The past month or so has been interesting, to say the least. I suppose that followers of this site are used to sporadic updates by now. Usually it’s because other things are keeping me busy or distracted and while my trip to Greece has certainly kept me busy, this last bout of inactivity stemmed from more serious matters.

A local news broadcast from Toronto is a good a primer to the situation:

While I could probably write an entire entry detailing the inaccuracies of that one report, it did get a few key details correct. A friend and I were arrested after a passerby noticed the two of us entering a sewer system in a residential area of Toronto and decided to call the police. While we were underground, blissfully unaware of the situation brewing above us, an entire fleet of emergency response teams were brought in to investigate the situation.

It was obvious that they reacted to the situation without knowing just who or what they were dealing with; this isn’t exactly the sort of thing that happens on a routine basis in any city. Workers proceeded to enter the sewer via a winch and harness system. They assumed that conditions below them were too dangerous to navigate, so only travelled as far through the system as the ropes they were tethered to allowed.

A stretch deemed too dangerous to navigate through without the aid of ropes.

Getting caught was the result of bad luck, but also poor decisions, the kind that are easy to make after doing this for years without ever having faced any serious consequences. You begin to feel less nervous about doing things over time, like opening up manhole covers while other people are nearby. You start to forget about the little things that can often lead to consequences.

While I’ve had run-ins with various people (including police officers) in the past, misunderstandings have usually been cleared up on the spot. Based on what I’ve heard, this has generally been the case with other people around the world involved in similar activities. So it’s easy to feel complacent and maybe even a bit cocky, but I suppose it was a given that something like this would happen eventually.

After the police discovered the two of us, or rather, after we gave ourselves up, we were brought to the station (yes, in handcuffs) and questioned individually. My policy is always to be up-front about everything I do. I showed them the pictures on the camera , told them why I was down there, gave them the URL for this site and hoped for the best.

Some officers found the situation humourous, while others were astonished that two people would deliberately enter what they thought was a shit-infested tunnel that spelled instant death. It seemed as though everyone there who had never set foot underground before in their lives was suddenly an expert. “You two are lucky to be alive!”

Aside from their concern, jokes were made and compliments were paid to our photography, but it was hard to laugh along or feel flattered knowing that there was a chance that I might receive a criminal record. In most scenarios, a situation like this would warrant a provincial-level trespassing fine, which is a touch more expensive than a parking ticket. That wasn’t going to be the case here.

After several hours we were fingerprinted and had our mugshots taken, and the two of us were let go for the night, and told that under no circumstances were we to talk to one another outside of legal council. Of course, we were also forbidden to enter sewers or areas related to “public works.”

After arriving home, interview requests started showing up in my inbox from various media outlets who had caught wind of the story, probably by listening in on events using police scanners. They only escalated over the course of the day. Knowing how often dialogue can be misquoted or taken out of context, I decided it was best not to respond to any of it. I also avoided commenting on the situation on my site.

Subtitle from the Toronto Star. I have no idea where they got the term 'undergrounding' from.

The following day, our man bites dog story had officially entered the daily news cycle and while a lot of it was inaccurate and exaggerated, it didn’t go as terribly as I expected. Maybe this was the result of the two of us having a good amount of material online that even the laziest of journalists could use as a reference point. It probably also helped having intelligent people who spoke well on our behalf. Also, if the comments left on news sites were any indication, there was a good deal of public support behind us. (And anyone who reads online comments knows that they’re often the last place you can expect to find support.)

24 hours later news agencies had moved onto the next big strange story, which was something of a relief. I’m not adverse to being in the media, but I disliked the idea of having what I do being framed around the arrest. The legal aspect isn’t something that I generally talk about here, partly because I feel it would be distracting, but also because I wouldn’t want anyone to get the impression that it’s a reason why I do any of this.

Nice headline in an otherwise terrible article. (See link at bottom of entry to read it in its entirety.)

While the criminal charge was considered to be light, the following days I, along with my wife, were a bit nervous about what might happen. The court date was set at the end of the month, but not having ever been in this sort of situation before, we were dependent on the generous levels of support and advice we received from family, friends and strangers alike.

The more advice we received, the clearer it became that the charge of mischief wasn’t something that would stick in relation to our situation. At the same time, we decided it would be a good idea to obtain some form of legal representation. We wasted no time in finding a lawyer who confirmed that it would be difficult to find us guilty of a charge that’s usually reserved for acts of vandalism or other activities where ill-intent is involved. Still, it wasn’t clear how long it might take for the charges to be dropped or how much any of it was going to cost us financially.

As was anticipated, the charges were eventually withdrawn. We received this good news a couple of weeks ago during the first leg of my hiatus here in Greece and are relieved to put it behind us. Plus, I’m glad I can now talk to my friend without requiring the presence of a lawyer.

While Athens seems to have its share of things worth seeing below street level, it’s not worth the risk – any run-ins with the law here might turn out worse than the one in Toronto. Language barriers, unclear trespassing laws and one of the highest urban population densities in the world probably wouldn’t make for the best combination. Aside from this though, I’m looking forward to photographing another city using a different frame of reference. And I still have a backlog of entries to post about Montreal that I’ll post over the next few months.

Lastly, I’d like to thank everyone who offered their support during the course of this past ordeal. I feel indebted to those who took the time to send kind words or to offer advice. It would be easy for something like this to make me feel discouraged or defeated, but on the contrary, I’m left feeling more validated. Thank you for your kindness.

Further reading:

Toronto Star  article
http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/article/790701–two-men-arrested-for-late-night-foray-into-sewers?bn=1#photo

CBC news report
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/toronto/story/2010/04/05/sewer-explorers.html

The Hour (based on an interview I did for a local paper)
http://www.hour.ca/news/news.aspx?iIDArticle=19676

Spacing Montreal article (Thanks, Alanah)
http://spacingmontreal.ca/2010/04/07/blogger-arrested-in-toronto-sewer-forray/

Mischief, as defined by the Canadian Criminal Code
http://www.efc.ca/pages/law/cc/cc.430.html

The Garrison creek and sewer system
http://www.lostrivers.ca/GarrisonCreek.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garrison_Creek

http://humanriver.ca/?page_id=39

Other sewers and storm drains in toronto
http://vanishingpoint.ca/d_tor.html
http://pipecleaner.wordpress.com/

“The drains, too, this hot weather, at their grated bars tell tales of the stagnant petulance imprisoned within them.” – regarding the Craig Street sewer, Montreal Witness, 1872.

“It was a constant fight against humidity, disease and decay. It seemed as though all the crap that had oozed from the slums of Montreal for over a century had collected here.” – Marcel Talon’s account of the sewer, 1993.

Since launching this website just over a year ago, three questions I’ve been asked most frequently have involved what sewers smell like, how I get down there to begin with, and whether or not I’ve ever run into anyone else while inside of them. The first two make a good deal of sense. After all, who wouldn’t want to know what raw sewage smells like? And how does one get inside a sewer?

But the third question involving encounters with other people is a curious one mostly because it hasn’t happened yet. Not only that, but I can’t ever imagine it happening either- at least not here in Montreal. Our sewers aren’t exactly the most easily accessible things in the world, nor are they the most hospitable of  places. I’m not even sure how often people working for the city venture underground to have a look at things these days. The preferred method seems to involve the use of remote controlled video inspection systems.

The question likely stems from the often mythical stories from elsewhere around the world involving people found underground, from the “Mole People” of New York City, to the Cataphiles of Paris. Of course, Hollywood movies and various popular works of fiction have long relied on the underground as a staple home to a variety of miscreants and monsters. Perhaps it’s scenes such as this that come to mind whenever a city’s sewers are mentioned:

Most well-known stories involving the underground tend to be set in places other than Montreal though. CBC journalist Brian Stewart once stated: “No one has ever sought to rhapsodize over Montreal’s sewers, however, and certainly no one ever famous has seen fit to hide there.”

But despite this, it would be a mistake to pretend that there hasn’t been a long history of people who have passed through these systems.

For the most part, this aspect of Montreal’s history may not exactly be the stuff that legends are made of, but it is one that deserves to be documented in more detail than it has already.

Earliest Accounts

“When we see men at work on the sewers from time to time, the generality of us citizens are impressed that some wise movement is being made towards  ameliorating the sanitary condition of the city. - letter to the editor, Montreal Evening Post,  1879

The earliest records of Montreal’s sewers tend to be fairly cut and dry affairs. Most are either city planning documents or financial records and references to people tend to be limited either to the names of engineers or foremen. Occasionally we’re given the number of workers employed, but little else emerges from the bureaucratic muck. It isn’t until the 1870s where we begin to get a bit more detail beyond mere technical and financial matters.

A foreman’s daily work journal from 1877 detailing the reconstruction of the Colborne Street sewer makes reference to workers unable to continue due “sore hands.” Elsewhere in the journal  remarks are made about the weather (“splendid day”), which is about as much personal interjection as one could hope to find in such a document.

Fortunately, newspaper articles written during this era offer a bit more colour to the projects taking place in the city. As its name would imply, an 1876 issue of the Canadian Illustrated News contains drawings depicting the reconstruction of the Craig Street Sewer. This 8 foot tunnel which took three years to complete, presently runs underneath rue St Antoine. It was built to help improve the poor drainage of the smaller sewer set in place years earlier. It would  also become the principal waste conduit for the city. For the first time, not only do we get to see a picture of a sewer in Montreal, but we get to see the workers as well.

Details of illustrations depicting work on the Craig Street Sewer during 1876.

The scans from the paper are frustratingly dark and fuzzy, but here we see the faces of men working amongst the stationary wooden derricks, the crib work, and work horses pulling wagons. In one frame we also see an excited looking group of men collecting their money during pay day.

"Pay Day at the works"

An article written a year later in the Montreal Daily Witness reveals that the crew for the Craig Street Tunnel works was “91 French-speaking to 61 English-speaking.” Typical of the time, this French majority is described as being “excessive.” Another article states that of this crew, “not a life had been lost and accidents had been rare” and as proof of the project’s success in this particular area, we are told that the physician’s bill was a mere $32.

Also in the Daily Witness, two years after the completion of the tunnel, is found a wonderful account involving one writer’s trip through the Craig Street sewer. The article describes the sights, the sounds and, yes, even the smell of the sewers. It is a report that’s as true today as it was back then.

“It was a happy disappointment to find so little odor present, after having heard so much about sewer gas; the smell was just perceptible and that was all. The atmosphere was unpleasantly warm and the work of wading through the water rather fatiguing.”

Through this article we also learn that boats were once used for sewer inspections, as revealed in a second-hand anecdote involving two workers almost getting swept away after losing a pole used for steering. Despite this near-dire story though, the underlying tone of the story is one of adventure and often humour.

“The garments assumed for the occasion had evidently been designed with a view to utility rather than beauty, and the good people who stared at the uncouth apparitions assembled in Victoria Square might well be excused for their curiosity. “

Decades later, news from this same sewer would take on a much darker tone after an eight year old girl fell into it through a manhole cover that a city worker had inadvertently left open. She was quickly swept away with the sewer’s current. The news made the New York Times.

New York Times article from the Spring of 1921.

Through more detailed articles in the Montreal Gazette, we learn that grappling irons were dragged through the sewer, and one brave soul from Verdun even donned a diving suit to search for the missing girl- a task that many men were said to have refused. Despite these efforts her body was never found.

Things Pick Up Underground

In the beginning of the 20th century, more details begin to emerge involving work in the sewers, mostly during their construction. Waves of immigration from countries such as Italy and Poland add new players to the labour scene, new contractors and further tensions amongst workers often desperate to find work. New tools such as mechanical trenchers also begin to be put to use, thus reducing labourers required for certain operations such as trenching. Concrete begins to replace masonry requiring a different skill sets and much experimentation as was the case with the Notre Dame de Grace sewer.

Sewer construction slowed down over the course of World War I, but during the years afterwards, in particular the Great Depression, an enormous amount of work underground was accomplished. Montreal really had no choice at this point, due in part to an aging sewer system no longer able to keep up with the growth of the city. Newly paved streets in particular caused excessive amounts of water to enter the sewers.

One month prior to the great Stock Market Crash, over seven million dollars was authorized by Montreal’s City Council to cover over Riviere St. Pierre, a project which would result in one of Montreal’s largest sewers.

In the midst of the depression work continued to increase thanks in part to an enormous “work-for-relief” scheme devised to replace direct aid for the unemployed. Between local, provincial and national levels of government, an additional 11 million was spent to help put an estimated 10,000 men to work building fifteen different sewers.

It must have been viewed as win-win situation for all involved, especially from the City’s point of view. On one hand, it would receive an upgraded sewer system built using a large, and readily accessible supply of labour, and on the other, the “social menace” of direct aid could be avoided entirely. In one telling quote from the City’s initial report, the project could help deter “a form of Socialism analogous with the dole system of Britain, destined above all to erect parasitism and shiftlessness into a social system.”

Sewer work in Verdun, 1938

A few details of this workforce can be gleaned from the Gazette archives. Preference was given to married men and to those with families. They were paid upwards of 40 cents an hour- a rate higher than what was commonly paid.

“Inspectors will be named by the city who will make contact with parish authorities and secure lists of the biggest families in Montreal. From that list will be chosen the men who are to go work for the winter be removed from direct relief.”

Another article further explains that “if some men are unable to stand the work, or will not work, replacements will be made in the same fashion. “Won’t works’ will be dealt with severely, according to a plan now being studied at the City Hall.”

The Iberville collector sewer, September 2007.

“Donning rubber boots, rubber coats and hats, reporters scrambled down a man-hole and spent nearly an hour learning all about Montreal’s biggest east end sewer at first hand. Obliging company officials and sewer commission engineers explained the construction details as the curious news-gatherers- carrying flashlights, and warned not to smoke – waded about in water which was sometimes up to a foot deep. Reporters were assured that the water was not “sewage” – they took their word for it.”

Incidentally, two panels over on the same page is another story about a local politician scheming to have unemployed men trucked out to Ste Therese to collect peat from bogs to be used as fuel. “So certain am I that the majority of men on the dole are anxious for anything to keep them employed, I am going to try all kinds of things to keep my ward men busy.”

Evidently the sewers weren’t enough to keep everyone busy.

Clearer Faces

Meilleur Atlantique sewer inspection photo from 1955

“The big collector sewers are large enough for two cars to pass and the maintenance men walk through them daily on inspection trips. That, says Lebeau, introduces the element of danger. A brief rainstorm in the city can fill the passages to the top in a few minutes and men trapped below would drown. Often when men are underground a man is stationed on the surface with a barometer and to watch the weather if rain threatens.”

Salut! A hello from the past inside the Meilleur Atlantique overflow conduit.

While it threatens to veer towards hyberbole, it’s the sort of article that often does its subject matter justice.

“Sometimes the brick walls, dripping and aging in the dark, are suddenly washed golden by the flashlight beams of wading men. And as their lights play on twisting currents destined finally for the ocean, this scene, in this place, is not without a fleeing and eerie beauty.”

More interesting are the quotes from the sewer inspectors themselves who speak of their encounters with rats, the odd “wild cat” as well as the hazards involved in their occupation. “You can only work here if you don’t think about it… about what’s in the tunnel. I keep busy, I never think about it, so it never bothers me.”

An (almost) Perfect Sewer Plan

No story about a city’s history of people and sewers would be complete without at least one good story involving criminal activity. While Montreal’s sewers have been the subject of countless contracting scams and likely used for the discarding of illegal substances, only one case involving criminals stands out as being noteworthy- even legendary.

In 1992, career criminal Marcel Talon hatched a simple plan: dig a tunnel from the Craig Street sewer into the basement level of the Bank of Montreal. It’s here where money is (or once was) held temporarily before being placed into vaults. Knowing this, Talon gathered together a small group of accomplices and worked out the timing so that they could walk in, hold the place up, get downstairs, load up their bags with money. While the police had the building surrounded, they’d use their tunnel as an escape route.

As mentioned toward the beginning of this entry, the Craig Street sewer presently runs below rue Saint-Antoine, and conveniently enough, passes very close to the north side of the Bank of Montreal building. All that would be required would be the digging of an additional tunnel roughly 30 feet in length.

Detail of City Sewer map showing highlighted paths of the Craig Street Sewer and Talon's excavation.

Of course all this required months worth of research and preparation. Using sewer maps from the city’s planning department, they decided the best entry point into the sewer would be roughly 2kms East of the bank using a manhole near St. Denis and rue Saint-Louis. Neither the manhole they used or the small side-pipe they used to enter the Craig Street sewer appear to exist today.

As to not arouse any suspicion before entering the sewers, they disguised themselves as city workers, and went so far as to spend $35,000 modifying a truck to look like an official city works vehicle. Since the manhole was situated at the edge of the street curb, they simply had someone park overtop of the manhole while they were busy underground.

Talon's entry point at the corner of rues St. Louis and Bonsecours.

An inflatable zodiac, complete with an electric motor was used to get from their entry point over to the area that was to be tunneled. The sewer usually only has two feet of water flowing through it. Not only this but it’s very much full of a century’s worth of sediment including a good number of rocks brought down through the sewer’s snow dumps. Given this, they went so went so far as to build three dams to raise the water level high enough to accommodate their boat. From there it was (almost) all smooth sailing.

They smashed their way through the side wall of the sewer and in early spring of 1993 began work on the tunnel towards the bank, building dykes around the entranceway to prevent it from flooding during wet weather. Judging by photos it appears as though they made a fine mess of the sewer during the process.

The entrance to Talon's tunnel.

Today this section of the Craig Street sewer is considerably tidier looking, but traces of Marcel Talon’s tunnel can still be found today. Its entrance, wisely bricked off by the City.

Talon's tunnel (on right) as found today.

In order to prevent their 1.5 meter tunnel from falling in on itself, they used wooden beams and telescoping metal poles for support. Thirteen meters worth of excavation and an unspecified number of days later they reached the foundations of the bank which they spent close to a day smashing (and burning) their way through. Eventually they reached a point where a single drill-hole could be made through to the money room. Once they had determined the thickness of the walls they were able to dig out a section that left a 7cm thick section between the tunnel and the room on the other side.

Talon's makeshift tunnel between rue St. Antoine and the Bank of Montreal's foundations.

The idea was that the remainder could then be taken care of with thermal lances and magnesium bars. On the day of the hold-up, someone inside the tunnel was to be given the signal to start the burning process. Upwards of 200 million dollars would be gathered up and then they’d escape.

All this was supposed to have happened and most likely would have had it not for one occurrence that put an end to their planned heist. While Talon and his gang were elsewhere, a tree, no less than 10cm in diameter fell through into the tunnel. It was the result of sub-surface erosion or perhaps the weight of a snowplow. Regardless of the cause, it left a meter wide sink-hole in the sidewalk in front of the bank. The city was immediately called in to investigate. From that point on it was game over.

Despite the best efforts of police and other investigators, the would-be thieves were never found. It wasn’t until Talon, later arrested for the robbery of an armoured truck, signed an immunity deal with Crown prosecutors in 1994  that all was revealed. A year later, Talon authored a book about his criminal activities entitled Et Que Ca Saute! Loosely translated: hurry it up!

A decade later, the book was used as inspiration for the movie Le Derniere Tunnel, set in Montreal and not filmed in the Craig Street Sewer, but in the nearby and significantly drier Brock Street tunnel.

Urban Explorers Take Over

As mentioned earlier, sewers are no longer frequented by people to the same extent that  they once were. It’s been close to twenty years since the island last constructed a large-scale sewer and occupational health and safety regulations have pretty much ensured that sewer inspection gangs are a thing of the past. In addition, sewers are routinely dealt with externally. Instead, high-power vacuums attached to trucks are used to deal with clogs while CCTV or SONAR devices get used for actual inspections. That only leaves people such as myself and a few other like-minded urban explorers left roaming these systems the old-fashioned way.

For the most extent, it’s been urban explorers who have been keeping  the tradition of sewer-walking alive and well. As a bonus many have taken the time to document their experiences. Of note are underground trailblazers Urban Exploration Montreal (UEM) whose  website holds a nice record of their first foray into a storm drain back in 2002. While they never did venture into the combined sewers of Montreal, they did make valuable (and inspiring) inroads through other equally impressive underground systems.

Adding to the list of contributors are nel58 who stepped things up considerably when she, TaP and D-v-S delved into the Saint-Pierre Collector during the winter of 2005. News of their adventure soon made it to Toronto and elsewhere via the website UER and  helped establish Montreal as a city that had great potential for underground exploration. Having heard of her endeavors, I wasted no time in meeting up with her when I first moved to Montreal in the fall of 2006.

Looking into the small pipe leading towards the Craig Street Sewer, March 2007. (Photo courtesy of nel58)

Shortly thereafter we nervously made our way into the Craig Street sewer. Ill-equipped and unsure of what we were getting ourselves into, we received our first taste of a 125 year-old sewer. We were unaware of the history behind it and of the people who had made their way through it prior to our arrival. Much like the reporter from the Montreal Witness in 1877, we were taken in by the sewer’s peculiar beauty. From that point forward we only wanted to see more.

Snow dump hatches inside the Decarie Raimbault collector sewer.

For the past couple of years now, I’ve been looking for ways to get inside the sewers found within a northern portion of the island of Montreal. Actually, that statement is a bit misleading since it hasn’t exactly been a high priority.

Covering the areas of Ville St. Laurent, Ahunstic-Cartierville and the Town of Mont Royal, my view towards these sewers was somewhat indifferent. I knew that they were often large (up to 15 feet in diameter), but because they consisted of long stretches and were built a relatively short time ago, I had assumed that they would be quite boring and repetitive. Maybe even duller than the industrial parks and suburbs that they pass beneath.

Drainage basins for the island of Montreal as defined by the City's planning department in 1955. The region in red is the focus of this entry.

These were always the ones I’d get to once I finished exploring more interesting things, but nevertheless I would occasionally find myself looking for ways to access some portion of it. I never had much luck until just recently.

Part of the problem in accessing sewers in Montreal, at least for laymen such as myself, is that 99% of the manholes are situated in the middle of the street. This wouldn’t be an issue if the lids covering them didn’t weigh up to 300 lbs— definitely not the sort of weight you can easily throw around.

Eventually I did manage to find one feasible entry point in a most ideal location— a quiet spot, free from both car and pedestrian traffic. Better yet, this entry point was at the center of the system so trips could be divided up nicely without having to make extensive round-trips.

Despite my low expectations of what these sewers might have to offer, I was quite pleased with my find. Just over a week has passed since the  first visit inside of it, and we’ve only covered a relatively small portion, but so far those expectations have been exceeded.

But before we delve into the system, it’s worth having a peak at what was in this region both before during the time of its construction.

New Frontiers

Island of Montreal circa 1901.

If we go back to the late 1900s, much of this area was uninhabited save for the few hundred people living in the then small communities of Ville St. Laurent and Cote des Neiges. The surrounding land was primarily agricultural. A small network of roads linked the community of Cote Des Neiges at the foot of the Mont Royal to the North shore of the island.

1913 map showing the underground railway connection between the Town of Mont Royal and Montreal.

A decade later, with the advent of the automobile and tramway came population growth in the area. No longer would the growth of Montreal need to be exclusive to the areas immediately surrounding  the city of Montreal. In 1911, the Canadian Pacific Railway purchased 2,307 hectares of rural land northwest of Cote des Neiges before building a tunnel straight underneath the mountain towards the heart of Montreal.

The acquired land would eventually be turned into the island’s first suburb. Incorporating a European-style radial street plan, this “Model City” would mark the arrival of planned growth for the island. From now on, the city would develop, not solely on necessity, but the anticipation of what the future might entail.

Baby Steps Towards a Sewer System

Detail of 1922 map illustrating the north island's collector sewer and its two tributaries.

Of course, with this new development came the need for sewers. In 1912 two seven foot concrete collector sewers were constructed. One served the northern edge of Notre Dame de Grace and the second for the Town of Mount Royal. The two sewers merged just northeast of where the Decarie interchange is today, then generally followed the path of what was then known as Farmer’s Road before emptying into Riviere Des Prairies roughly five kilometers away.

I recently discovered a way into the portion running north of  the interchange.

The Notre Dame de Grace Collector, constructed in 1912.

At only 7 feet tall, the paris-style sewer “sidewalks” weren’t exactly convenient to walk on, but they did offer a respite from the often mucky conditions found in the centre trench. The half dozen rats scurrying along with me seemed to agree.

1911 plan for the Notre Dame de Grace collector. Source: Province of Quebec Archives, Montreal Region.

Missing in the section I walked through was the 16” pipe which appears on plans for the sewer. Although it’s unlabeled, it’s presumably a water main. This practice of running multiple utilities through the sewer system, while common in cities such as London and Paris never quite caught on in Montreal.

One of several low-tech flow regulators that stand in the way.

But in typical Montreal sewer fashion, nothing is ever as easy to get through as it first appears. A series of flow control gates cut across the sewer every 100 meters or so. In most cases, I could craw I’d you have to climb over the top. Not wanting to have to put up with this, and knowing that Riviere Des Prairies was a good four kilometers further, I didn’t venture too far downstream.

The junction where the two sewers combined. To the right: Notre Dame de Grace. To the left: Cote des Neiges.

At the upstream end, the junction for the NDG and Cote de Neiges sewers can be found, but unfortunately both have been sealed off making further passage impossible.

Growth and the Need for Planning

If the development of Mount Royal marked the beginning of rational planning, it’s clear that its sewage system was still mired in the 19th century way of thinking. At only seven feet tall over a total length of kilometers, there was no way this sewer could ever facilitate the rapid growth that would come decades later. As Ville St. Laurent and the surrounding communities continued to grow steadily, sewage overflows during heavy rainstorms became more common.

Wartime housing in 1944 in the Ville St-Laurent neighbourhood of Bois-Franc for employees of Noorduyn Aviation Ltd. Source: Pistard Archives.

By the time WW2 rolled around, large-scale industrial complexes such as Vickers and Continental Can were beginning to take up large tracts of land. War-time housing units, erected quickly for local employees took up additional real estate. Given the circumstances, new sewer construction wasn’t exactly a high priority. If the system was to be replaced, it would have to wait.

Naturally, things grew even faster in the years following the war. In the late 1940s, the Norgate Shopping Centre (Canada’s first mall) was constructed at Decarie and Cote Vertu. A network of relatively low-density residential areas was begin to spread. With talk of new highways and arteries being built in the near future, it only made sense that the 40+ year old sewer system in the area would require a major overhaul.

Big Thinking, Big Sewers

Open-cut construction of the Meilleur-Atlantique Collector sewer in Cartierville, 1953. Source: City Archives of Montreal.

The new collector sewers were designed far larger than necessary for the time, not to accommodate household and industrial waste, but to handle the storm run-off of the newly paved landscape. As Montreal’s Director of Public Works Department, Lucien L’Allier explained in 1957,  their size was determined based on the region’s “imperviousness” more than actual population. Densely developed residential areas were given the same treatment as those designated for industrial use. “Medium class” residential areas, more likely to contain water absorbing lawns, were put in the same category as railway yards.

1956 diversion ditch for the waters of Ruisseau Raimbault. Its flow is now contained within the Decarie Raimbault sewer. Source: City Archives of Montreal

Determining the size and path of this system was no doubt a tricky task as it involved a fair amount of speculation in how the area would evolve. Given that it was the late 1950s, there was a high level of optimism regarding how much the island would and could be developed. To put this into some perspective, by 1961 there was an expectation that the population for the island of Montreal and outlying areas would reach 7 million by 2000 with much of this growth occurring outside the city of Montreal. While there would be explosive growth over the next two decades, their estimations were a bit off the mark. Today’s population for this same area sits at roughly 3.6 million.

For all the flaws of today’s sprawling metropolis, Montreal’s city planners must be credited for at least attempting to think ahead to the future. As mayor Jean Drapeau stated in 1955, efforts were being made to “not only solve today’s problems, but avoid creating others, and try to anticipate problems 10, 20, even 30 years in advance.”

While Drapeau was clearly referring to the city’s planned autoroutes, the same approach was used when planning the island’s new sewer systems starting to be built around this same time. The crown jewel of these new systems was the Decarie Raimbault.

Enter the Decarie Raimbault System

Sewers constructed for the Decarie Raimbault system between 1956-58. Image source: City Archives of Montreal

The Decarie Raimbault system takes its name from Decarie Blvd and Ruisseau Raimbault, the creek which was diverted underground during the development of the system. At over x miles long, it took three years to complete at a total cost of x number of dollars.

Heading around the bend towards Cremazie blvd.

Possibly the same location taken in 1958 during a final inspection of the sewer.

The first time nel58 and I entered this sewer, we were happy to find that it was easy enough to walk through. With the exception of a few slippery spots, it could be navigated quickly enough by keeping to the edges. This stretch was tunneled through limestone and despite its size could be built using any steel reinforcement. With the exception of one section where a portion of the ceiling has collapsed, it seems to be holding up quite well.

The first noteworthy feature we came across was a rather massive snow dump chamber shown at the beginning of this post. It’s a feature which seems to have been added late— during the 1990s, by the looks of the materials involved. Google Street View now provides us a convenient way of being able to see the facility that contains to the large hatches.

Sewer stretch marks at our midway point.

Carrying on up through the main section of the sewer provided few rewards. It is a 2.5km slog through the same style of pipe, running westward parallel to the metropolitain highway. These sections aren’t particularly deep below the surface, but it was chosen to use tunnel boring machines rather than more commonly used open-cut techniques.

Tunnelling of the southern portion of the Decarie Raimbault system in 1958. Image source: City Archives of Montreal

Although not stated explicitly, the disruptions of open-cut construction would have no doubt caused mayhem in an area already well known  for traffic congestion. Before being replaced with the spaghetti junction that exists today, the old Decarie circle was described in 1957 as “chaotic, chronic and intolerable.” Local businesses were up in arms. I don’t imagine that digging open trenches along the neighbouring streets would have helped things any, especially not during a municipal election year.

Junction discovered after travelling roughly 3kms upstream. The passage where I'm standing heads south towards the Decarie expressway.

Eventually a junction appears, with one pipe heading south  and a smaller one continuing further west. We opted for the smaller one with less water coming down through it. Given that it was already late, we didn’t travel much further before deciding to call it a night. Only after I looked the sewer maps upon returning home did I discover we had made it to the middle of the Decarie interchange. Not bad for one night. After all, how many people can say they’ve walked below one of the city’s more infamous traffic arteries? I know, not the most exciting thing in the world, but given the area, you have to take what you can get.

1959 Gazette article announcing the new Decarie interchange. Source: City Archives of Montreal.

Being that this system was only recently discovered, there is still an incredible amount of it left to explore. There are sewers that snake their way up towards the mountain. There’s a connection over to the Meilleur Atlantique collector which most living in Montreal are familiar with because of its tendency to overflow out onto the ‘Acadie interchange. Basically, there’s enough here to keep me busy for awhile so stay tuned.

A rare view of Rivière St. Pierre, 1956, location unknown.

I recently stumbled across a peculiar old map for the island of Montreal showing a rather fantastic depiction of the island’s former creeks and lakes. It’s unlike any other map of the island I’ve ever come across. There’s no publication date printed on it, but given its author, Aristide Beaugrand-Champagne, it likely dates from the 1920s.

Beaugrand-Champagne was one of the city’s  architects and historians. He was also the originator of the idea that Jacques Cartier first arrived in Montreal from the north via Riviere Des Prairies rather than the South. Though it had its share of proponents, it was, and still is a controversial theory. This point of Cartier’s landing is highlighted on his map along the north shore, in Sault Au Ricollet.

During his studies, Beaugrand-Champagne paid special attention to the island’s former watercourses. In doing so, he came to the conclusion that the Iroquois village of Hochelaga was once situated in Outremont rather than in an area contained somewhere within the McGill University campus— another controversial theory for its time.

Anyway, with that mini-history lesson is out of the way. Here’s Monsieur Beaugrand-Champagne’s pièce de résistance. Clicking on the map for the larger view is recommended for this one.

Beaugrand-Champagne's map illustrating the island's topgography and hyrdrology between 1542 and 1642.

It’s hard to tell how much of this map is based on Beaugrand-Champagne’s knowledge of the island’s geography and how much of it is based on his imagination or even cultural bias. Any illustration attempting to show what the island looked like more than a couple of centuries ago is bound to have a certain degree of inaccuracy, and this one is no different.

For a map intended to show what the island looked like during the 16th century, the large lakes at the eastern end of the island seem inconceivable.

However, a surficial geology map from 1975 reveals these same areas to consist mostly of peat- a sign that, at the very least, there was once marshland there. One of these areas contains the recently developed complex of subdivisions named Anjou Sur La Lac. Of course, the “lac” that exists today are entirely artificial creations.

Detail of map from 1975 illustrating the east island's surface geology. The portions highlighed in purple represent areas high in peat.

While the depiction of former lakes and marshland might be accurate, the map isn’t without its flaws. Ruisseau Molson is mislabeled as Ruisseau Migeon which was actually situated further west. The general tangle of lines formed by some of the creeks bear no resemblance to either the earliest maps of the island from the 1700s or the more detailed cadastral  plans that would start to show up a century later. The way each system conveniently connects to the next also seems a bit unnatural and makes it less than convincing.

Besides Beaugrand-Champagne’s map, there’s little else out there that illustrates the island’s former hydrology. There are a couple of old maps that illustrate certain drainage boundaries, but there’s really only one other option out there if ever you want to know exactly what flowed where.

Detail from the map entitled Les Ruisseux et Fosses published in 1955.

In 1955, Montreal’s Water and Sanitation department published a map entitled “Les Ruisseux et Fosses.” Despite its age, it’s what they’ll give you at the City’s Planning Department if ever you go in and ask for a map of Montreal’s creeks. These same paths show up as dotted lines on the city’s sewer maps, and I suspect it’s what developers will refer to when deciding where they should and shouldn’t build certain things.

Not surprisingly, a lot of it contradicts other maps published over the past few centuries and its unclear what source some paths were based on. While a good deal of it does seem to be accurate, especially the areas surrounding downtown Montreal, some of it seems either too complex or not complex enough. Nevertheless, it’s the one I’ve chosen to use as foundation for my own interactive map. While I’m tempted to go through it and clean up a few things, it would be a difficult task to figure out just what should be changed.

Take Ruisseau Glen, a small tributary of Riviere St. Pierre that once ran just east of the Turcot interchange. Given the number of variations of its path from map to map, it’s hard to know which one is the most accurate.

Which one is it? Variations of Ruisseau Glen's path from multiple maps dating from the 1700s to 1956.

Another problem with almost all of these maps (my own included) is that there’s no indication as to how wide these watercourses were and how much water actually flowed through them. One might assume that a line represents a creek when in reality it may have just been the smallest of springs. Even one of the city’s more famous lost “rivers”, Riviere St. Martin is shown on one map from the 1700s with “This Rivulet is sometimes dry” written below it.

Detail of map from 1760 showing a portion of Riviere St-Martin flowing behind the original fortifications of Montreal.

Whether its lack of water was caused by Montreal’s development or from natural causes is unknown. Similarly, Riviere St-Pierre, which by some accounts was quite broad at the points where it emptied into the St. Lawrence, was likely no larger than a small brook a short distance inland.

Even the portions that did appear to be deeper or wider were the result of human engineering as was the case in Verdun and Cote St. Paul where attempts were made to use the creek as an open tailrace for the city’s waterworks’ engines. Additional modifications were likely also made to prevent the sort of flooding recorded in an 1878 issue of The Montreal Daily Witness.

Article from the Montreal Daily Witness, June 10th, 1878.

Unfortunately, since much of the landscape where these watercourses once were has been leveled and built over, we don’t have much to go by. With but a few exceptions, we can no longer see the contour of the land where water once flowed. The natural vegetation surrounding them has been uprooted.

With these visual clues scrubbed from the landscape, we can begin to look underground for clues, but it’s impossible to gauge how much of what flows through the sewers comes from the original network of creeks and how much is just wastewater.

Depiction of the City of Montreal's collector sewer system in 1962. By this point most of the creeks in this area of the island had dissapeared.

Instead we are left with a few (very few) photographs, written descriptions and a bit of oral history from those old enough to remember their remnants. These  systems didn’t simply disappear when they were covered over, though. Instead, they just underwent a transformation.

I’d like to think that my experiences and recollections of following these systems through the sewers are just as much a part of their open-ended history. Despite the  fact that their paths now appear fixed and are easily traced, things will continue to change underground just as they did on the surface.

Pipes will be enlarged, made smaller or set deeper into the ground. Old lines will be removed and others will be added elsewhere. New maps will be drawn, photos will be taken and hopefully over the course of this ongoing evolution, more stories will continue to be told.

I have a feeling we're not in Montreal anymore.

I’ve been asked a number of times if I’ve ever come across anything underground in Montreal that’s surprised me.  I never really quite know what to say since most of what I see is fairly predictable. It’s mostly pipes and chambers of varying sizes, constructed out of either concrete, brick or occasionally metal. I haven’t (yet) come across any dead bodies, pirate ships or gold coins — although I did find an old wallet once. What surprises do exist usually aren’t worth mentioning; a section that abruptly ends or a stretch that gets larger in diameter when you were expecting it to get smaller. Not exactly the sort of stuff that inspires answers people are hoping to hear.

Occasionally, though, I do come across things that I’d consider to be quite out of the ordinary and this entry involves one such example.

Enter the Cote St Paul Collector Sewer

The Cote St. Paul collector (CSPC) delivers wastewater from the southern half of Cote St. Paul towards the eastern edge of Point St Charles where it falls into a far larger sewer, the Saint Pierre Collector.

The main arm of the CSPC  begins as a 6’ brick pipe built during the late 1800s and finishes with 12’ prefabricated concrete pipe that was set during the 1990s. Running parallel for much of its length is the former water conduit turned sewer that I covered in this entry. A short connection exits between the two via a 5’ pipe, thus allowing any excess flow to be conveyed from one sewer to the other. I’m assuming the CSPC was added (or more likely reconstructed) to accommodate the burgeoning neighbourhoods that came after the second world war.

The original brick portion of the sewer is fairly straightforward. There’s a nice example of a shaft where snow would have been dumped down into the sewers from street level.  Rusty “shock bars” and a variety of stones lining the sides and bottom helped prevent ice and other falling debris from fracturing the surrounding brickwork.

A 19th century snow-dump shaft at the beginning stages of the Cote St. Paul collector.

Eventually the brick comes to an end and the sanitary flow falls down into a nice little concrete chamber.

The beginning of the newer concrete section of the sewer that runs underneath Blvd. de la Verendreye

Canoes in the Sewers?

For the next few kilometers, it’s a typical mid 20th century sewer- cast-in-place concrete and horseshoe shaped. It runs below underneath Blvd Lavendreye for approximately three kilometers, a stretch that contains few noteworthy characteristics. The exceptions are two shafts which former city planners have marked on maps as “pits pour canot” – literal translation:  “well for a canoe.”

City sewer map showing locations of snow dumps and "pits for canoes." Also shown is the old aqueduc water supply conduit running just a bit south of the CSPC.

At the top of each of these shafts are two sets of racks which appear as though they were designed to swing up and down. It definitely isn’t a canoe (or boat) friendly contraption so it’s unclear where the name comes from. I’ve never come across this sort of thing anywhere else, either on maps or through firsthand experience walking through the city’s sewers.

The mystery contraption at the top of the "canoe" pit. Obviously it hasn't been used in quite some time.

Another Sewer, Another Planet

A giant flowstone that seems to have become dislodged from another point in the sewer.

It’s at the downstream end of the CSLC where things start to get fun. Here, a six-foot high brick relief sewer veers off to the North. I was hoping to be able to follow this to get inside a portion of Riviere St. Pierre that was covered over. Instead, I found something far better.

I’ve encountered calcite deposits inside sewers in the past. Stalactites, stalagmites, “soda straws” and flowstones are all to be found in just about any sewer or storm drain that is more than a decade or so old. Caused partially by the limestone in cement, these formations can help turn a run-of-the-mill system into something quite wonderful. This one is no exception. In fact, I’ve never seen anything else like it.

What happens when you don't clean your sewers.

For roughly 100 meters, the walls of this century-old sewer make for a breathtaking spectacle. Nature has completely taken over to the point where you’re easily tricked into believing you’re not inside a man-made structure anymore. Instead, you are in a cave deep beneath the surface of the earth in some exotic country. Wherever you are, you are most definitely not 15 feet below a light industrial district and a fifteen-minute drive from your home.

An assortment of objects caught during higher water levels, lies snagged or in encased in the columns of calcite. It feels a bit like walking through a jungle, only the vegetation has been replaced with dangling plastic bags, condoms and panty-liners. As unsanitary as that might sound, the surrounding beauty supersedes the grossness of these individual objects.

Adding a bit of comedic relief to this relief sewers is an old (knock-off?) Spiderman action figure, which will most likely remain entombed in this blessed mess for the remainder of its days. Its pose only adds to its appearance of helplessness.

Sewer: 1, Spider-Man: 0.

Around the Bend and Back Again

The spic and span brickwork around the the bend in the sewer.

Carrying onward, the sewer takes a 90 degree turn at which point things start to settle down a bit. Around the bend, the sewer is (almost) as clean as a whistle. Not only are the walls free of the formations and debris a few feet earlier, but water coming into it via a small connection runs clear and seems to be free of any sanitary flow. However, that doesn’t last for very long.

A torrent of sewage falling down from the main branch of the CSPC.

A loud rumble can be heard off in the distance, the result of a 12-foot drop-shaft chamber. Here the old brick sewer continues on, but is intercepted by the main arm of the Cote St Paul collector. A violent torrent of water from the latter falls down from an adjacent side of the chamber resulting in one big hot and foggy mess. Without any means of reaching the bottom of the chamber or the opposite side, there’s no choice but to head back in the opposite direction.

Vibrapipe

The gateway into the section constructed during the 1990s.

Once back out of the brick sidepipe, you can continue further downstream through the main arm of the CSLC. A bit further and the older concrete construction comes to an end and one is greeted with a taste of the 1990s. A robust hexagonal  arch creates the entrance way into a robust chamber. A foot-wide groove designed to hold stop-logs runs down the walls and across the floor.

A short distance beyond this point is where you’ll find the beginning of a modern 12’ concrete pipe manufactured by Vibrapipe. Its name and casting date are stamped onto each section. Compared to the older sewers covered so far, this one shows few signs of wear and tear. While I wouldn’t look forward to having to walk through kilometers worth of this stuff, it can make for somewhat interesting space-age style photos.  Fortunately there isn’t too much of this found on the island of Montreal, at least not for the larger diameter sewers. While common in other cities like Toronto, here in Montreal it’s still somewhat of an anomaly.

Prefabricated concrete pipe compliments of the Quebec company named Vibrapipe

This section of the sewer takes roughly the same path as the smaller brick. Following this leads to another dropshaft chamber which incidentally is a short distance away from the other one. Right before the edge there are ten poles (aka “tell-tales”) suspended from anchors in the ceiling.

Suspended tell-tales inside the last walkable portion of the CSPC.

You’ll see these in Montreal sewers before any significant drop. The poles  swing back and forth easily and are there to remind workers that they are near the edge of something that they could fall down into. In this case one 10 foot deep pit, with the other one  just  a bit further downstream is probably as good a place as any to put them.

It’s also a good place to turn around and head back home.

A shaft underneath Bridge Street once used for dumping snow into the sewers.

Perhaps the most interesting underground features in the Montreal area are found within the old sewers built during the mid to late 1800s. Usually constructed entirely of brick and of sizes up to 9’ in diameter, they often appear to be steeped in history in a way that newer concrete sewers just can’t compare to. They have a warmer and organic quality to them as well that I tend to appreciate. Where concrete sewer systems can feel like cold modernist pieces of architecture, the brick ones seem more like inviting Victorian homes.

A good example of these characteristics can be found within the Point St. Charles Collector. As its name implies, this sewer was responsible for the drainage of the eastern half of Point St. Charles. (The western half was serviced by another sewer that I first started to explore in this entry). The sewer was also responsible for a portion of the neighbourhood once known as Victoriatown. Given that so little from this area can still be found at street level, it’s of some comfort that at least its sewer system can still be found and explored today.

Getting Started

Late 1880s representation of Montreal superimposed with the paths of the Point St. Charles Collector. The oldest portion of the sewer is shown here in red.

The oldest section of this particular system was constructed between 1862 and 1864, a time when the city was starting to implement its first master drainage plan. While some stretches of the creeks running along Craig Street (now St. Antoine) and William had already been covered over, the Point St Charles collector represented the beginning of a new era of widespread and methodical wastewater management. Five additional collector sewers would be built during this same time, only a few years after London and Paris finished developing their now legendary underground systems.

In its initial stages, the outlet of the Point Saint Charles collector was situated at the edge of a drainage channel for the Lachine Canal. This channel has mostly been covered over, but a portion of it can still be seen today underneath the Bonaventure highway opposite Farine Five Roses. In this same area, the Riverside Pumping Station was added in 1887 to help alleviate the system during spring floods. Shortly thereafter, a secondary sewer line was also added. A larger and deeper concrete tunnel would come decades later, and then another one still came during the 1990s with the introduction of the island’s interceptor network.

Today, the area is a confusing mash-up of old meets new technology which is hard to make sense of even when you’re inside.

The underground spaghetti junction found at the intersection of Bridge and Riverside.

Inside The System

Standing inside the lovely 147 year old egg-shaped section.

Using this area as a starting point, one can make their way a short distance into the oldest 4×6′ section of the sewer. I say a short distance, because, for whatever reason, the section approaching Bridge St. is filled to the top with rubble.

As far as you can get through the oldest section of the sewer.

Digging Through History

I imagine there must have been a fair amount of trial and error when it implementing drainage systems in the 1800s. In this case it’s unclear if the tunnel simply collapsed or of it was deliberately taken out of commission and filled with whatever was convenient at the time.

The last 50 meters or so of this section are half full of debris which makes it a bit uncomfortable to get through. It’s strictly crawling-height at this point, with the only payoff coming from being able to play guerrilla archaeologist while sifting through the rubble. Here you’ll find fragments of old glass, pottery and other unidentifiable materials. I’ve yet to find anything valuable inside a sewer in Montreal, but the bits and pieces of objects encountered in some areas are often interesting enough to make a bit of digging worthwhile. Just mind the worms. And the mosquitoes, too.

Various artifacts recovered from within the sewer rubble.

A few minutes of picking through the debris revealed the crown of a dark hand-blown bottle that closely resembles the one shown here for Hostetter’s Stomach Bitters. Regardless of what company the bottle came from, it likely dates from at least the 1870s.

The Second Line

Inside the placid stretch of the collector that was later built during the 1880s.

Perhaps as a result of problems encountered with this older sewer, a second relief line was later built that runs parallel to the original one for most of its course. Its exact construction date is unknown, but it’s safe to say it was probably built during the late 1880s around the same time the Riverside Pumping Station was completed.

A bit of a tight squeeze through a 2×3 foot side-pipe will allow you to enter this section. It has a wonderful arched shape which is common in other cities, but is something that I haven’t encountered before in Montreal. From here it’s easy to get through thanks to a hard layer of sediment lining the bottom that you can easily walk on top of. This 1km long stretch  is almost 7’ in height, but the grit and gravel removes at least a foot from this.

Unlike other sewers built around this time, there were no streams passing through this territory whose waters could be redirected to help keep the system free from silt and other debris. I don’t imagine the smaller sewer connections entering from the nearby stockyards and the Grand Trunk Railway shops could have helped much either.

Things are fine up until you reach the intersection of Bridge and Wellington where the sewer makes an abrupt turn to the west. Here the solid base of debris becomes a sloppy mess that’s less forgiving when it comes to supporting your weight and it’s at this point where things start to get fairly uninviting. The 130 year old brickwork changes to a shorter and much newer pre-fabricated concrete pipe that’s half-full of water. At this point there isn’t much incentive to push forward so your best bet is to turn around, go down Bridge Street and head back out.

What are most likely the roots of a poplar tree that have found their way into the moisture of the sewers.

One interesting feature of this stretch is the vegetation that’s managed to finagle its way in through to the sewer in search of water. The roots of some trees have taken the easy route in through smaller connecting pipes, but in other cases, some roots have actually pushed their way right through the mortar of the brickwork itself—no small feat considering most of these older sewers were lined using 2-3 rows of bricks.

Smaller roots that were determined to find their way to water through the brickwork.

The line of poplar trees and sumac situated in an area that the sewer passes through are the likely infiltrators. Half these trees look healthy, while the other half look as though they’re about to die so it’s hard to say just what effect the sewage is having on them. I’ll let the botanists and environmentalist out there figure this one out.

The line of trees South of Mill Street that are presumably drawing water from the sewers.

Grit removal tanks of Montreal's wastewater treatment plant.

Montreal’s wastewater treatment plant can be found at the far east end of the island in Pointe Aux Trembles. It’s the largest in North America and ranks the third largest in the world- capable of handling 32 cubic metres of water a second.  Raw sewage (usually) ends up here via a network of deep-level tunnels referred to as interceptors. These interceptors form a ring around the island, collecting and distributing wastewater to the plant before it has a chance to enter the surrounding rivers. To get a better sense of how the interceptors work, you can have a look at the entry I wrote  here.

Montreal's wastewater treatment plant as seen from Microsoft Live Maps.

While it’s an impressive system in terms of its scope and capacity, the treatment process itself leaves much to be desired. In fact, it’s actually one of the worst in Canada. A national “report card” issued by the Sierra Club in 2004 gave the city’s treatment process a grade of F-. The only other city to receive a grade worse than Montreal was Victoria, a place which doesn’t even have a treatment process in place yet.

The biggest problem is that the plant only provides primary treatment of its sewage. Most other cities across Canada deliver secondary and even tertiary treatment of wastewater resulting in far cleaner water. By comparison, the effluent from Montreal’s plant remains full of pharmaceuticals, heavy metals, and a multitude of other contaminants. While this pollution is usually kept clear from the shores of Montreal, it inevitably ends up somewhere downstream of the island where the effluent has been known to be wreaking havoc with the river’s ecosystem.

Effluent plume from the treatment plant's discharge location east of Pointe Aux Trembles. Source: Environment Canada

Even during the era of its conception during the late 1960s, Montreal’s proposed treatment plant was deemed to be inadequate to solve the problem of worsening water pollution. Secondary treatment schemes were entertained, but the costs involved were considered too high for it to be considered feasible. Instead, the plan was to incorporate additional levels of treatment to the plant after it was completed, which at the time was expected to be 1981. It was thought that by then “cheaper and better schemes may be available.”

Montreal has always been behind the times in terms of sewage treatment. While much time and money was put into developing its large-scale collector sewers between 1920 and 1965, their contents simply flowed directly out into the open waters surrounding the island.

Baby Steps

Perhaps anticipating future problems, in 1930, the Province of Quebec ordered that Montreal start treating some of the sewage flowing into Riviere Des Prairies. Shortly thereafter, Montreal began work on the North Interceptor. This 14 foot tunnel was intended to transfer sewage towards a site on Isle de la Visitation where it was thought that a local treatment plant could eventually be built. The interceptor was such a low priority that it took 25 years to complete. As for the proposed treatment plant, ground was never even broken and by 1967, plans for its construction were officially scrapped.

Final inspection of the North Interceptor sewer in 1955, 25 years after the start of its construction. Source: City Archives of Montreal

From Bad to Worse

Editorial cartoon from 1945 - "O rivières de chou nous!"

For close to a century, Montreal could always rely on the swift-moving waters of the St. Lawrence, Riviere des Prairies to whisk sewage away from the island.  However, by the 1940s, it was becoming obvious that this practice was no longer working as well as it had in the past. Public swimming areas around the island were being forced to close. The waters were starting to foul. Clearly, there was no way of hiding the fact that the practice of continuously dumping sewage into the open waters was causing problems. Still, it would take another thirty years before concrete steps would be taken to help remedy the situation.

Isle St. Helen beach signage - from no littering in 1937 to no bathing in 1941. Source: Pistard Archives

By the 1960s, an average of 400+ million gallons of sewage a day was being discharged directly into the waters surrounding the island.  By contrast, during this same period, Toronto was cleaning 98% of its wastewater using a combination of four treatment plants. Montreal couldn’t claim to match this percentage until 1996. It would be the last major city in North America to start treating its sewage.

Starting to Get Serious

1970 map showing preliminary paths of the island's interceptors and locations of its treatment facilities. Source: City Archives of Montreal

In the summer of 1967, during the middle of Expo, mayor Jean Drapeau’s engineering department released a report proposing, not one, but two treatment plants for the island- one which could handle the north/east watershed and another for the south/west encompassing downtown Montreal. Over the next few years, much debate amongst the island’s communities took place involving  where these facilities would be located, how much could be spent and when they might be completed.  A site adjacent to the Victoria Bridge (previously used as a parking lot for Expo) was considered as was Isle St-Therese, but both were later shelved due to “environmental concerns.” Years would pass before a master plan was drafted.

It was eventually decided to build just one treatment plant in Point Aux Trembles  and eventually use it to treat all the island’s municipalities’ sewage. Both the North Interceptor and the St-Pierre collector system would be incorporated into the plan- measures which city officials claimed would help save millions of dollars. Work finally commenced in 1974 with the expansion of the North Interceptor. It was expected that the system could be completed and functioning by 1981. Turned out they were about 15 years off the mark.

Sewerage Scandals

The website for Montreal’s treatment plant provides a timeline highlighting key dates in the construction of its treatment system. It’s a decent overview, but it conveniently leaves out all the problems encountered along the way. There are no indications as to why the project took close to twenty years to complete at cost of over a billion dollars more than the initial estimates.

Graph from 1976 showing the escalating costs of the treatment project based on rising inflation and a completion date of 1986. Source: City Archives of Montreal

To go through that history of problems in detail would take far too long for one blog entry,  but one can get a sense of it all by reading through the newspaper headlines that appeared over the duration of the project.

1964 – “Sewage plant site Marked”
1967 – “Construction of wastewater treatment plant to cost $131,000,000″
1968 – “Roxboro residents warned: don’t swim in the Back River”
1969 – “Town of Mount Royal against city on new sewage plant”
1970 – “Clean air group claims sewage project ‘Waste of Money’”
1971 – “Montreal’s sewage treatment plan probed further by Quebec”
1971 – “Montreal to build $300,000,000 sewage disposal plant”
1973 – “Quebec tells Montreal to accelerate work on sewage system”
1974 – “Quick start to sewer plan urged”
1974 – “Pollution ratings close eight more area beaches”
1974 – “Montreal’s $500,000,000 sewage clean up”
1975 – “Executive committee seeks tender control”
1975 – “Quebec to pay half Montreal’s sewage nill”
1976 – “Economic woes threaten metro, sewage line work”
1976 – “Sewage plant, metro delayed”
1976 – “Is the Saint Lawrence an open sewer?”
1977 – “Province suspends sewage project”
1977 – “Sewage contracts stopped by Montreal”
1977 – “Costly sewer system simply shifts the problem”
1978 – “Back River Clean by 1986″
1978 – “Our sewage scandal: big plans but still little action”
1979 – “First phase completed of Montreal’s $1.2 billion sewage clean-up”
1979 – “$240 million sewer line awaits as city argues with suburbs”
1980 – “Time to take the plunger”
1983 – “Montreal wants Quebec action on huge southern sewer line”
1985 – “Dumping sewage into our rivers: there’s light at the end of the tunnel”
1985 – “Sewage pipe polluting 20km of river: experts”
1986 – “Boat will tour St. Lawrence sewer dumps”
1987 – “Push of button officially starts sewage plant”
1987 – “Montreal sewage plant called oversized, substandard”
1988 – “Not cleaned up yet”
1989 – “Waste spills into river after plant breakdown”
1990 – “Sewage plans running late, completion set back to ’94 by problems”

You get the idea…

Completion and Beyond

Finally, by 1998 all portions of the interceptor network had been completed and was being used to transfer most of the island’s sewage to the treatment facility. Being grossly over budget and over schedule, the original plan to introduce secondary treatment never came. Having already been considered obsolete during its conception, today’s plant is in dire need of upgrading if it’s to match the expectations of the 21st century. An announcement was made last year that Montreal would be seeking $200 million to help convert the plant into an ozonation treatment facility. The conversion would make it the largest city in the world to be using this more efficient process, but so far details have been vague and it’s questionable as to how and when all this might happen.

But despite the fact  the existing plant is behind the times in terms of treatment, it does do an adequate job of handling large amounts of wastewater. As well, the large-diameter interceptors can usually accommodate heavy rainfalls, which means a lower percentage of raw sewage ends up in the rivers when compared to other cities such as Toronto. As a result, the water around the island is a great deal cleaner than it used to be— enough so that the water is now deemed suitable for swimming.  While the number of recreational beaches on the island has dropped from over 20 in the 1940s to only two today, they can still be used. It’s better than nothing, I suppose.

So Teri and I will be leaving for Greece later this week where we’ll be getting married on June 20th. I was never able to convince her that having the ceremony in a drain would be a good idea, but she did agree to doing a  slightly ridiculous photoshoot.  I figure any girl that’s willing to humour me to this extent is one that’s worth holding onto. Besides, she looks quite fetching in polka-dot boots, doesn’t she?

See you soon.

Here’s a bit of video footage from about a month ago near the LaSalle entrance to the aqueduct. I’ve been poking around this general area for about a year now, hoping to find something interesting related to either the former or existing water supply intake pipes. I haven’t had much luck with that yet, but while walking through the woods at the edge of the aqueduct, I stumbled across a manhole cover which led to a fairly large, but half-flooded chamber.

After climbing down a very rusty ladder to a narrow ledge, I lit the chamber up with a spotlight to get a better look. A second ladder, with even rustier rungs, was almost entirely submerged from the flooding. I couldn’t see the bottom. I saw an entry point for water along the  side of the chamber facing the aqueduct. On the opposite side of the chamber, two additional channels with ceilings sloping down towards the height of the water could be seen. It was difficult to tell if they were entirely submerged, though. I thought that maybe if the water level there was low enough it might be able to get a better look down through the length of them.

Overlooking a portion of the chamber from the ledge.

Not content with being unable to see everything from the vantage point of the ledge, I returned a few days later with my good friend nel58 and (what else?) a $10 inflatable boat from Canadian Tire. Actually, a pool-toy would be a more apt term for it. Either way,  it did the job— at least up until nel58 took it for a spin. Ten minutes later it sprung a leak. Whoops.

The water level ended up coming up to the very top of the two channels I was interested in so that ended up being a bust, too. I figure they both lead into the conduit that I covered in my previous entry. If that’s the case, then there’s a good chance that most of that portion is considerably flooded as well.

A view from the "boat." The two channels that presumably lead into the water distribution conduit can be seen beneath the far wall.

So, all we could really do was go for a little cruise around the chamber using our “disposa-boat.” I can think of worse ways to spend an evening. The acoustics were fantastic and I imagine that during warmer months it would make for a nice little subterranean swimming hole. The water seemed clean enough for it. A variety of graffiti adorning the walls indicates that local kids have used the chamber for various activities in the past, but who knows if swimming was ever one of them.

What was the chamber used for originally? My theory is that it was added after the 1913 collapse of the water conduit. Up until that point, there was only one way water could enter the tunnel- through a small intake situated close to the shoreline of LaSalle. When a new intake system was developed to bring a cleaner source of water into the aqueduct itself, it probably made sense to have that same water be conveyed towards this chamber and  into the conduit. If ever it needed to be drained for inspection or repairs, then stop-logs could be added to serve as a temporary dam.

View of one of the two walled-off inlets found near the midway point of the aqueduct's water conduit.

Similarly, near the midway point of the conduit explored in the last entry, there is another chamber that looks as though it was added around the same time and for similar reasons. There may be others that I just haven’t come across yet. It has two inlets/outlets facing the side of the aqueduct, both of which have been permanently sealed off. There may have been simple control gates here at one point. Another slot for stop-logs runs across the middle of the conduit, dividing the two channels so that if one length of the tunnel ever needed to be taken out of service, the remaining portion could still be used.

Video footage courtesy of nel58.

In my last entry I talked about Montreal’s Aqueduct canal and its role in bringing water to the city of Montreal. In this entry, we’ll begin to go underground, but first, a bit more history…

I mentioned the use of hydraulic machinery and how it was powered by water by the aqueduct. Only a small portion of that water (less than 5%) was actually sent through the pipes and into homes and businesses. By the late 1800s, several problems with this system started to make it less than ideal. The first issue was that demand for water was increasing and more horsepower was required to distribute it. The aqueduct at the turn of the century, roughly a quarter the width it is today, was incapable of providing the hydraulic horsepower necessary to power the pumps.

On top of this, the success of system was often at the whims of mother nature. Low water levels in the summer and ice blockages in the winter frequently reduced pumping capacity. As a result, steam power, which was both cost and labour intensive, would then have to be used as a back-up.

Another problem was that the water was being brought in directly close the shoreline of the St. Lawrence River, which by this time was starting to become less than pure. City officials maintained that the water posed no health risks. However, there was a concern that drainage from properties situated upstream of the entrance to the aqueduct had the potential to cause future problems. Given that there was still no filtration process yet in place (and wouldn’t be until the early 1920s), engineers were starting to become somewhat mindful of what could possibly be entering the city’s water supply.

20th Century Solutions

To address the shortage of available horsepower, in 1907, after two decades worth of proposals and deliberations, it was decided to widen the aqueduct from 40 to 140 feet. Along with upgrades to pumping equipment, the alteration would provide a total of 2,500 HP during the winter months. A rate of 5,000 HP during the summer was achievable when the aqueduct was free of ice, or ‘frazil‘.

To help improve quality of water, a 9’ concrete conduit running underneath the aqueduct’s north shore was built between 1907 and 1909. In addition, the intake for this conduit would extend towards the middle of the St. Lawrence, where the water was less likely to contain sediment. By enclosing the water inside this underground pipe, the risk of further cross-contamination would also be diminished. The conduit would also serve as a continuous water supply while the aqueduct was emptied during its widening.

Rumour Has It.

I first learned of the conduit a couple of years ago, not through the city archives or maps, but from a message board dedicated to Verdun . In a bit of oral history, an older member recollected a time during his youth when he and his friends would open a manhole cover near the north side of the Crawford Street Bridge and climb down into a ‘9 foot pipe.’ This was enough to pique my interest. I decided to go have a look for myself.

When I arrived, the only manhole I could find in the area was now in the middle of Blvd De La Verendrye- a rather busy thoroughfare. If it was the same one he entered, then it must have been before the 1960s which was when they built the road . I walked further along the street hoping to find other options, but every single one was situated in the road. Feeling a bit dejected, I filed it under ‘things to look for if ever bored’ and left it at that.

A few months passed before I came across another reference to the conduit, this time in a city planning document from the 1930s. I learned that the pipe was connected to the waterworks system. A few weeks later, when Controleman came back from the City Planning department with a handful of sewer maps, one of which made clear where the conduit ran, that it was no longer in use, and more importantly, where the best point of entry was located.

City planning map detail showing aqueduc and the old water conduit (in red).

In what I consider to be a continuation of underground exploration traditions, our entry point ended up being but a few feet away from the manhole that the older gentleman from Verdun once used. A three foot high drainage pipe within Parc Angrignon, just large enough the crawl through, provides a 21st century means of access.

Inside the Conduit.

Manhole chamber (and groundwater infiltration) underneath Blvd. Verendrye

The conduit itself resembles many of Montreal’s older concrete sewers, but with pronounced horizontal lines from the wooden forms that were used during construction. For a century old tunnel, it’s in excellent. The water is, at times, thigh-deep, but it is slow moving and not that much of an issue assuming you have the stamina to wade through it for long periods of time. Sewage can be detected, but for the most part the water is cleaner than what is usually encountered underground in Montreal. I wouldn’t want to drink it, but I wouldn’t mind falling in it either.

As a testament to its cleanliness, small fish can often be spotted over the course of its length. During one trip, I even came across about a half dozen mud-puppies that somehow got swept into the system and have done their best to make this dark tunnel their home.

One of many Mud-puppies spotted inside the conduit. This particular one was close a foot in length.

The Montreal Water Famine of 1913

By the winter of 1913, work had begun to widen the canal an additional 25 feet. This further widening was commenced to help generate electrical power for the city’s lighting systems. Rather than have to expropriate additional land on the south side of the canal, the City decided to make the enlargement on the north shore instead, close to where the conduit ran. It’s here where all sorts of problems began.

In the midst of this second enlargement, a two-foot long portion of the conduit was damaged. Workers did their best to try and repair the break, but a few days later, sixty feet worth of the conduit collapsed. The damage left close to 300,000 people in Montreal without a proper water supply. Adding insult to injury, the event occurred on Christmas Day  — never a good time for catastrophe to strike.

New York Times headline from Dec 28th, 1913.

City workers scrambled to repair the break while the people of Montreal had to receive water through water carts or from properties fortunate enough to have access to Cartesian wells. In one instance, Ogilvy’s department store, with a 1,200 foot deep artesian well in its basement, was able to provide water for people in the area. Meanwhile, large factories such as the Angus Shops had to be temporarily closed, while streets were patrolled day and night to react quickly to the first sign of fire.

Buckets of water being handed out from a casks during the shortage.

The  conduit was eventually repaired four days after its collapse using sections of boiler plate riveted together to form a steel pipe. Wasting no time, the city decided to let water through the length of the conduit as soon as the concrete surrounding the pipe had finished setting.

1913 newspaper clipping showing the repaired section of the conduit as well as the dry aqueduct to the right of it.

The joints held, and close to a century later the steel pipe can still be found. It’s a great deal rustier, but despite this, it’s holding up well.

The steel pipe section today.

While the conduit repair was successful, the city’s confidence in its water supply was severely shaken. An investigative report submitted to the city’s Board of Commissioners blamed the collapse on both the materials used during construction of the conduit as well as the excavation that had been taking place at the time.

More importantly, the report made several recommendations that would help prevent another such calamity from occurring. Based on the report, an emergency supply pipe running from the Lachine Canal to the pumping engines was soon added as a temporary solution. Ensuring a more reliable back-up supply system wouldn’t come until later.

Yesterday and Today.

It’s not clear at this point when the city stopped using the conduit  for its drinking water supply. It likely became obsolete by the time the filtration plant was put into operation during the 1920s. Impure water running the length of the open aqueduct was less of an issue after that. Repositioning of the system’s  intake pipes probably also ensured a cleaner supply as well. Also unclear is when (and why) the City officially abandoned its plans to use the aqueduct for purposes of power generation.

Fresh water flowing out from underneath a syphon that presumably connects to the Des Baillets water treatment plant. A makeshift ladder sits off to the side.

Today the conduit is still in use, both as a sewer for LaSalle and as an overflow tunnel for the Charles Des Baillets water purification plant which was built during the 1970s. The aforementioned relatively clean water and levels of sand (fare probably attributable to the plant’s filtering system.  A walled off section prevents water from the River from entering the conduit directly.  Before this, a section of the conduit has been replaced with a junction chamber with one pipe leading towards the discharge tunnel of the plant.

Junction chamber situated near the Des Baillets water treatment plant. Clean water flows in from the right and raw sewage from the left.

Given that there is currently only one known feasible entry point into the conduit, walking its entire length (and back again) would be a formidable task involving a 16 km round trip. To this date, I’ve walked roughly half its length, but I’m going to have to find other ways in if I’m to see the remaining portions.