Understanding the Built Form of Industrialization Along the Lachine Canal in Montreal Desmond Bliek and Pierre Gauthier
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Document generated on 10/01/2021 3:36 a.m. Urban History Review Revue d'histoire urbaine Understanding the Built Form of Industrialization along the Lachine Canal in Montreal Desmond Bliek and Pierre Gauthier Volume 35, Number 1, Fall 2006 Article abstract This article tracks the morphogenesis of one of the birthplaces of Canadian URI: https://id.erudit.org/iderudit/1015990ar industry: the Lachine Canal corridor in Montreal. The authors propose a DOI: https://doi.org/10.7202/1015990ar reading of the evolution of the artifacts and spatial forms to be found along the canal from its construction starting in 1819. This work complements the See table of contents history of Montreal's industrialization and working-class communities by offering the untold story of a piece of the city whose birth and long sedimentation of built forms testifies to the emergence, peak, and decline of a Publisher(s) new industrial order. The urbanization of the Lachine Canal corridor is, we argue, the result of a complex dialectic between a residential spatial order of Urban History Review / Revue d'histoire urbaine the faubourg and a first- and second-generation industrial spatial order. Accordingly, the fine folds and articulations of domestic space and the ISSN sidewalks, streets, and church steps that are the sites of socialization and exchange succeed, or have imposed upon them a divided space organized by 0703-0428 (print) the flows of goods, materials, and energy destined to serve the industrial 1918-5138 (digital) machine. The urban tissues, residential and industrial, today testify through their artifacts and spatial configurations to the historical conditions that saw Explore this journal them created and transformed. Cite this article Bliek, D. & Gauthier, P. (2006). Understanding the Built Form of Industrialization along the Lachine Canal in Montreal. Urban History Review / Revue d'histoire urbaine, 35(1), 3–17. https://doi.org/10.7202/1015990ar All Rights Reserved © Urban History Review / Revue d'histoire urbaine, 2006 This document is protected by copyright law. Use of the services of Érudit (including reproduction) is subject to its terms and conditions, which can be viewed online. https://apropos.erudit.org/en/users/policy-on-use/ This article is disseminated and preserved by Érudit. Érudit is a non-profit inter-university consortium of the Université de Montréal, Université Laval, and the Université du Québec à Montréal. Its mission is to promote and disseminate research. https://www.erudit.org/en/ Understanding the Built Form of Industrialization along the Lachine Canal in Montreal Desmond Bliek and Pierre Gauthier Abstract en creux, dans les configurations spatiales, des conditions This article tracks the morphogenesis of one of the birth• historiques qui les ont vues naître et se transformer. places of Canadian industry: the Lachine Canal corridor in Montreal. The authors propose a reading of the evolu• Introduction tion of the artifacts and spatial forms to be found along New debates over the future of now derelict or underutilized the canal from its construction starting in 1819. This work landscapes of production have prompted a critical examina• complements the history of Montreal's industrialization tion,1 re-contextualization,2 and extension of concepts of built and working-class communities by offering the untold heritage in the wake of de-industrialization3 in North America story of apiece of the city whose birth and long sedimen• and the West. This paper presents the results of an ongoing tation of built forms testifies to the emergence, peak, and case study that seeks to understand the history of one such decline of a new industrial order. The urbanization of the area, the Lachine Canal basin in Montreal, by exploring the Lachine Canal corridor is, we argue, the result of a com• spatial dynamics of its particular industrial landscape. Using plex dialectic between a residential spatial order of the the theoretical framework and methodological approach known faubourg and a first- and second-generation industrial as urban morphology, we develop a historical reconstruction spatial order. Accordingly, the fine folds and articulations of the underlying spatial logic of the site that reveals a century- of domestic space and the sidewalks, streets, and church long dialectic between industrial and residential spatial orders, steps that are the sites of socialization and exchange informed by major currents in the political, economic, and tech• succeed, or have imposed upon them a divided space nological histories of Montreal, and continues to shape contem• organized by the flows of goods, materials, and energy porary spatial conditions. Our aim is to enrich the understanding destined to serve the industrial machine. The urban tis• of the industrial history and geography of the Lachine Canal by sues, residential and industrial, today testify through unveiling the role of the built landscape as a structure influenc• their artifacts and spatial configurations to the histori• ing the industrial urbanization. We argue that the mechanisms cal conditions that saw them created and transformed. of transformation and conservation of the built landscape—the structural permanencies (what remains ingrained in the land• Résumé scape in spite of ongoing change)—present in the system of Cet article trace la morphogenèse de Tun des berceaux the built landscape play a critical role in mediating the actualiza• de l'industrialisation canadienne : le corridor du canal tion of cultural, economic, and technological transformations. Lachine à Montréal. Les auteurs livrent une première Urban historiography often refers to the material city as a tes• lecture de l'évolution des artefacts et des formes spatia• timony of the living conditions of one group of urban dwellers les qui se déploient de part et d'autre du canal, depuis or another, and regularly cites its concrete forms as evidence sa construction à compter de 181% À l'histoire de l'indus• of the broad social and economic transformations that affect trialisation et à celle des communautés ouvrières des society. Mysteriously though, the material city, in particular abords du canal Lachine, se superpose ici une histoire when considered as a dynamic entity, remains one of the great inédite, celle d'un morceau de ville dont la genèse et la unknowns of urban history. Most theoretical perspectives treat lente sédimentation des formes bâties témoignent et enre• it as a dependent variable, either as a neutral stage on which gistrent l'impact de l'émergence, de l'apogée et du déclin the human drama is being played or as a passive by-product of du nouvel ordre économique industriel. Nous démontre• social or economic processes. By focusing on the emergence rons que l'urbanisation du corridor du canal Lachine est of the built landscape of the Lachine Canal industrial district, le fruit d'une dialectique complexe entre un ordre spatial this paper theorizes the built environment as a dynamic system résidentiel de faubourg et un ordre spatial industriel of its own, governed by internal sets of relations. Although the de première et seconde moutures. Ainsi, aux tissages et modes d'articulation fins des espaces domestiques et de city is a material projection of social, political, and economic leurs espaces contigus de socialisation et d'échange que systems or structures, this projection proceeds through sys• tems of spatial symbolization, and is manifested in a substance, sont les trottoirs, rues et autres parvis d'église, succède 4 ou se superpose un espace divisé et organisé en fonction the built space, that has its own consistency and resilience. des flux, tantôt de matériaux et de biens, tantôt d'éner• Such an approach stresses the structural qualities of the built gie, qui sont destinés à alimenter la machine industrielle. environment, seeing urban material culture not as a reflection Les tissus urbains, résidentiels comme industriels, livrent of the modes of production or as the sole product of deci• aujourd'hui le témoignage, en dur dans les artefacts, ou sions and purposeful building practices of social actors but 3 Urban History Review / Revue d'histoire urbaine Vol. XXXV, No. 1 (Fall 2006 automne) The Built Form of Industrialization as having its own structure and logic, which are imposed on contributions are important in their situation of urbanization social agents by offering them a substance to work with that practices in their cultural, economic, and political context as is only partially malleable. In this sense, the urban built land• means for agents (both individuals and organizations) to use scape is socially produced while simultaneously producing urban land as a strategy for economic gain and social survival. society by offering (or withholding) opportunities for agents Tulchinsky's, Lewis's, and Hanna's work on industrial geogra• to realize themselves socially, economically, and culturally. phy and the emergence of industrial suburbs in the southwest Urban morphology focuses "on the tangible results of social and of Montreal is rich in its understanding of the pathways created economic forces: they study the outcomes of ideas and inten• and followed by industrial capitalists as they fashioned already- tions as they take shape on the ground and mould our cities."5 shaped urban space in Vieux-Montréal and farmland on the The resulting anonymous and structural product, the urban tis• fringes of the city to meet their needs.21 Lewis's work serves as a sue, is the central object of study for urban morphology.6 In their valuable reminder of the temporally and politically diffuse nature attempts to understand and elaborate that framework, urban of urbanization through his notion of myriad manufacturing morphologists have pursued a variety of strategies.7 Some, such pathways coalescing into an industrial district with complex inter- as Gianfranco Caniggia and Gian-Luigi Maffei,8 grouped into firm linkages and varying control over the landscape. His work an Italian, or 'Muratorian,' school inspired by the work of Italian leads us to consider more deeply the morphology of the built architect Saverio Muratori, have analyzed the city as a means of landscape as a structural component in that process.