Samcon, Montreal Condo Developer, Proposing Massive Project on Point Rail Yards

Twitter is exploding this morning (well, at least among urban development geeks) with news that Samcon, a condo builder known for its small-scale and affordably priced condo projects, has announced plans to build 850 condos on the old CN rail yards in Point St. Charles.

The rail yards are south of Bridge St. and east of Wellington. I've just noticed that Google has written "Sebastapol" as "Sevastopol". Hm, does this have anything to do with Russia's annexation of Crimea?

No news release yet, but the company, which has found success by targeting first-time and mid-price buyers, says that 75 per cent of the offering will be "affordable" housing.
Two things, what will the reaction be in the Point, where residents are well and truly fed up with the traffic and congestion that a spate of new construction has brought to the usually quiet residential streets.
Second, the land Samcon is looking at is the same parcel that the Casino de Montréal has been eyeing for some time. Before that, it seems to me that developer Vincent Chiara had a scheme to build a shopping mall and some housing.
According to reports, Sam Scalia, Samcon's president, says the new project and future projects will be developed according to principles of walkability and will be located close to public transit.
Not sure how that squares with the railyard, which is accessible to Wellington St. and a direct bus to downtown but nowhere close to a metro station.
More to come, no doubt. 

Just Listed! Point St. Charles 4-Bedroom Cottage

Just listed in Point St. Charles, a lovely four-bedroom Victorian. 582 Bourgeoys St., a bit south of Wellington, was built in 1885 and has been lovingly cared for by an attentive owner. It's big enough for a growing family though the easy flow of the main floor would make it a wonderful home for that sociable couple who like to entertain. The asking price is $524,000.

The floors, door and window trim, as well as a grand staircase that wends to the second storey, are all stripped original pine. The hot water radiators (super comfortable heat)  are hidden beneath ornate 19th-century brass and marble mantles. The ceilings are high, the windows and doorways are large. In short, like broad-at-the-beam Queen Victoria herself, this house was built for comfort.

The main floor features a spacious living room that easily accommodates a huge sectional sofa, ideal of family movie nights or gatherings of friends.

The dining room, with a view onto the back garden, can easily seat 12, without crowding.
The kitchen retains its original tall wooden cabinets. There's room for a breakfast table and a nook for a desk, computer station or spot where the kids can do homework while a grown up gets started on dinner.

The main floor also has a powder room. A door at the back of the kitchen communicates with the main floor laundry and to a large treated wood deck and flagstone patio in the sunny, fenced back yard. There's a lane behind the house and the flagstone patio can double as parking in a pinch. Street parking is easy.

 Upstairs, you'll find four real bedrooms, including a massive master bedroom that measures nearly 13 feet by 13 feet. The second and third bedrooms are equally spacious.The smallest room is irregular in shape. It would make a perfect baby's room or den/office. All of the rooms have high ceilings and large windows. This is a quiet residential street with two and three-storey buildings. The light pours in all day long.

The main bathroom is divided into two rooms, a bath with shower in one room with a skylight and the WC in another little room of its own. The fixtures have been updated.

Point St. Charles has become one of the most sought-after neighborhoods in central Montreal in the last 20 years, in part because it is an easy 10 minute drive, 20 minute bike ride or 20 minute bus trip to the corner of Peel and Ste. Catherine. The housing stock is older, with lots of Victorian charm and more modest homes that have been gussied up with sleek contemporary style.

582 Bourgeoys (the anglo old-timers pronounce it Burgess)  offers the luxury of space, a rare fenced AND sunny garden, carefully preserved cachet and four real bedrooms.

The basement is unfinished, but is easily 7 feet high, with interesting potential, if the square footage above ground isn't enough room for you.

As with all houses, it has a few quirks. There's a new chimney liner but the brick chimney itself will need attention in the next few years. The windows are older and still work fine, but aren't as energy efficient as newer models. We all have our little imperfections, don't we?

Check out the complete listing at marylamey.com. Give me a call if you'd like to schedule a visit.

Masala Comes to Point St. Charles

I was doing errands on Centre St. in the Point this afternoon and stumbled upon a new restaurant near the corner of Shearer.

Imagine my delight in finding that Masala, a well-known downtown Indian eatery and cooking school has decamped to the Le Sud-Ouest.

 Let the debate about the merits of this Indian restaurant versus that Indian restaurant rage on Chowhound, I love Indian cookery and anything that multiplies the offerings of dhal and chicken masala in my part of the world, is alright by me.

Bring your friends. And your own wine.

Montreal Heritage Home Tour - We're In!

Tomorrow kicks off Montreal's annual Architectural Heritage campaign celebrating  the best of the city's architecture.
The line of activities includes lectures, museum exhibits, as well as walking and bus tours exploring the city's many way cool neighborhoods. If I could, I'd do the walking tour of the Point tomorrow. Alas, it conflicts with my sprog's soccer practice and soccer practice wins.
The good news is that my listing at 276 May St., Verdun has been selected by the jury for this year's heritage tour. 276 May is one of the oldest homes in Verdun. We have deeds going back to 1891, when the land was sold to a Mr. May. He built his house in 1895.
Too bad that in the late 1950s some urban planning fool decided it would be a good idea to build the elevated approach to the Champlain Bridge about 100 feet from the building's front stoop. Here's the way I look at it, 276 May was  there 70 years before they built the bridge and it will be there 100 years after the bridge is scrapped. It was built to last.
It has also been lovingly restored and updated by my client. I don't feel the least bit self-conscious in proclaiming it one the prettiest houses in Verdun. Hell, it is one of the prettiest houses in Montreal.
We've printed enlarged images of some of the original deeds to show during the open house visit from 1-4 p.m. on Sunday, Oct. 2 and again on Oct. 9. We're expecting a big turnout. Bring your cheque book in case you want to make an offer. At $339,000 it is verrrry nicely priced.
You can check out the other activities on between October 1 and Oct. 13 here,

A Page from Montreal History

Original handwritten deed dating  from 1891 for the sale of what is now 276 May St., Verdun.

Sometimes I get to brush up against history as I go about my business as a real estate agent.  The vendor of the property at 276 May St., Verdun has a stack of deeds going all the way back to when the land was originally subdivided into building lots back in 1891.

The spidery cursive has faded somewhat over the last 110 years, but it is still legible.  If you read all the deeds you get a sense of the evolution of a neighborhood, because each deed has the name and occupation of both the seller and the buyer.  This property passed through the hands of a career military man  to a mechanical superintendant and later from shopkeeper to a mechanic and from him to a labourer and then to a nurse's aide and so on and so on.

What I like about this particular deed is that many of the names, probably obscure in their time, now have deep roots and resonance in Verdun and neighboring Point St. Charles. I quote:

On This Sixth day of March, one thousand eight hundred and ninety one.  Before the undersigned Public Notary for the Province of Quebec, in the Dominion of Canada, residing in the City of Montreal Came and Appeared John Samuel Knox of Rozel, Ryde, Isle of Wight, England a Lieutenant-Colonel in Her Majesty's service, in his capacity as sole Executor of and universal legatee under the Last Will and Testament of the late Robert Knox of Rushbrooke, near Coleraine, in Ireland.

 Knox, Rozel, Ryde and Coleraine are all names of nearby streets in the Point.   Mr. Knox sold the land to an Edward May of New Brunswick.  In turn Mr. May gave his name to the street on which he built a string of stout and respectable stone and brick houses.  The house I'm selling is near the corner of May and Rushbrooke.

The things you can learn if you just stop to read the fine print.

By the way,  the original deed of sale specifies that the buyer cannot build a slaughterhouse, tannery or soapworks on the premises. I guess NIMBYism - Not In My Back Yard - is not a 20th cerntury invention.

Looking for Real Estate Deals

I just took part in a live chat hosted by The Gazette on the topic of finding real estate deals. The questions came at us fast and thick. It was a bit chaotic but lotsa fun.

You can read the transcript here. There are some good tips for finding deals and knowing a deal when you see one.

The Gazette's Green Life blog has a story about a couple of gardeners in St. Henri who turned what had been a garbage-strewn lot in their neighborhood into a vibrant and verdant urban oasis.
You can read it here.
These green-thumbed activists are part of a growing guerrilla gardening movement taking rootaround the world. The idea is to make blighted corners of the cityscape whole again by sowing seeds, planting flowers, herbs and the like.
The St. Henri lot had been abandoned for many years when locals decided to clean it up. The owner seemed to be okay with this, right up until they posted a sign inscribed Parc Jardin Communautaire Delinelle. As we used to say in my feminist student group back in the day, to name it is to claim it. He doesn't mind them messing in his vacant lot, as long as everyone is clear on who owns it.
A similar guerrilla garden was started in a tucked away corner of Point St. Charles about 15 years ago. Residents of Sebastopol and Congregation Sts. adopted a weedy little patchy at the end of their block and planted flowers under the shade of the weedy Manitoba maples. All was well, until the city decided to sell the lot for development.
The folks got together and raised a fuss, managing to catch the ear of Mayor Pierre Bourque. Bourque, as you may recall, used to run Montreal's Botanical Garden and has a big soft spot for things horticultural. The garden was saved. The city ceded the plot of land to the good people of the Point. The garden is still there, the black-eyed susans, sedum and echinacea more lush and lovely than ever. In fact, I took the picture above there today.

You can find out more by visiting the Guerrilla Gardening website. Check out their recipe for making seed bombs.

The Secret World of Point St. Charles

Living in the Point means being engaged with your neighbors, whether you like it or not. Houses are generally built close to the property line, putting front steps and even doorways right on the sidewalk.
But there's a secret world in the Point. Behind those close-set houses you'll often find huge yards, sometimes wild, sometimes beautifully landscaped, invariably full of mature trees that do a lot to gentle the urban landscape.
Above is a picture taken from the balcony of a client's newly acquired condo in the Point. He fell for the architecture of the building, the high ceilings and the spacious rooms. The balcony and the tranquility of the neighboring yards are a bonus. I love this view.

Jane's Walk - Point St. Charles

It was a sunny if blustery day for Jane's Walkers in Point St. Charles today as three local volunteer guides led about 15 people on a walk through the old working class neighbohood. The talk was a little heavy on political skirmishes of the past and a little light on the kind of human-interest stories that bring neighbohoods alive. Still, I'm glad I went. A lively discussion broke out about which is the best Indian restaurant on the main drag, Centre St. Apparently four of them have opened in the last year.
I gleaned a few things during the walk. If you've ever biked the Lachine Canal bike path, you might have noticed the remains of the red brick factory and a blackened smokestack just east of the Charlevoix Bridge. (Left) It is all that remains of a 19th century rope-making factory, the Converse Co.. The factory was a narrow building that lined the canal from the Charlevoix St. to, wait for it, Ropery St. a long city block away. Now I know how Ropery St. got its name. Because the rope was wound around stanchion located at either end of the factory, they needed a long footprint, but not a lot of width.
St. Gabriel's Church on Centre St. in the Point was built by the sizable Irish community in 1895.(Right) It was the second church built on the site, replacing a wooden church built in 1875.
In 1954 the church was heavily damaged by fire, which explains why it has no steeple. By that time, many of the working-class Irish who had filled its pews had moved out of the neighborhood. The bell tower never was rebuilt.
According to our tour guides, the first Europeans settled in what is now Point St. Charles in 1654. It was mostly agricultural land. Today, 43 per cent of the neighborhood's rental stock is social housing.

Contrary Beauty or The Ghosts of Cities Past

Saw a fantastic show by photographer Martin Berubé and painter Renée Mollitt at the Galerie West in Ste-Anne-de-Bellevue on Friday night.
Berubé takes evocative photos of the decayed and forgotten corners of the urban landscape in stark black and white. The photo on this post, copped shamelessly from the Spacing Montreal web site, is a window detail from the old Bank of Montreal building on Wellington St. in the Point.
The photos, often of faded signs, empty windows and blank walls are haunted and haunting. I'm always amazed when an artist can find beauty in the kinds of day to day scenes that many of us pass without a second thought.
The show is called Bellezza Contrari, contrary beauty. Sharing the wall space with Berubé is mixed media artist Mollitt, whose landscapes and oversized flowers are rendered in bold colours and given texture by the use of dryer lint, waxed paper, dryer sheets and other recycled materials. They were gorgeous.
The show closes on Tuesday.
By the way, the Wellington St. bank building, owned by McGill architecture prof Pieter Sijpkes looks substantially different today. The good professor lovingly removed the peeling paint by hand to reveal the glowing orange-red brick beneath. I was there last night for a play put on by the Point St. Charles Community Theatre. The non-profit group has a ton of fun and raises money for a youth drama program in the Point. Agatha Christie followed by egg salad sandwiches and home baking. My kind of night on the town!