Allied generals — most notably Hap Arnold — realized early on that defeating the Nazis meant we'd have to become even better organizers than they were. The Allies had a massive resource advantage, but Arnold saw that fully leveraging that advantage in a two-front war was going to require a new generation of strategic planning tools. To that end, he brought together the first teams that pioneered the field of operations research (and which, after the war, formed the core founding group of RAND Corporation, which has continued to play a leading role in developing foresight techniques). [...] And every American, it seems, absorbed the lessons. [...] an entire generation learned to take the long view, think in big pictures, and visualize future events. When the war ended, millions of men and women brought those skills home to the cities and suburbs, and applied them every aspect of their lives from building companies to running households. [...] It's become a peculiarity of our character, this brash and pragmatic assumption that if you want to create a certain kind of future, you simply articulate the vision and start laying out the steps that will get you there. There aren't that many cultures in the world that offer such strong support for big ideas, elaborate logistical and organizational planning, and long-term foresight — yet, until you're outside America for a while, it's hard to notice how special this trait really is, or how strongly it defines us as a people.

Which is why this whole "Who could have foreseen it?" question reveals so much about what's gone wrong in Bush's America. It's an admission of yet another secret piece of the right-wing agenda that's been quietly, steadily moving along since the Reagan years, and has finally brought us to the point where its catastrophic implications can no longer be ignored.

She's also got a good quote from a widely read piece by UK journalist Jonathan Raban, about the state of city planning in Wasilla under Sarah Palin's mayoralty.

Remember Griffintown, will be running straight through until 5pm on Sunday evening. There is a lot to do, and a lot to see! So check out the schedule, and come on down! (NOTE: THE GALLERY WILL NOW OPENING AT 5PM.)

RAIN OR SHINE the show must go on! So bring a coat or an umbrella, and come enjoy a FREE weekend of festivities!

How to get here:

By Car from the West:
-    Take Highway 20 East and continue towards "Montreal Centre-Ville" on to the 720 East.
-    Get off at the Guy Street exit, and turn right on to Rene-Levesque
-    Follow Rene-Levesque until Peel Street, where you will turn right, going south on Peel.
-    Follow Peel until Ottawa Street (two blocks south of Notre-Dame)
-    Turn left on Ottawa, and two blocks down (Corner of Ann Street) you will reach 950 Ottawa Street, and Remember Griffintown!

By Bus and Metro:
-    Go to Peel Metro (Green Line) and take the 107 Bus South (at the corner of Peel and St. Catherine) Here is a link directly to the STM Schedule: http://www2.stm.info/azimuts/horaire.wcs?l=107&d=S&t=52398&lng=a
-    Get off at Ottawa Street, and walk two blocks east of Peel, (Cross Peel Street), and walk two blocks, and you're here!

Here is a link to the 107 North Schedule leaving from Peel and Ottawa Streets:
http://www2.stm.info/azimuts/horaire.wcs?l=107&d=N&t=53872&lng=a

WE ARE LOOKING FORWARD TO SEEING YOU!

We have a lot of people to thank for this event, and I apologize in advance if I've forgotten anyone.

Harvey Lev - for the FREE use of his property, without his generous contribution, help and advice, this event wouldn't have been anywhere near possible!

CUTV (Concordia University Television) - Jason Gondziola (Station Manager) has been a huge supporter of this event, without him, we wouldn't have had the money to put this event together, so hats off to him for all the support!

Indyish (www.indyish.com) - Risa Dickens is one of the greatest people in the world!  Risa, thank you for all the help, advice, chats, support and E-V-E-R-Y-T-H-I-N-G you have done to make this three-day celebration, everything it will be! And Tristan Brand for all is help and support! We're glad you're doing better!

Moog Audio, AKG and Soundcraft for supplying all of our Audio Equipment!

St. Ambroise for their sponsorship and support!

Loyola High School, for projectors, vehicules, and support!

QPRIG McGill & QPRIG Concordia, for the continued support!

The Committee for Sustainable Redevelopment of Griffintown, without the help of Judith Bauer and Chris Gobeil, we wouldn't have been able to get all the people we had for this event!

Steven Peck, for his abundance of work, help and fantastic presentation! (Go check it out! See below for times.)

Matthew Barlow, for all the help organizing our tours, and helping with just about everything Griffintown.

Denis Delaney for offering his precious time!

Liliane Aflalo, Jessica Aflalo & Maza "Oma" Lorentz, for the use of their cars on numerous occaisions.

CJAD 800/Mix96/CHOM 97.7 - For the generous donations and on-air time!

All of our Volunteers (too many to name!)

To the CUTV staff: Melanie Gallant (PR), Veronique Leblanc (Community Outreach)

Emmanuel Hessler for all his hard work, support and phenomenal ideas! Many, we love you!

To all the artists, who have GENEROUSLY donated their talents and time! (We will be collecting donations for all our artists!)

And finally, a VERY Special Thanks to our Technical Advisor, "Name it, I do it" guy, scavenger hunt organizer, and overall supporter of this event from DAY ONE... Dominic Roussel. Without Dom's help, this event wouldn'thave been at ALL possible. He has been, and continues to be a remarkable person, and we owe him a huge big ass hug for all the work he as put into this event! Thank you Dom.

See you this weekend!

Paul Aflalo & Liz Bono (Event Coordinators)

--
[paul@paulogic.com]

[www.paulogic.com]

Well, if your central nervous system has been technofied, this may look pretty cool. Sad to see Montreal's uniqueness being transformed into an international generic that has no true home or cultural value.

On the design front, they've been working with American-born architect Eric R. Kuhne and his London-based firm CivicArts on the architectural design for Project Griffintown. And the first released image looks like this:

I'm not sure what to think about this. It's a single rendering, but at this distance, the buildings look awfully like generic office-park, reflective-glass, cookie-cutter affairs. And check out those big angular hotel towers! Shades of The Fountainhead (movie version) mixed in with Things To Come.

That said, the firm has done tons of work in Kuwait and Dubai, as well as new-ish "towne centre" lifestyle retail developments across the UK. They seem able to work in multiple modes; their One New Change project in London is actually quite admirable. 

The CivicArts website says their philosophy is a high-minded "Marketplace of Ideas," which to me sounds like "Shopping is Good," especially when you read the accompanying blurb:

“Cities have always been marketplaces for commodities, goods, services and faiths, but in this passionate appeal to contemporary society, Kuhne believes that none of these truly reveres the power of civic life. Hoping to restore the story-tellng quality of architecture and cities, Kuhne weaves a collection of stories into a compelling philosophy of creating great civic spaces. Trade is what brings life to cities, Kuhne analyses the responsibilty that contemporary society has in redeeming the vitality of cities and towns. Using examples of his work on four continents, Kuhne illustrates the way retail can become the new dimension of how experience takes precedent over architecture, and the way that we can use retail to bring back the pageantry of civic life to cities and towns.”

I'd have preferred they make at least more than a passing mention of sustainability, walkability, and transit-centric design, but their essential point is correct; urban neighborhoods are villages animated by retail Main Streets.

The problem, of course, is how to create meaningful places from scratch. A lot of the best work is done by infill, where fine-grained scale permits incremental evolution; Projet Griffintown still aims to erase one of the oldest street grids in North America. There's also a question of architectural style; how timeless is this going to be? How well are these buildings going to age? Can any of these buildings be upgraded or re-adapted to other uses?

The crucial issues of green space, sightlines to the Mountain and increased car traffic on Peel Street still need to be addressed. 

I'm going to reserve judgment until I can see more of the planned street levels and individual building designs, but I still have my doubts.

The Mass In The Park.

Griffintown mass for St. Ann to go on despite pastor's death.

Factotum was there and posted a few pictures.

Essentially, the project has gone through at the municipal level -- the proposed changes to the urban plan were adopted, paving the way for Devimco's project.

Since then, there was a meeting at the local borough council in order to "conform" the local borough's own urbanism plan to the new city plan, at which we all attended, spoke, and asked questions.

After that, there's been one or two procedural meetings, but there's something else very interesting going on which might derail Devimco's project altogether.

The city some time ago gave Devimco an extension in order to get their funding guarantees together. And, likely linked to that deadline, according to Le Devoir, the actual expropriations have been pushed forward to September. 

If Devimco can't come up with funding guarantees in time, then their 'entente de developpement' with the city falls through. The question then becomes, will another developer step in to do something within this new, grossly overscaled urban plan?

Given the state of the economy at the moment, and the never-to-again-be-cheap price of oil, I can't foresee anyone looking at a car-based retail project and thinking that it would be a good long-term investment. Now would be the time to do something bold and innovative; maybe it's time to talk to the developers of Dockside Green, or Foster and Partners -- they're building the world's first modern carfree sustainable development, Masdar City, in the UAE.

If they can do it, why not us?

I'm not sure if they're going to allow much time for questions or comments -- but we're going to show up en masse to remind them that they are elected officials, and if they want to stay elected, it's not really a good idea to ignore established democratic processes, expert opinions, and the wishes of the people. 

If you want to add your presence / voice to the meeting:

Arrondissement Sud-Ouest

815 Bel-Air (not too far from Lionel-Groulx metro, one street over from Rose-de-Lima)

Doors open at 6:30. If you want to ask questions, best to get there early and sign up.

Some quotes,

"It's a breach of trust," said Dinu Bumbaru, program director for Heritage Montreal."Imagine if we have this flawed process that we saw in Griffintown applied to all these projects? Montreal is going to be a planning hell."

And my favorite in the can-you-stretch-this-one-any-further category comes from executive committee spokesperson, Allan DeSousa, "And a tramway line runs in two directions. Griffintown residents might use it to shop downtown". That's like saying people will move here because of the shopping, but may prefer to shop elsewhere, still, it is good to know that he understands the basic dynamics of tram travel.

Marvin Rotrand, Union Montrealer Warren Allmand and Projet Montréal leader Richard Bergeron were the only members of the 65-seat council to oppose the project.

Council has "a few lone voices among this pack of unanimous-voting acolytes of the mayor," architect Joesh Baker said bitterly. He objects to the project's scale and density.

The most ironic part of the whole thing is City Hall announcing it will form a committee to study improving Ste. Catherine Street. Suddenly it needs improving? If it ain't broken now, but you know you are inflicting great damage....?

It is pretty obvious that council is made up of people anticipating wonderful careers beholden to favors given to developers. Something is very wrong with council's support for the Griffintown project, something very tragic in the making.

This is the same administration responsible for "improving" infrastructure on blvd. Saint Laurent. That project kept the street torn open, dusty, noisy, traffic fragmented, and a basic nightmare for a year and half while at least fourteen business were forced to close. But these same people are capable of giving the city billion dollar make overs? Gimme a break!

The Tremblay Administration needs to be voted out of existence! The elections are only a little over a year away. But it is time to start organizing now!

Griffintown: Is It The Right Plan For The Right Place?

Guess What's In The Big Box?

Concern on Mount Royal Avenue

It's such a great concept.

Slightly obscured view of Five Roses sign.

This is part of the magic of Griffintown and it's possibilities. The Devimco project will completely wipe out sight lines like this.

Montreal seems to have a thing for architectural history as evidenced by the ruins at Champs de Mars (just outside City Hall).

Or even symbolic ruins like besides this museum on Old Montreal.

Send me your photos of preserved ruins in Montreal and I will post them here.

The Mass In The Park

Griffintown Wiki

History Under Demolition

by Raphaël Fischler, School of Urban Planning, McGill University

The Griffintown saga is an example of what has become routine in Montreal. A developer comes up with a project; citizens and planners (civil servants, members of municipal advisory committees, outside experts) believe that the plan is weak in several respects; officials, however, find that the plan is a great investment which will bring good tax-revenue to the city; they disregard the advice given to them and give the developer what he wants.

This is a caricature of what really happens, of course. In most cases, projects do get changed somewhat in response to advice given by residents, planners and others. The new development agreement between the City and Devimco shows that the Tremblay administration has forced the developer to improve his project in several ways, for instance by including more park space and by showing a bit more respect for the existing historic context.

But the improvements come nowhere near to responding to the requests for change that were issued. I don’t know exactly what the planners working for the City and for the South-West borough told officials about the project. I cannot imagine that they found it all good. What I can tell you, and what many of you know, is that both the Comité d’architecture et d’urbanisme and the Conseil du patrimoine, two so-called “expert” panels, issued very negative assessments of the project. Independent experts have expressed similar opinions in the media, and a large number of residents and other stakeholders have stated their reservations in public as well. The weaknesses that these people have highlighted have not really been remedied in the new plan.

The main problems with the plan—if one may restate what has been said repeatedly—is that it is the wrong thing in the wrong place. It contains nothing else than a new destination for commerce and recreation, a new regional node right next to downtown and Old Montréal. It contains “big-box” stores and associated shops with a total floor area of 100,000 square metres (larger than any regional shopping centre on the island of Montréal, barely smaller than Carrefour Laval) and close to 4,000 housing units (at a gross density that is higher than in any Montréal neighbourhood except parts of downtown). And it does all that by means of an urban design that is completely at odds with the morphology of the area and its surroundings.

A related problem is that, due to its size, the project requires major interventions by the City: expropriation (done solely for the benefit of a private developer), infrastructure investment (at least $60 million, plus the $300-million tramway) and plan amendment (of course, current plans and regulations do not allow for such a mega-development). The City is going to use its power and money to do something that contradicts its own policies and endangers existing urban areas. And, to make things even worse, it is doing so by short-circuiting public participation in the process.

All this has raised intense criticism. Rarely has a project met such unanimity of opinion. Rarely have experts issues such a strongly worded opinion as they did in this case. Even the Ordre des urbanistes du Québec, which normally does not intervene in specific cases, has seen fit to add its name to the list of a signatories to a letter addressed to the mayor Montréal. All this must mean something.

One of the things this means, is that the Tremblay administration is not playing by its own rules and is betraying its own promises. When Tremblay became mayor of Montreal, he and Robert Libman, who was then in charge of urban planning at the Executive Committee, said loud and clear that, from now on, Montréal would demand higher-quality architecture and urban design and would manage urban-planning processes in a more fair and transparent manner. The time of “anything-goes-as-long-as-it-brings-in-property-taxes” was over.

Tremblay had the opportunity to deliver on this promise, because he had a strong real-estate market and because he had political support. When developers are eager to build, it is far easier to demand certain things from them, such as the inclusion of affordable housing, the use of green building technology, or simply good, context-sensitive urban design. The Montreal Summit had given Tremblay a strong consensus in favour of more participatory processes. But Tremblay has squandered this opportunity and André Lavallée, who is now in charge of urban planning, is too isolated to make good on theses promises on his own.

The sad reality is that our elected officials do not really know what to ask for. Too often, they do not know the difference between good and bad urban design, between sustainable and unsustainable urban development. (Not that the differences are radical, but they are real.) The same holds true of their understanding of citizen participation. For Alan DeSousa, public consultation on the Griffintown project was (I quote from the notes for his speech today) “exemplary.” That represents a very modest notion of public consultation at its best…

When we talk about good urban design, good urban development or good urban planning, one may of course ask: who is to say what is good? One person may think that Paris is the greatest city in the world; for another New York City is tops; for a third, Sienna is a dream place. And for every person who loves how Paris looks, there is one who hates how much Paris costs, or one who hates how undemocratically it has been planned. Even within Montréal, some people believe that downtown is the greatest place to be, while other are enamored with Rosemont and yet others feel good only on the West Island. In the same way, some people believe that large-scale projects are important to make a difference and to create a harmonious environment. But others believe that small-scale projects are the way to go, because they are less risky and allow for fine-tuning over time. So who is to say what the right vision or attitude is?

Ultimately, urban development is a collective responsibility. It has to be managed by the community, through the political process. In this process, there must be room for leadership and there must be room for broad participation. Leadership can come from many sides, from private developers as well as from grassroots organizations. But leadership is expected also from our politicians. What the Griffintown project shows, is that there is a lack of political leadership in urban planning and development in Montréal. Our elected officials seem to have no sense of priority and to react to development proposals in an ad-hoc manner.

In truth, many people are afraid of political leadership in urban matters. They recall the terrible things that were done to the city in the past, for example the demolition of neighbourhoods to build highways. Many residents want their representatives to help protect their neighbourhood, to be conservative. Even our dear Plateau progressives can be terrible NIMBYists. For them, exercising leadership often means saying “no.”

But Griffintown is not Milton Park. Griffintown is not a vibrant neighbourhood being threatened by large-scale demolition for the sake of private profit. Griffintown is a more or less derelict, half-abandoned area that can use major reinvestment. Indeed, reinvestment has started there, along Peel Street and along other streets. What it also needs is municipal leadership to guide that reinvestment in ways that are socially, environmentally and economically sound.

Good urban design and good urban planning can take place only if there is political support for these values. Montréal has some champions of good design and planning, such as the CCA and Héritage Montréal. It also has good defenders of democratic decision-making, among them the members of the Montreal Citizens Forum.

What Montréal does not have, not yet at least, is a culture that values urban design and urban planning. Officials and citizens too often accept easy solutions when, for the same money, they could have something better. One should not ask for excellence all the time; excellence is too hard and too expensive for the bulk of urban development. But clearly, Montréal deserves something better for Griffintown than what is being proposed now. Experts and professionals can help, but what is most needed is a better-informed political class and a more proactive population. The organisers of this meeting are to be commended to trying to generate movement in that direction.

• Supposedly more green space and/or public places, they say, but according to (possibly badly drawn) new diagrams, it looks like a lot less now. The new plan seems to extend a space from Square Gallery Park down to the canal; there's also a new public space / pedestrian area extending down Ann near or under the railroad tracks. This in addition to their pedestrian extension of De La Montagne through a "piercing" under the tracks to the canal, and a vaguely-defined public space where Peel becomes Rue de la Commune, again under the tracks, near the proposed concert hall / arts complex. On another map, a green area extending up from the Canal along Wellington appears to have vanished.
• Rue Smith will be rehabilitated and not closed, and sections of Murray and Shannon below Wellington will be kept as pedestrian streets in the "lifestyle sector."
• The area below Wellington has had its height restrictions eased to encompass 70m buildings (!) where only 60m buildings were allowed in the previous design. That said, minimum street heights have been lowered to 9m from 14m, which should in theory allow for more human-scaled buildings at the pedestrian level.
• The former "camillienne," aka comfort station, at the corner of Wellington and Murray will not in fact be moved to St. Ann's Park, but will be integrated in situ. Whether its vocation is still to be a museum for Irish Griffintown is still unanswered.
• Most troubling, is that where four of the larger and more interesting buildings were planned to be "partially reconstructed," the new plan shows outright demolition, with only the old police station on Young being preserved and moved to De La Montagne. Is this just bad diagramming or has preservation (or taxidermy if you want to call it that) gone out the window?

Many people believe, erroneously, that the only way to achieve environmental efficiencies in development is by building very tall buildings. Indeed, improving the average density of building in England is critical to achieving “location efficiency,” which reduces automobile use and greenhouse gas emissions, as well as minimizing land-take. But these efficiencies only begin to occur at 17 units to the hectare, when public transport becomes feasible, and begin to tail off at densities above 70 units to the hectare, according to a definitive research study from the United States which has recently been applied by my Foundation in a London project. This is because achieving environmental gains is a function of density, access to public transport and walkable, connected streets. Pedestrian street access becomes more difficult at higher density. Indeed, there is also a question about whether London’s overstressed public transport network can actually handle greater density at the centre. Creating visual pollution is not the answer to achieving greater efficiency. [...]

The argument has been made that London must build tall buildings in order to protect its place as a global financial centre. [...] I am not opposed to all tall buildings. My concern is that they should be considered in their context; in other words, they should be put where they fit properly. If new vertical cul-de-sacs are to be built, then it seems self-evident to me that they should stand together to establish a new skyline, and not compete with or confuse what is currently there – as has already happened to a depressing and disastrous extent. 

There is a very real and urgent risk looming over us that in the drive to make historic cities like London and Edinburgh “world cities” in the commercial sense, we simply make them more like every other city in the world and in so doing dishonour and discredit their status, character and local distinctiveness. In “A Vision of Britain,” I suggested that the impact of new buildings could be softened by an acceptance of the existing street rhythms and plot sizes and that the buildings in a city such as London, Edinburgh or even Bath or Ealing are the individual brushstrokes of a grand composition, which works because all the participants understood the basic rules and “grammar,” with harmony being the pleasing result. This lesson is, I believe, still as relevant today as it was in the Enlightenment, when builders sought to remake their cities to compete on a new stage. For the past sixty years or so we have been conducting an experiment in social and environmental engineering that has gone disastrously wrong.

(via Martin Laplante.)

A SPEECH BY HRH THE PRINCE OF WALES AT THE NEW BUILDINGS IN OLD PLACES CONFERENCE AT ST JAMES'S PALACE, LONDON

31st January 2008 

Minister, Ladies and Gentlemen, I am enormously grateful to all of you for coming today, particularly to the Minister for giving up her precious time for what promises to be a lively and interesting gathering on the subject of New Buildings in Old Places. If I may say so, I am delighted to see so many familiar faces (dotted about in the audience - pepperpotted not in ghettos!) and very pleased indeed that The National Trust and Historic Royal Palaces have joined with my Regeneration Trust and my Foundation for the Built Environment to sponsor this timely event. And I must use this opportunity to apologise to poor Ros Kerslake and Hank Dittmar for constantly putting them under so much pressure to deal with so many issues that this conference seeks to review.
 
At present, our country looks to be in the midst of one of its periodic building booms, and in an ancient land such as our own, we cannot help but build the new amongst the old. I can only think of two times in our history where it was proposed to build homes, workplaces and shops on such a massive scale, and both times it changed the face of Britain. I am thinking of the Victorian era, when our predecessors built the face of the cities of industrial England, and of the post-war period through to the end of the 1960s when there was a rush to rebuild, knocking down much that was old in the process. In the first case, although there were the inevitable mistakes made, much that was built was of enduring value and at least acknowledged the historical patterns and identity of past generations. In the second, every time-tested principle and all reference to an accumulated inheritance in the “grammar”, if you like, of architecture and building were simply thrown out of the window and we have been living with the consequences of this enormously risky experiment ever since. And the gigantic experiment still goes on, with the same mistakes being repeated and with yet further consequences for people’s lives and for the long term future of this planet.
 
In the haste to build after the Second World War, many untested new design theories were put into practice, with the best of intentions but disastrous results. I am thinking particularly of the brave new world of housing estates – the system-built, deck access variety, and the tower block – which quickly became sink estates all across the country, unloved and relentlessly, depressingly ugly, with endless wasted acres of “public open space” and a dearth of private space. I know because I spent a lot of time in the 1980s trying to see what I could do to improve the inner cities. Many of these have been torn down after only 20 to 30 years of use. The builders of that era also ripped apart many town and city centres for enclosed shopping malls and parking structures, many of which have also been taken down.
 
 
Ladies and Gentlemen, the point about all this is that we simply cannot afford to repeat these mistakes, but this time in a twenty-first century guise. In fact, I would go so far as to say we must not repeat such mistakes. We owe it to the people of this country to do infinitely better and that is the purpose of today’s conference: to try to learn from the past, and take the best ideas forward as we build what will become tomorrow’s heritage today.
 
Now our current plans call for building three million new homes by 2020, which you all know better than I, which amounts to 240,000 new houses each year, at a time when the house builders currently only put up 185,000 houses per annum. And if that doesn’t seem like a challenge, The National Housing Planning and Advice Unit has said that 270,000 houses need to be built each year, arguing for a total by 2016 of 3.25 million!
 
Such ambitious housing targets will impact both the countryside and our cities, towns and suburbs, and groups ranging from The National Trust to the Campaign to Protect Rural England have, most understandably, expressed deep concern about the potential consequences. A 2007 Housing Audit by the Government’s design watchdog, the Commission on Architecture and the Built Environment, found that “the housing produced in the first few years of this new century is simply not up to the standard which the Government is demanding and which customers have a right to expect.”
 
Requirements to build on brownfield land and an appropriate concern about building at densities that support public transport and mixed-use means that much of the new housing is being built within existing built-up areas, and provided in the form of flats in residential towers of nine to twenty stories. These towers are generally opposed by local residents, but loved by “buy to let” investors and planners to add a bit of the “wow” factor to their suburb or town. I therefore hope very much that this conference will address the issue of building housing at greater densities in a way that is harmonious with town and city scapes, with the existing heritage and with the needs and desires of local residents. We have endured for too long the prevailing lack of courtesy within the public realm and the time has come to reinvent “good manners” in the way we build. We should surely be asking whether it is a natural pre-requisite of “being modern” to display bad manners? Is it “being modern”, for instance, to vandalize the few remaining relatively unspoilt, beautiful areas of our cities, any more than it would be “modern” to mug defenceless elderly people? Can it not be modern “to do to others as you would have them do to you?” That’s the question.
 
Ever since I so rashly decided to get involved with these issues by writing “A Vision of Britain,” I have been working on a series of principles for building better places. Together with my Trust, my Foundation and the Duchy of Cornwall, I have been trying to put these principles into practice at Poundbury and other smaller sites – although not without a bit of difficulty here and there!
So now, taking advantage of the fact that I am nearly sixty, I would like to share a few thoughts with you about the ways that we can build new buildings in old places, distilled from nearly twenty years of all this experience.
 
Now, it seems to me that the following ideas might conceivably be worth following up:
Firstly, recognition that sustainability actually means building for the long-term – one hundred years, rather than twenty years; 
Secondly, because of this, it is worth building in an adaptable and flexible manner, reassessing and re-using existing buildings wherever possible; 
Thirdly, it is worth building in a manner that fits the place, in terms of materials used, proportion and layouts and climate, ecology and building practices; 
Fourthly, it is worth building beautifully, in a manner that builds upon tradition, evolving it in response to present challenges and utilising present day resources and techniques; 
And, finally, it is worth understanding the purpose of a building, or group of buildings, within the hierarchy of the buildings around it and responding with an appropriate building type and design. Doing this often implies the composition of a harmonious whole, rather than the erection of singular objects of architectural or corporate will which merely panders to ego-centric imperatives. 
 
Such principles, in my experience, tend to create added social and environmental value, as well as commercial value. They apply whether building anew or adapting existing buildings. We all need to consider the meaning of heritage and recognize that sustainability is achieved by creating buildings that people will both want to use, and be able to use efficiently, a hundred years hence. Local distinctiveness should flourish and traditional craft skills should be re-discovered and incorporated in new buildings as well as old; so that true and timeless methods of building are exploited for not only the beauty they create, but also the environmental benefits they offer. You may possibly, ladies and gentlemen, have heard of the Slow Food Movement which has emerged as a direct reaction to the overall destructiveness of fast food (and incidentally, as probably you may have read, we waste a third of all food in this country too)… What we need is a “Slow Architecture Movement” as well. This is not mere romanticism, for after 32 years of The Prince’s Trust I have come to see just how many young lives are wasted; how much potential talent and technical craft skill is lost because people are not able to follow their true calling and thus become psychologically frustrated and alienated. I have seen an awful lot of such young people. We never seem to think about this aspect of the whole built environment equation – the fact that we are actively discouraging young people from putting their souls, yes their souls, into buildings through the skills they acquire…
 
So in those places where more ambitious urban development is appropriate, there are principles of planning which, again, can make sure new development is adding value to communities in this country. Such principles include well-designed public spaces, a mix of shops and services within walking distance, values of hierarchy, legibility and proportion, integration of high-quality private, social and affordable housing – and by incorporating these qualities we are applying the lessons tradition teaches us about how better neighbourhood design improves the lives of those who live in new developments.
 
And while we are talking about principles, let’s just consider for a moment, if we may, the issue of taller buildings in our historic towns and cities, and especially in and around the United Kingdom’s twenty-seven World Heritage sites. In this area I very much fear we are repeating the mistakes of the 1960s, but doing so with even greater hubris and efficiency!
 
Corporate and residential towers are being proposed across London, and overshadowing World Heritage sites from Edinburgh to Bath – this audience will not need reminding of the fact that the World Heritage status of sites such as Edinburgh’s old city, the Tower of London and Westminster have all been challenged by U.N.E.S.C.O. due to new construction in recent years. And so they should be, as there is no point at all in having a World Heritage site unless it retains its unique integrity. There are, after all, other areas where such tall buildings could be accommodated within their own context. The French have managed it quite well up to now in La Défense, in Paris (but I hear there are even current threats to the integrity of the historic quarters of Paris from ever taller, deconstructed glass monoliths). For some unaccountable reason we seem to be determined to vandalize these few remaining sites which retain the kind of human scale and timeless character that so attract people to them and which increase in value as time goes by. What is it, Ladies and Gentlemen, about our outlook which perpetuates desire deliberately to desecrate such places? You would think, wouldn’t you, that we might have outgrown this kind of attitude by now…?
 
Thus, in chasing the corporate tenant or the buy-to-let investor, we may not only be destroying our heritage, but killing the goose that lays the golden egg for we will destroy what makes our cities and towns so attractive to tourists in the process. Interestingly, London currently holds almost a two per cent share of world tourism and London tourists spent £7.5 billion here in 2006, according to Visit London, with visitor surveys attesting to the fact that the Tower of London and St. Paul’s Cathedral are Britain’s top paid attractions. Nevertheless, speculative towers are currently proposed in the environs of both the Tower and St. Paul’s…
 
Many people believe, erroneously, that the only way to achieve environmental efficiencies in development is by building very tall buildings. Indeed, improving the average density of building in England is critical to achieving “location efficiency,” which reduces automobile use and greenhouse gas emissions, as well as minimizing land-take. But these efficiencies only begin to occur at 17 units to the hectare, when public transport becomes feasible, and begin to tail off at densities above 70 units to the hectare, according to a definitive research study from the United States which has recently been applied by my Foundation in a London project. This is because achieving environmental gains is a function of density, access to public transport and walkable, connected streets. Pedestrian street access becomes more difficult at higher density. Indeed, there is also a question about whether London’s overstressed public transport network can actually handle greater density at the centre. Creating visual pollution is not the answer to achieving greater efficiency.
 
It is crucial to stress before it is all too late, and before people are persuaded otherwise by clever marketing, that these location efficiencies can be achieved easily by traditional English building types, including the four to five storey terrace and the six to ten storey mansion block. It is worth remembering this. In fact, Kensington and Chelsea, which so far lacks tower blocks, is the densest London borough. It is worth noting that the Urban Renaissance report showed how densities of 75 units to the hectare can be achieved by mansion blocks and terraces, both of which can provide family housing, and can include gardens, unlike the typical one to two bedroom tower blocks being built all over London today.
 
And, if we look at London’s skyline, and compare it, say, to Paris where, up to now, building heights are regulated far more precisely, we are immediately struck by how much less is protected here than abroad. The current debates about tall buildings here in London would have been unnecessary and superfluous in Paris – where tall buildings have been concentrated, as I have mentioned earlier, in the urban quarter of La Défense – outside the historic area which, of course, continues to attract tourists and their spending power.
 
And, in Berlin, too, where an immense programme of reconstruction and regeneration has gone on – larger than in any other European city – the city leaders have insisted upon rigorous limitations to the height of new buildings. These kinds of approaches can help to achieve a far more coherent sense of harmony and civic self-confidence than the alternative “free-for-all” that will leave London and our other cities with a pockmarked skyline. Not just one carbuncle, ladies and gentlemen, on the face of a much-loved old friend, but a positive rash of them that will disfigure precious views and disinherit future generations of Londoners.
 
To seek to protect historic views and vantage points, and oppose the planning of random new towers – for perhaps they would be better described as “vertical Cul-de-Sacs” or “Network Congestors”! – is not, I believe, synonymous with supporting what some have rather disparagingly called a “museum city.” It is certainly legitimate to ask, I would have thought, how it can be considered sensible, or indeed rational, to implant such “congestors” into a network of streets which were designed to function with two to three storey buildings… You might think, too, mightn’t you, that in today’s world there would be a whole series of health and safety issues that needed to be considered!
 
The argument has been made that London must build tall buildings in order to protect its place as a global financial centre. While this argument doesn’t in any way apply to the dozens of undistinguished blocks of one and two bedroom flats being built all over the city, surely business seeks glamorous buildings? If this is so, then Canary Wharf already provides, like La Défense, a place for those statements of corporate aspiration to be made. Why can they not be concentrated there, rather than overshadowing Wren’s and Hawksmoor’s churches? My concern is that London will become just like everywhere else with the same homogenized buildings that express nothing but outdated unsustainability. It may be very surprising to some that the preferred location for many hedge funds and the new private equity firms is neither the City or Canary Wharf, but Mayfair, St. James’s and Belgravia, thus demonstrating the enduring appeal of the mixed-use, mid-rise, human scale city quarter.
 
So, the key point I want to make is that I am not opposed to all tall buildings. My concern is that they should be considered in their context; in other words, they should be put where they fit properly. If new vertical cul-de-sacs are to be built, then it seems self-evident to me that they should stand together to establish a new skyline, and not compete with or confuse what is currently there – as has already happened to a depressing and disastrous extent.
 
If clustered, then the virtue of height becomes something that can, in the hands of creative architects, be truly celebrated. This solution, so clearly the case in Manhattan or La Défense in Paris, requires locations where intrusion into historically protected views, either at height or at street level, can be avoided, and is, therefore, difficult to justify in places such as the City of London where the pressure to build at height is often greatest.
 
There is a very real and urgent risk looming over us that in the drive to make historic cities like London and Edinburgh “world cities” in the commercial sense, we simply make them more like every other city in the world and in so doing dishonour and discredit their status, character and local distinctiveness. In “A Vision of Britain,” I suggested that the impact of new buildings could be softened by an acceptance of the existing street rhythms and plot sizes and that the buildings in a city such as London, Edinburgh or even Bath or Ealing are the individual brushstrokes of a grand composition, which works because all the participants understood the basic rules and “grammar,” with harmony being the pleasing result. This lesson is, I believe, still as relevant today as it was in the Enlightenment, when builders sought to remake their cities to compete on a new stage. For the past sixty years or so we have been conducting an experiment in social and environmental engineering that has gone disastrously wrong.
 
Is it not time to say, ladies and gentlemen, in the words of William Cowper – that “Here the heart may give a useful lesson to the head, and learning wiser grow without his books?”

A fabulous cartoon by Jack Ruttan.

Coudonc, ces gens là quand ils déménagent dans un nouvel appartement, est-ce qu'ils laissent la peinture telle qu'elle en prétextant que c'était comme ça, on le laisse comme ça? Ça me surprendrait pas mal. J'en ai assez du monde qui veulent pas de changement ou d'avancement dans la vie. Crisse, ils prévoient des milliers de nouveau logements, dont la moitié seront des HLM, c'est quoi le problème? Un autre argument est que cela augmentera le trafic automobile dans les alentours du centre-ville. Bein oui, pis? Si c'est pas là que le monde ira se promener, ça va être ailleurs.

Que des gens se prononcent contre le projet qui prévoyait un nouveau casino dans le bout du centre-ville, je peux comprendre. Je veux dire, je pense pas que d'attirer les touristes en augmentant le nombre de machines à sous soit une très bonne idée. Mais dans le cas Griffintown, on parle d'un projet immobilier et commercial qui pourrait rapporter gros à l'administration de la ville.

Voici un texte de Yves Boisvert qui résume bien ce que je pense.

Wake-up! Arrêtez de courir sur un tapis roulant en faisant du surplace pis allez donc courir dans les rues un peu...

Montreal City Council votes tonight on approving the PPU that allows Devimco's project to go forward.

If you can be there today, you'll need to get to City Hall by 4:30pm to register to ask questions, then return at 6:30 to get your speaking order number before the session starts at 7pm.

If you can't be there today, express your dissatisfaction with the process by calling or emailing your city councillor. It only takes a few minutes and it means a lot. (PLEASE -- be polite when doing so.)

Currently, we are urging them to not approve the current PPU, and to extend public consultation on the project to allow for appropriate time for citizens and organizations to examine the revised project that was announced this week by the City and Devimco. The word of the day is "What's the rush?"

You can find out who represents you on city council by using this page at the City's website. Just choose "Conseiller de la Ville" from the Title popup, then select your borough (Arrondissement) from the one below that. It should return the list of all the councillors that represent you.

For the Sud-Ouest borough which includes St-Henri, Little Burgundy, Griffintown, and Pointe-St-Charles, the councillors are:

Jean-Yves Cartier - email jeanyvescartier@ville.montreal.qc.ca

Line Hamel - email linehamel@ville.montreal.qc.ca

Jacqueline Montpetit (also the borough mayor) - email jacquelinemontpetit@ville.montreal.qc.ca

They share a common set of phone and fax numbers at the borough city hall: 
tel: 514 872-6814 fax: 514 872-3705

If you haven't already done so, sign the petition, or urge your friends, family and colleagues to do so! Between electronic and paper versions we've got over 700 signatures and it'd be great if we could break 1000.

maZe Canadia has posted some photos at Flickr.

And here is two from Factotum.

Part of a set at flickr by kinalaya.

And a still and a video from my friend (whom I missed), Jack Ruttan.

And this one from ben soo.

Never Give Up.

Funérailles de Griffintown Funeral - Montréal, Québec

In this pic: Myself, Chris Gobeil and Chris Erb of the Committee for the Sustainable Redevelopment of Griffintown, posing as pallbearers with the casket containing the ghosts of Griffintown. Originally uploaded by maZe Canadia

It was a funeral not for a neighborhood, but for good urban planning and real civic democracy, both of which have been markedly absent during the entire process.

About 150 people turned out for the march, including people young and old, walking, wheeling or with assistance, dogs and horses too. We got quite a bit of press coverage and I was briefly interviewed by CTV News, who have a video piece up about the Horse Palace here. (Windows Media).

More photos and video of the rally here, here, and here. Got more? Let us know in the comments. (no rickrolling!)

On April 28, 2008, after a long illness, the historic Montreal neighborhood is expected to finally expire with the passage of 44.04 on the agenda of the Asemblee Ordinaire de Conseil Municipal.

Born in 1804, when renowned surveyor Louis Charland laid out the street grid, Griffintown suffered through long periods of neglect by the city administration, followed by frantic bursts of municipal rezoning activity that disrupted it's circulatory system and ultimately led to it's demise.

Griffintown died after being infected with a severe case of inverted urban planning (PPU designed by the developer), consisting of big box stores, apartment towers and street closures, resulting in a debilitating loss of patrimony.

Predeceased by sister Victoriatown, also known as Goose Village, who died from expropriation while giving birth to parking lots, Griffintown is survived by brothers Milton Park and Old Montreal.

A funeral for Griffintown and outdated urban planning practices is planned for Sunday, April 27, 2008. Mourners are requested to join the procession at the Griffintown Horse Palace at 1220 Ottawa Street at 3:00 PM, or at Place D'Armes at 3:45 PM for the funeral march to City Hall, Place Vauquelin, where eulogies (and other speeches) will be offered from 4:15 to 5:30 PM.

In lieu of flowers, mourners are requested to vote for the party that promises to rebuild the urban planning function of the Ville de Montreal in the next municipal election.

In case of rain, bring a black umbrella.

CSR Griffintown

This Sunday, April 27th, there'll be a march from the Griffintown Horse Palace (1200 Ottawa street, near De La Montagne) to Place D'Armes, and then a mock funeral procession from there to City Hall. Families, kids,  dogs, and horses are all welcome. The march starts at 3pm, the funeral procession at 3:45pm.

Details at the CSRG blog.

• Joseph Baker: Architect, past president of the Quebec Order of Architects. Former director of the School of Architecture, Universite Laval
• Lucia Kowaluk: Community Organizer, past coordinator of the Urban Ecology Centre of Montreal. President, Milton-Parc Citizens Committee
• Raphael Fischler: Professor, School of Urban Planning, McGill University
• Michel Gariepy: Professor, Institut d’Urbanisme, Université de Montréal
• Henry Aubin: Columnist, The Gazette
• Chris Gobeil: Spokesperson, The Committee for the Sustainable Re-Development of Griffintown

For more information, check out their website: http://www.montrealcitizenforum.org/

Monday, April 21 at 6pm.
888 De Maisonneuve E., 5th floor.
In the Salle du Conseil d'Arrondissment.

The Montreal Citizen Forum is organizing a public information meeting about Griffintown with Joseph Baker, Lucia Kowaluk, Raphael Fischler, Michel Gariepy, Henry Aubin, Chris Gobeil and Carole Piché-Burton.

Thursday, April 24 at 7pm.
St. James United Church
1440 St Alexandre

If you're interested in joining and supporting the local citizens' movement, check out the Committee for the Sustainable Redevelopment of Griffintown at csrgriffintown.wordpress.com.

Phyllis Lambert and the Quebec Order of Architects call for a moratorium on Projet Griffintown, calling for it to be rethought and for proper city-wide public consultations to be held via the Office des consultations publiques de Montréal.

If you agree, maybe you should sign the petition.

Why The Swedes Are Right, And Claude Provencher Is Wrong. Background on two Swedish eco-friendly developments roughly the same size as Griffintown, which further proves the kind of thinking the Gazette article discussed. Also calls into question architect Provencher's unquestioning support for the project, compared to much better-thought-out projects he's worked on such as the Quartier International and condos at the east end of the Old Port. 

Forward-looking architects realize we are at the end of the cheap energy era, so we shouldn't keep designing cities around cars.

McGill architecture professor Robert Mellin writes about the project he and his graduate students have worked on for the past year or so, envisioning a sustainable "eco-industrial" role for Griffintown and the Lachine Canal.

Architecture profs Pierre Gauthier and David Hanna addressed the Little Burgundy Coalition about the impact of the Griffintown project back in February.

Jean-Claude Marsan wrote a damning op-ed for La Presse on February 6th: Montreal deserves better.

How Devimco first presented the project at the ETS. Our notes on this.

City agencies worry that the Griffintown project will threaten Montreal's UNESCO World Heritage City status.

McGill's Raphael Fischler wrote in December that Projet Griffintown represented a potential commercial threat to downtown, and lamented its oversize nature.

Images from Devimco's proposal. Note that they backtracked and said the architecture wasn't final; this was to show approximate massing. If anything looks less like "Montreal," it's hard to say.

Our vision. We kicked off this blog as an extension of a presentation we gave at the SAT's Pecha Kucha design show-and-tell night back in September 2007, and we Photoshopped Montreal-style buildings over Devimco's horrible Dix-30 shopping centre to show that building real, livable streets isn't that difficult.

Since then, we were treated to other wonderful presentations showing other visions of the project, such as Pro-Pointe's eco-condo concepts, (PDF, 3MB) and urban planner Steven Peck's comparison of modern Irish cities with Griffintown's history. (PPT, 12MB). (Check out all the memoranda from citizens and groups here at the City of Montreal's website.)

We've noted time and time again that you don't need tall buildings to have density, as European cities show. And as Pointe St. Charles residents have demonstrated in their self-generated plans for the Alstom / CN rail yards, good urban design can come from the grassroots up.