THE 197 6 OLYMPIC GAMES by Jeanne M
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w LEGACY OF GRANDEUR: THE 197 6 OLYMPIC GAMES by Jeanne M. Wolfe Summary The Olympics resulted in both joy and anguish for the City of Montreal. Joy in the form of improved sporting facilities in some neighbourhoods; anguish in debt and the ongoing saga of the material and financial failures of the Olympic stadium. Sommaire Pour Montreal, /es Jeux olympiques ont ete synonymes a la fois de bonheur et d'angoisse. Le bonheur a pris la forme d'instal/ations sportives ameliorees dons certains quartiers; /'angoisse est nee de la dette heritee des O/ympiques et de la saga continue/le des echecs physiques et financiers du Stade olympique. ontreal is probably Canada's best Camillien Houde to be the locale for management company, the Olympic Mknown city for hosting special the Empire Games, a plan aborted by Installations Board, to take over the events. The World's Fair, Expo 67, held World War II. It is now well served by project, to make sure that the games to celebrate the centennial of Canada in two metro stations, Pie IX and Viau. would open on the appointed day in July 1967, and the Olympic Games of 1976 1976. They did, but the stadium was The Facilities were landmarks in the history of the roofless and without its tower. city. Expo 67 reflected the much larger The Olympic Stadium was designed by coming-of-age of the quiet revolution Roger Taillibert, a French architect, the Other facilities prepared for the and the profound changes that were personal choice of Mayor Jean Drapeau. Olympic games included an elegant wrought in Quebec in the I 960s, while It seems that Mr. Drapeau had long velodrome (also designed by Taillibert) the Olympic Games were a weird wished to have an imposing tower built adjacent to the stadium, the renovation mixture of bungling and pride, with in Montreal, and had indeed unsuccessfully of the existing sporting facilities in the mixed results for the city as a whole. lobbied the designers of Expo to Olympic park, the rehabilitation of other incorporate one into their plans. With athletic and sports grounds all around The Site the Olympics he got his way, and the the city, the construction of a rowing The Olympic Games were awarded to stadium, supported by 34 precast basin on lie Ste Helene and the Claude Montreal in 1970, with the City in concrete ribs circled by a huge concrete Robillard Sports Centre in the east end. charge of all planning and development collar, was eventually built, with an Other venues were outside Montreal; work. The key site chosen for the games emerging inclined tower to which were for instance, the equestrian events were was Maisonneuve Park in the east end. to be fastened the cables to open and held at Bromont in the Eastern Townships, The park was originally acquired by the close the flexible roof. The whole and the sailing at Kingston, Ontario. old industrial suburb of Maisonneuve undertaking was fraught with trouble- (annexed to Montreal in 1918), as a design problems, engineering problems, The Olympic Village was built by centrepiece for its plans for a "city difficulties in transporting the private-sector entrepreneurs. It consists beautiful". Bisected by Sherbrooke prefabricated pieces from St. Eustache of twin 22-storey pyramids, reputedly Street, the park was made up of the where they were cast, labour disputes, imitating a resort in the south of Botanical Gardens and a golf course to financial woes, management difficulties, France, and contains a thousand the north, and to the south were contracting scandals-all well apartments. Its unfortunate design has various sporting facilities including the documented by opposition councillor no interior corridors.Access to the Maurice Richard Arena and the Nick auf de Maur and others. The Quebec apartments is by exterior walkways that Maisonneuve Sports Centre. In fact, in government became so alarmed about are too narrow to be used as balconies, the 1930s the site of the Olympic the situation that in November 1975, while passing foot traffic invades stadium had been selected by Mayor it created a provincially controlled residents' privacy, except for the end Plan Summer/~te 2005 units. It, too, was plagued by financial Montreal Expos baseball team, named The Olympic Village, after much debate scandals. Further, its location, on the with pride in 1968 for t_he world fair, and recriminations by social housing public golf course north of Sherbrooke, played their first game in the stadium in activists, has been privatized, and the was severely criticized, not only because 1977. They have recently played their ground floor contains government it ate up green space, but also because last, since the team proved unprofitable offices including, ironically, offices of the it involved building a tunnel under the and has been sold to the United States. Minister of the Environment and the street for the athletes to get to the While the swimming pools in the base Rent Control Board. stadium in safety (shades of the Munich of the tower remain popular (they are Olympic massacre); this in turn meant the home of the club that produces Overall, the Olympic Games did not that the fine trees lining Sherbrooke champions like Alexandre Depatie), turn out positively. Plagued by scandals, Street had to be felled, an act causing most of the tower is now rented out as cost overruns, strikes and uncertainty, public outrage. private offices. The vast underground the whole episode was subject to a parking space is largely used to store public enquiry, the Malouf Commission, The Legacy vehicles not used by their owners in which attributed much blame to Mayor The Olympic Games last only two winter. Today, users of the stadium are Drapeau. However, the improved sports weeks. What was their legacy to the reduced to the occasional rock concert, facilities such as the Claude Robillard city? A new interest in athletics, some trade shows, events such as monster centre, the swimming and diving facilities new and renewed sporting facilities, and truck rallies, and the odd large gathering in the base of the stadium tower, the as is well known, an enormous debt and of groups such as the Jehovah's rowing basin, and the Biod6me, have all endless problems in the maintenance Witnesses. In 1976, it was estimated become great assets to the city, and and use of the stadium. It was finally that the stadium had then cost one much patronized. The stadium continues finished I I years later, in 1987. The billion dollars: a recent accounting proposed concrete tower proved too suggests that $2.8 billion has been spent to be a subject of heated debate: it is fragile for the retractable roof-gear and on it so far. familiarly known as "the Big Owe", and had to be redesigned with steel bracing some observers think it should be torn The velodrome also proved for the Kevlar roof to be installed. down. Equally vociferous are those who uneconomical; bicycle racing was not However, it was not long before see its powerful form as a thing of overly popular in Montreal in the mid- problems were experienced, and there beauty-"beau de loin et loin de beau" 70s. Paradoxically, just as the sport was has been an ongoing saga of materials handsome from far but far from gaining momentum, the City decided to failure, replacements, and finally in 1998, handsome.A bittersweet legacy. • transform the building into the Biod6me, a fixed roof. which has become a living environmental A month after the games, the Alouettes exhibition demonstrating four football team began using the stadium, ecosystems: polar regions, a tropical Jeanne M. Wolfe is Professor Emeritus, School but a few years later it reverted to forest, the Laurentian forest and the of Urban Planning, McGill University, Montreal, McGill's Molson Stadium since the maritime Gulf of the St. Lawrence. It is Quebec. She can be reached at Olympic venue was too costly. The much visited. [email protected] Further Reading Auf der Maur N. The billion-dollar games. Toronto: James Lorimer; 1976. Legault G. La ville qu"on a batie. Montreal: Editions Liber; 2000. Lortie A, editor. Montreal thinks big. Montreal: Canadian Centre for Architecture; 2004. Plan Summer/Ete 2005 .