density to liveability.
@@SomeDudeQC yes, I totally understand. As a matter of fact North Americans told me that Montreal was considered the most "European" city in North America. The transportation system (4 metro lines and buses) is still one of the best you can find in North America.
you all live a lifestyle too dependent on transit for my liking. i prefer the flexibility of driving with ample parking. this is probably why i would never visit or live in cities where owning a car is troublesome. also, one has to consider grocery shopping. i buy my meats by the 10s of kilos and it would be daunting to travel with that on transit.
@@asadb1990
I still see a lot of drivers in Montreal, and a lot of cars at the grocery stores that have parking.
People still drive to costco and buy in bulk...
But if you live in an area with a grocery store, you could (before pandemic) be used to shopping every few days for fresh stuff to eat. It was a big adjustment for my parents early on in the pandemic to be limited to only shopping for groceries once a week.
I dream of living in a neighborhood like this! I just want to own a home that’s dense, but human scale, where I can have my own space, be connected with my neighborhood, and safely walk and bike around. I hope we make more neighborhoods like this in North America!
We have to convince the "nimby" crowd! 🙂
@@Curiousandfearless we don’t gotta convince we just gotta yell a little louder than them
It makes me smile that visitors talk positively about the place I live. I was born in Montreal and lived there ever since. Some of the pictures you showed are actually from my neighbourhood. Thanks for an interesting and positive video. I'm happy if you enjoyed your stay.
We really do have such a beautiful city. It makes me smile when I travel and people talk to me about their time in montreal. They always speak fondly about it.
I moved to Montréal back in 2012 (From France), lived in Calgary and Vancouver, Visited Toronto, and as much as I enjoyed these cities for other unrelated reasons, I could not picture myself living elsewhere permanently that Montreal. For that exact reason.
And even if I wanted to live in Toronto or Van, I could never afford it. Let alone buying. Im not a millionaire.
Montreal gets more and more expensive over the years unfortunately, but it is still nowhere near renting in Van or To. Calgary is not that bad tho.
soon you'll be priced out everywhere in the country as well as most western countries around the world. canadian politicians for example plan to raise canadas population to 100 million extremely quickly, mainly through mass immigration. how do you think that's gonna affect housing prices?
Calgary is still affordable, the only problem is that it's Calgary.
The two years I lived in Montreal was the best, most pleasant urban experience I've ever had, superior even to my time living in Berlin and Istanbul.
One of the reasons explaining this type of housing and the number of rooms and all is the fact that, at the time of their construction, the plexes were often rented to (and built for) large working class families needing a lot of space to live. Also this type of compact lowrise wooden building made it affordable to build for small business owners and small investors. Many companies would offer to build these blocks with components and shapes to choose from a catalogue making them often share a lot of similarities without looking the same and keeping the building costs low.
This is why I love Philly. There's very few apartment buildings compared to houses. The majority of houses are townhouses and keeps things relatively dense while still allowing people to own an entire house instead of just an apartment.
As a Montreal native, I’ve gotta say this was literally an incredible video.
That means a lot, thanks!
@@OhTheUrbanity No problem! As an anglophone from the west end of the city I was even more impressed that you went further into depth about the distinct architectural styles in the west end, neighbourhoods that are equally beautiful and historic, but definitely different. Not a lot of visitors venture out of the Plateau and the Old Port, physically or mentally haha. You even mentioned the west island burbs. Montreal really is a super unique city with a super diversified urban fabric for a North American context.
I agree
I don't understand why there seem to be literally zero new plexes being constructed. All new developments in the city, even small ones, are condos. The hippodrome site for example would be an excellent place to add a new neighborhood based on plexes instead of handing it over to mega-developers to put up condo towers and give us another Griffintown.
The land is too expensive for developers to build lower-density housing, unfortunately.
@@realpostmillennial that’s not true. The real reason is there is no zonage regulation do the promotors can build as high as they want and make more profit.
As far as I know there are very few developments being built specifically as rental units. Most new ones are condos that are then rented out by their owners (if not turned into Airbnb units). Might be an area where municipal + provincial government could invest in 'new old buildings' as a way to increase rental availability, particularly for families.
@@realpostmillennial All it requires is for the city to change the zoning. If they mandate medium density, then that's what will happen.
@@ajkandy You do know that municipal and provincial governments are behind this, as the big developers have deeper pockets for "donations," right?
I chose Montreal to settle after travelling throughout North America extensively. By far the most livable large city on the continent.
Did you also consider Mexican cities (assuming you aren't a native hispanophone)?
@@spiguy Not a native speaker, pero,si yo hablo Espanol! I worked in Guatemala for a year. I did travel through Mexico too, before it got crazy. Monterray was cool, I could see my self living there. Merrida was nice as well, but the heat and humidity was too much for my nordic blood
Love how you explained this. Super video :)
City looks so chill
Being originally from Montreal myself and now living in Toronto, I always felt that the Montreal approach would help solve some of the housing problems here. There is a lot of resistance to high rises being built in local neighbourhoods and multiplexes seem to be the ideal alternative solution if local politicians were willing to change their zoning bylaws.
Same goes for the rest of Canada! Over here in BC we're struggling with the same thing.
@@urbanistgod But theres a middle ground between high rises and single family homes
There are not many cities in which I could live in North America. Maybe only Montreal and New York in fact.
It only occured to me recently that livable cities are cities where you can walk to do everything. Cities where you dont need a car. Car dependancy is a cancer in America.
People who complain about the trafic are usually living in suburbia. They would say they dont like cities because of the trafic, not realizing that they are the trafic, and the people walking on the sidewalk live in the city. Funnyvenough, the same suburbian people always come back from their holidays in Europe saying how nice was Paris, or Rome, or Madrid. The thing is, they walked those cities ! Because they were not stuck in their cars, the walk Paris, from store to store, from bakery to wine shop, from one park to another... they dont even realize that Paris in itself is not that nice, its just that they were able to enjoy a walkable city, for once, not stuck in trafic.
I love Montreal. I lived in Tokyo, Hong Kong and some European cities... but you will never convince me to move in a city where I need a SUV to get milk on a Saturday morning, or where I need to find a parking spot on my way to have a drink after work with friends or colleagues.
I remember when my family was shopping for their house in the 1979/1980, the huge triplex on the Plateau Mont-Royal are listed at 45k. My aunt bought one and she still had it. Today, a triplex in that area (not renovated) is around 1.2M$.
One large downside to these buildings are the external metal staircases. While they save indoor space, they can be very hazardous during the long, brutal Montréal winters. One of your photos shows these stairs covered in snow, which hardens to ice in the deep cold. This will be a problem from late October until mid-April most years. They can be pretty precarious if you are bringing in groceries, your baby, or furniture.
yep, I was scared of outside stairs, they seemed to me really dangerous.
I've been living with them all my life and find it a minor inconvenience. All one has to do is remove the snow once in a while. Also, though backstairs are often all metal, I have never seen entrance steps made of metal.
I've moved couches and fridges up those stairs so many times and I've feared for my life. Otherwise I like the charm of these convoluted structures.
Remove the snow and sprinkle some eco-friendly de-icer ! It’s not complicated!
Climate change has changed that. These past couple of years, you don't really get any significant snow until latest December or even early January, and late spring isn't as cold as it used to be.
Yes yes yes! I live in Vancouver and it's frustrating to look around and see the lost potential. I visited Montreal for a month about a decade ago and I loved it, especially for its affordability, culture, and housing.
My aunt and uncle lived in NDG when I was a teenager. The variety of housing on just their street amazed me. They had story and a half, 2 story, split level houses and concrete apartment buildings all in the same block!❤️🇨🇦
You should look at the Paris style of 4-7 floor buildings with courtyards. They still allow sunlight and neighbourhoods have a strong sense of community and plenty of character. There are very few high rises in the city center, they are found in some of the suburbs, such as La Defense.
Yeah! We've spent a bit of time in Paris, mostly exploring random neighbourhoods on foot, and we found it fascinating. It wasn't all great (the Champs-Élysées was a traffic-filled disappointment) but so many of the neighbourhoods just felt lively and full of character. We'd love to go back with more of an eye for the housing.
@@OhTheUrbanity That's mostly the "globalization" and mass international tourism that turned the Champs-Elysées into a huge international brands shopping and chain food alley.
It used to be one of the Parisian cultural life main center (cinemas, books and records) but almost of it is gone now and even Parisians don't venture there anymore. Just another place for international non-francophone hords of tourists to be served in English and buy perfume stuff... You know that the more information is written in English on shop windows the more unauthentic and boring the place is.
PARIS RESTE UNE TRES BELLE VILLE, SURTOUT QUAND ON Y PARLE FRANCAIS
As a former resident of Montreal, who was dragged away my parents in the 1960's, I am enjoying this series on one of my favorite topics, urban design and geography. This particular one, brings me back to the Montreal of my youth, where we lived in NDG, in a Plex near McDonald and Monkland. My old grade school (now a school for recent immigrants) and the park, brings back warm memories. Thank you for this unique view of a very memorable city!
I have this to add: the reason these units are low rise is because developers want to avoid the costs associated with having to include an elevator once a certain number of floors is reached
Need an elevator from 4th floor onwards
Elevators where never a consideration at the time. They just build residential housing that way.
@@newtonfall1 only a sith deals in absolutes
@@supersasquatch he’s right they built like this long before elevators were mandated
Also the building codes stop at three floors in most places. Regardless needing a elevator is determined by if someone who has disabilities lives there.
You've just gained a subscriber. Good job on the video, we need more videos and channels about urbanism in Montréal. Also, to clarify for people who don't know Montréal, we have a lot of low density-single family suburbs around the Island of Montréal. About half of the population of the Great Montréal (2 millions people) live in the suburbs.
Greater Montreal is over 4 million people
@@trevoncarter4861 i was talking about its half, so 2 millions
@@wavearts3279 Then "(2 million people)" should be placed after "live in the suburbs" otherwise it's confusing. Or put "that is" instead of the "( )".
Perfect example of gentle density, thank you. Deploying in my local YIMBY push.
As someone currently visiting Montréal from Toronto, this (like your other videos) was very well researched and narrated! Goes to show another quirk that makes this beautiful city so unique and amazing!
Thanks very much---hope you're enjoying the city!
most high rises don't even have good walkability and are completely centered around cars. I think that's an even bigger issue.
True. I've lived in high rises downtown and they don't give you a feeling of being connected to the city the way plexes do. It feels more like a fortress where getting in and out is time consuming and hectic.
Depends where, I have lived in two Montreal high rises with excellent walkability.
@@urbanistgod Think the implication might be how a high rise provides for residents using their own bicycles.
Yeah, suburban highrises are built far from the road, and therefore walking still feels like you're not progressing, therefore encouraging car use
Recently visited Montréal this summer and suffice to say it is my favorite city in North America. The urbanism and culture make it a truly great city. As a Francophile I would love to live there.
Montreal reminds me of the older parts of my home town of St. Louis Missouri, mostly built when the city still had a large French population (I'm sure that's not a coincidence). See: Lafayette Square, Benton Park, & Soulard neighborhoods (among others). Sadly, many other neighborhoods like these were lost to 1st urban renewal & later neglect & blight.
Love saint louia red brick rowhouses or flats
I just watched this video for like the fourth time. This is such a GREAT model for livable, personalized, leafy, walkable, bikeable, amenity-rich neighborhoods (as you point out). Thank you for the excellent analysis.
Glad you liked it so much, it was one of our favourite videos to make too!
This is actually a great video and needs more attention!!!
Oh man, I miss Montreal. I prefer the smaller city I'm in now, but I miss the walkability and diversity of Montreal.
Yeah, Montreal just has a special charm that's hard to forget. Did you end up in a smaller city elsewhere in Quebec, or in another province?
@@OhTheUrbanity - I would have been interested in reading Fearsome Fawkes' answer to your question. :) As for myself, I live on a large top-floor apartment in a 3-storey house close to the heritage district of Kitchener. The houses in Kitchener have a particular charm and character - due in large measure to the strong German cultural influence. However, once you leave Kitchener's central district, the housing takes on the characteristics you noted for much of anglophone Canada - single-family detached houses surrounded by wastelands of strip malls and high-rise buildings. The features that you describe in Montreal housing remind me a lot of those I encountered while living in a medium-sized town in SW France. The one advantage I'd say that my current housing situation in Kitchener has over Montreal is the sense of space I have here. Throughout the pandemic and lockdown I've NEVER felt closed in or restricted.
J'ai écouté au complet, c'était vrm intéressant! Cool les références à la fin, je me demandais justement si ça s'appliquait à d'autres villes au Québec! Merci :)
Non, c’est unique à Montréal.
Loving those external staircases! I recognise the concept of mid rise multiplex neighborhoods where a each building would be owned by a family which lived in one of the units and rented the other ones out. Unfortunately, in this era of cheap money, it's become impossible for anyone who works for a salary to be able to buy a whole building, so new development is done exclusively by big investors and everyone is forced to pay their ever increasing rents. The old developments are also bought up one bx one by investors who throw the tenants out in order to renovate and rent out to new tenants for much higher prices.
It is really strange when you live most of your life in Montreal and move to another city. I am now west of Toronto in Hamilton. The lack of good reasonable public transit was a shocker getting here, lack of affordable housing and man I miss the food... I come home with a cooler full when ever I visit. Miss you Montreal
Why did you move? I would never leave a walkable area for a suburban wasteland.
@@injectideas7760 employment, spouse had dream job offer. I am able to find employment here being bilingual in a heart beat at twice the pay. People leave for a lot of reasons not having to do with the city.
@@injectideas7760 Hamilton is fairly dense compared to other cities outside of Toronto it was mostly built before cars but lack of reliable public transit amazes me especially in the former street car industrial neighbourhoods idk how mid century city planning ideals ruined so many places in North America
I'm watching this in my Montréal duplex!
I love the 5-plex, one huge apartment on ground floor, traditionally occupied by the owner. And 4 appartment (usually 2 bedroom) for tennant.
As someone who has been lived in Montreal for 10 years, I still learn a lot from your video! One thing I'd like to add, the old plexes usually have poorer sound insulation compared to concrete apartment builds, due to duplex's wooden structure.
Yup as a guy from trois-rivières living in Québec, I really agree with you ending. But you can still have cool plex in trois-rivières old working class neiborhood, mostly sainte-cecile and le bas du cap.
Incredibly detailed video with great footage! Love it!
I love checking out the architecture all around the city on my bike, Montreal is beautiful.
Thank you very much for this comprehensive look at housing in Montreal, the review dwelling size vs other cities confirms my experience .I grew up in Montreal then moved out west in 1977. My sister stayed and lived in a walk up apartment in Lachine. When I returned for a month long visit in 1980 I was shocked at how big it was. It was huge, with hardwood floors. It was L shaped .You opened the door to a short hallway then an enormous living room swept 30 feet or more to a balcony. This was the short side of the L. To the left was the hallway to 3 bedrooms and a washroom with the same hardwood flooring ; built c. 1950 - 1960. 6 people could live there without feeling cramped. Many parts of Montreal still have a very small British Style pub or a " depanneur" who sells basics and beer & wines, often from a house converted retail space in which they still live. My sister would buy 2 pints of beer for hockey games in the 80s from the depanneur on her corner - at this time , alcohol was fully regulated from government agencies in other provinces ie the ALCB - " Alberta Liquor Control Board". There is a certain charm of the aforementioned European architecture that Montreal exudes that other Canadian, while still very attractive cities , they do not give that sense of history beneath the feet.
Wow love this, wish there was more of this in the GTA, and especially Toronto itself. (And especially in our housing crisis /r/canadahousing)
I live just off Bloor in Toronto in one of the 6 unit older apartments, and there's a token amount of them on my street while the majority are single or duplexes. And this is all within 5 minute walking distance to the subway station.
We need to ease up on the zoning and make more human centered population density like these
Very well done video. Congrats!
Thank you for these wonderful videos. It's encouraging others in Canada are thinking about better density and walkable cities. I am encouraging my small town in Southern Ontario to build less for cars. Not only because it leads to better livability, but it's also more economical for the urban areas.
I love this video. Some streets in the video reminds me of parts of Brooklyn. I live in the East Village in Manhattan on a street with townhouses and small apartment buildings, not more than 4 or 5 stories. Most things are in walking distance, including the park and library, and there are a lot of bike lanes. I look forward to visiting Montreal.
Tons of American cities are like this all along the east coast.
@@fergusfraser8641 Yes, but I do think newer construction has been about private houses or high rises for a while. And a lot of the really livable neighborhoods have become trendy and overpriced.
@@fergusfraser8641 Tons? Yeah right maybe 5
A lot of movie scenes that are set in NY are actually filmed in MTL. It cost way less to block a street here thant it would cost to block a street in NY to film a car chase or just a car scene between buildings.
Originally, the triplex were designed for one family occupancy. The grandparents lived on one floor, and parents with small children on another floor, and other family members the last floor. People had huge families until the 1960s. Occupying one floor and renting the other 2 are a new phenomena that started 30 years ago ish.
Ah now I really want to visit! Looks like my kind of place. Oh and your videos are really well done. Alternating narrators keeps it even more interesting than it would be already. Great visuals. BTW I originally subscribed partly because of the channel's clever name.
i love this channel!!!!!! thank you so much for uploading this video !!!
4:07 This issue can be subverted through the replacement of garbage days with public bins to place garbage, compost and the different types of recycling in as is done in cities in the Netherlands
and enclosed!
@@greenmachine5600 Yes!
I just discovered this channel and I like your style! Keep up the good work!
That's much appreciated! Thanks for watching.
I agree, great video. Suggestions for further topics: elderly and disabled options in Montreal planning, traffic planning on the island as a whole and why it's such a disaster and fight, Green space planning here and how it's different, the new REM discussion and motivations, and high rise options in Montreal. Personally of the places I've rented/owned in Montreal i most preferred the high-rise where i could walk to shops and had my vintage weekend car in the basement garage.
Thanks for your video! Cities built before the car was king have lots to teach us. Loved living in our humble but charming 4 story walk-up on St. Marc in Montreal in the 80s. We live a side-by-side in the historic Thomas Sq district of downtown Savannah, Georgia now and for all the great reasons you listed in your video (as well as the great year round weather).
No city in North America is more Jane-Jacobs than Montreal. We're very lucky here. I live in a triplex :-)
I find that all East-coast's big cities in Canada and United State has the same urbanism but not the culture. Mtl has more a Happy land culture where people enjoy there city but. Montreal, Boston, New York, Washinton, Philadelphia urbanism are almost identical.
Toronto and Chicago are identical
Vancouver- Seattle are identical.
I miss going to Montreal every summer. I hope to be back this year. I stayed in an Airbnb not far from Atwater Market and it looked just like the triplex in your video. It was very close to a grocery and even had a cool 50s style diner around the corner.
Working my way through your excellent videos . Being right of center (Canadian version) its refreshing to see the clarity, without blinders that you bring to urban housing . I would like to point out that a lot of Montreal's livability is a direct consequence of hard times . Like Pittsburg or St. Augustine a city's economic
my plan on retiring was to move back to Mtl.
I basically grew up in the city, but I hadn't lived there for 30
years. I did a couple of exploratory trips to get the feel of the city again, and they were great, but...
I have been living in a small touristy town in SWOntario, lots of good restos and shops,
and I realized that I no longer had the right frame of mind for big city living...much as I have a great affection for Mtl...I can always visit...
(if they would just do something about the embarrassing trains in this country)
btw liked and subbed
Well there seems to be plans to vastly improve the trains you would take to Montreal. . . I sure hope the Toronto to Quebec corridor gets dedicated high speed passenger rail in my lifetime.
Going through all your videos and they are great. One city that I've lived in that has quite a bit of medium-density housing is Boston, especially in the Backbay and Alston neighbourhoods. Like in Montreal, these are older parts of the city.
I lived in Montreal from 89 - 92 and lived with three others in a 4 bedroom 2 bathroom with hardwood floors and brick walls washer and dryer and right across from Parc La Fontaine all for 800$! Those were the days...
@@urbanistgod We were friends
Having to choose between single family homes and high rise condos is very depressing. North America needs more cozy, mixed use neighbourhoods with mid-rise buildings. It also needs more pedestrianised streets.
@@urbanistgod that’s wonderful if you prefer those. What’s depressing is, not having a third choice, as in most cases they are outlawed by North American zoning laws.
@@urbanistgod Yeah but only a fraction and in most cases extremely expensive. Too much demand, unsurprisingly.
@@urbanistgod haha you’re clueless.
@@urbanistgod Are you on crack or something? I'm curious exactly which part you fail to understand. I don't care about which type of housing you prefer and neither should you care about which type I do. My problem is mid-rise / high density / mixed use neighborhoods being extremely limited due to absurd zoning restrictions in North America. To make it clear, I'm not saying there's anything wrong with high rise condos or single family homes. I'm saying the third option is way too limited and it's a problem. End of.
I lived in MTL for 7 years in a walkup triplex like the ones shown in this video. It makes perfect sense for city-living. I had good light, livability and connection to the neighborhood and with some buildings with cafes, depannerus(corner store), fruiteries directly downstairs, it was amazing! I am back in my hometown of Vancouver and it feels like a dump; a very expensive dump. I really miss the deciduous trees spilling on to my balcony. Montreal is a beautiful place!
Super interesting! Awesome video! Cheers!
Thank you!
Omg the houses with the external staircases look sooo nice ((:
Wow! Montreal's architecture looks beautiful! It has a more historical European feel but the multiplex houses are something that I've not really encountered in the Netherlands, Germany, Belgium or France. Seems like a great and comfortable way to house lots of people in not a lot of space.
O such beautiful houses (or homes I should call them) ! How I wished I lived in those neighborhoods
Very interesting! Didnt know this about Montreal! Thanks for posting
Glad you enjoyed!
Great video!!
Excellent analysis; Thanks.
Definitely interesting to talk about!
There is also a fair amount of plexes built around the city center of reazonable sized Québec cities such as Sherbrooke, Saint-Hyacinthe, Shawinigan, Victoriaville, Chicoutimi and Trois-Rivières (as you mentioned at the end). Some of them are as dense as the ones in Montréal. Such a nice video by the way.
Great video...thanks
I’ve visited Montreal a few times. Fell in love with it! I think it’s the most livable city I’ve ever been to. I’d love to move there except for one thing…I fear their winters! 🥶 I’m not sure I could take it.
Anyway, I intend to visit more in the future.
I lived in Montreal for 20 years - and am back again now - before going to Japan to teach English at the university level, and during our long summer holidays I came back to Montreal every year. One summer I was in a shop looking at post cards for some reason and saw some showing the triplexes typical of the city under winter snow. They gave me a catch in the throat and a stifled sob because winter in the Tokyo area has none of the beauty of Montreal after a fresh snowfall when the big old trees along the residential streets are laced with snow and those spiral staircases turn into ephemeral sculptures that are still beautiful even after the first set of footprints, and the cars parked along the streets look like loaves of bread waiting to be baked.in some kind of gigantic assembly line.
There's always a Metro station nearby and heating our apartments is worth the modest rates paid to Quebec's massive hydro-electric power system. A young Italian woman studying in Montreal recently posted something on Instagram where she expressed amazement that people actually hang around at home in T-shirts during winter when in Italy you have to bundle up inside. People still go out to the bars & restaurants in the evening, and the conviviality that's so ingrained in Montrealers does not hibernate even in the awful depths of February.
Indeed. Montreal is the most lively winter city I know. Where else has giant outdoor snow raves, an outdoor arts festival in February, so many ice skating rinks, sledding hills, etc. People throw the best house parties in the winter. I love walking by a house or small bar, hearing the music and barely being able to make out human forms in tank tops and giant winter boots through the condensation on the windows. When 70cm of snow falls in one night everyone just shovels out and continues life as normal, that would cripple most cities. The joie de vivre ici is all the warmth you need.
Le plateau royal is such a nice place to live, it's lively and the building are gorgeous
Thank you........well done!
Awesome! I wish more cities were like Montreal.
Thank you for a great video. In this relatively frenzied Montreal housing market, I bought a unit in a low-rise 12 unit condominium spread across two buildings in Lachine. I'm 150 M from the Lachine canal, the marina, and the various parks along St Lawrence River, as well the strip of restaurants along the Lakeshore. I'd be interested in your take on urban development patterns here versus in other parts of Montreal. Your Channel has very interesting and well-produced videos. Keep up the good work!
Wow that’s impressive
i actually found this video by accident as i was looking at/for montreal canadiens hockey videos.
that said i really appreciate your guys legwork to explain some of the unique neighborhoods in montreal. great learning experience, and imo, a template that in ways, many other canadian cities should actually emulate. while i am fortunate to afford a car, i still will always remember depending on the bus and my bike. in saying that, the bus should be accessible just on grounds of employment opportunities alone.
I don't think it's about affordability. People in large cities can typically afford a car, but often have no need for it. It's just a waste of money and time, standing in the garage except for a couple of days per year when you need to transport your grandparents to the country house.
I love the outdoor steps up to the second floor deck, instead of space used for indoor narrow steps.
I love these.
This is just excellent!
Glad you liked it!
We need this in Toronto and fast!
I love this..the living ability in medium dense is all for me! I despise elevators and hallways..this type of building helps with privacy and neighborhood living… 💜
Thoughly enjoyed the video. Thank-you!
Glad you liked it!
We were going to move to Montreal, then covid happened. We love the style of living, being able to walk or metro. Here in London you need a car, and the sprawl is brutal.
One big accessibility issue is snow removal. It is very hard for disabled or elderly people to be on the top floor of outside staircase buildings. My mom loved living in a duplex but had to go to en elevator high rise when she got older. That said, I love swirly staircases and the walkability of neighbourhoods is phenomenal.
Yeah, it's hard to get bored of walking in Montreal! We've often thought about how tricky it could be to age here because of uncleared/steep/inaccessible staircases like you mention but also because of some exceptionally slippery areas on sidewalks; we've taken quite a few spills since moving here.
Actually I remember reading in a newspaper history column that these buildings were supposedly made for families. The young family would own the property and live in one of the units while renting out the rest to tenants. As the kids got older, they would move into the upper units and the parents would occupy the 1st floor unit. This is how many of my co-workers whose families bought buildings in the plateau use it. One of the apocryphal stories of why the staircases are outside is because the Catholic Church had so much influence in QC society and they deemed dark hallways an "invitation to sin" so the exterior walk-up was created so the parents on the 1st floor could see who was coming to visit their daughters. 😛
Gr8 video, keep up the good work 2 other points, both on densification. 1) The units without basements or 1/2 basements, have crawl spaces, cellars, or part cellars that would have contained large coal boilers & coal storage room too. These spaces can be dugout deeper to full basements. 2) the majority of the 'Plexes have flat roofs that can easily house a prefab light steel addition. These carry all load across to brick walls. & since units are so long they can be set back at both front & back to create there balconies on the existing roof. The setbacks would ensure the new top floors would be invisible from the street & alley, & cause no more shading than rare existinting buildings with a peaked roof.
This windfall density bonus allowing 3 floors to effectively become 5 & 4 6 should have higher developmentment fees, unless these are social housing, restricted rate rentals, or "mother-in-law suites" for family. Another benefit to the city besides development fees is to address the Montreal's heat Island effect. The new set back roof balconies should have green cover & the new roof of the added story should have either solar cells or a green roof or both.
I lived in one of these... a 6 plex built in 1916. In the Point. Best neighborhood in town.
LOL @ ''This isn't going to turn Edmonton into Montreal...'' If ever Edmonton is transformed into Montreal, somebody should please advise Mordecai Richler. He said Edmonton was so breathtakingly ugly, the whole city looks like Montreal's Decarie boulevard. Since it's not a compliment, an Edmonton newspaper published Richler's home phone number.
To be fair, Edmonton sucks. Even the rich around Edmonton seem to agree, since they live in suburbs like Saint Albert or Sherwood Park.
@@urbanistgod but Edmonton still sucks 😅
@@urbanistgod And it's sad that Edmonton is one of the better cities in a 500km radius. Let that sink in.
@@evano5635 Edmonton is expensive AF too. A lot of these nice houses are 300k or 400k. Do yourself a favor and fly to Europe. Find a smaller house in a gorgeous medium city with lots of historical sites, beautiful landscapes for a fraction of the cost and enjoy the nice mild weather.
@@urbanistgod Just go to Eastern or Northern France between the French and German or Belgian border. It's like Canada but cheaper and better. You'll see many quaint little villages with dirt cheap land. You'll also see gorgeous medium sized cities like Besancon or Lille with tons of space for pedestrians and parks. I'm afraid that any Canadian city doesn't come close and costs more $$$ to live in with shittier climate.
There are also three story duplexes, built between 1850 and 1890 in the there the top apartment was on two floors.
"This obviously isn't going to turn Edmonton into Montreal"
OMG could you imagine though? The rest of Alberta would lose their minds...
I like the quirky alleys too.
Great video. Very clear and concise. Beautiful buildings too! Could y’all do a video on parks in Montreal or maybe a few in Quebec City?
Glad you liked it! Quebec City is wonderful, we'd definitely enjoy visiting again and getting some footage. As for parks in Montreal, we'll give it some thought and see what we can do.
If you understand French, check out the series 'Montreal dans ta pipe' by Ugo Bergeron aka CapitaineMontreal. (I wouldn't mind if OTU redid some of them en anglais for a wider audience though!)
@@ajkandy merci pour la recommendation!
Vidéo très intéressante. Merci !
Boston, MA has neighborhoods with "triple deckers" that were built 75-100 years ago, but usually built of wood and with interior stairways.
Urban vs suburban, bikes vs cars we may disagree on but we can all agree on the cuteness of the floofy kittuh.
I was raised in Mirabel and I find it crazy to see the difference between Montreal's urbanism and its suburbs
Amazing channel ! Just discovered you and I can guarantee that I'll be watching a lot more.
Hopefully your coverage can also increase visibility on Life-Sized city planning that makes a difference on day to day for the citizens but that are less sexy to make headlines on the newspapers (yes, I'm talking about the upcoming elections...! :) )
Glad you like it! As outsiders it's definitely interesting that some people in Montreal don't quite realize how special their city is, and why it's important for Montreal to embrace that instead of becoming a generic North American suburban city.
Nice analysis. Take a look at Philadelphia and it’s many variations of the row house and it’s different block configurations.
love it
Montreal is such a pretty city