Montreal needs better heritage preservation rules
It would be wonderful if the Redpath Mansion could be preserved, but the struggle to save it looks very much like a lost cause.
In its heyday it was a jewel of Montreal’s fabled Golden Square Mile, the preserve of the city’s baronial business elite of yore.
Built in 1886 in the classic Queen Anne style, it housed members of the family of John Redpath, a contractor and industrialist who made his fortune through his participation in the construction of the Lachine Canal and the sugar refinery that bore the family name.
Today, little more remains of it than its crumbling façade, and last December city hall issued its owners a permit to demolish the re- mains to clear the way for an upscale student-housing complex they propose to build on the site, situated up du Musée Ave., behind the Museum of Fine Arts.
That appeared to be the final blow to a longrunning campaign by heritage activists to save the building, dating to 1986 when it was bought by brothers Amos and Avi Sochaczevski with the intention of redeveloping the site.
But then, with demolition machinery poised on-site, Quebec Culture Minister Maka Kotto stepped in on Feb. 18 with an order to halt work for at least 30 days, in order to allow alternatives to be considered.
However, none have been forthcoming since, not from the government nor from the heritage champions who have waged the 28-year battle to save the building. Rather, the owners have gone to court to assert their claim to do what they will with their rightful property.
Certainly Heritage Montreal makes a strong moral case that it would be a shame to lose the building, and that a restored Redpath Mansion would be a more becoming feature of the neighbourhood than the proposed student residence. Heritage promoters maintain that allowing the demolition and redevelopment would reward the owners’ neglect of the building over the years of struggle to preserve it, and set a precedent for others to follow suit.
Nevertheless, what the preservationists have not come up with, apart from a series of injunctions to halt demolition over the years, is a sound plan for precisely what use a restored Redpath Mansion might be put to; nor have they or governmental authorities come up with funding to buy out the owners and restore the building.
The owners, meanwhile, appear to have a strong legal case in that they bought the property in good faith. At the time it was being used as a homeless shelter, and had not been designated a heritage building requiring government protection. They further assert that the residence they propose would serve a useful purpose and conform with existing zoning regulations.
It is true that there are many threatened buildings with heritage value in the city. But what this long, sorry saga illustrates is the need for better rules and procedures to enable their preservation.
Their absence in this case is as responsible as anything for the building’s seemingly inevitable demise.