Canada's Missing Historic Preservation Program

"There are about 7,200 such heritage sites across the country. They're finicky old dames requiring complex maintenance and upkeep, and while Britain and the United States have broad-based programs for preserving "built heritage" - a national trust and tax credits, respectively - Canada has none."

"A national heritage trust system, advocates say, is badly needed. Heritage buildings are "endangered" in Canada, says Natalie Bull, executive director of the Heritage Canada Foundation, because developers often prefer to knock them down and start new."

"It's easier, Ms. Bull says, to throw up a cookie-cutter development - such as a new condo - than to take time to work within an existing, antiquated heritage site with its own 'quirks,' or 'problems.'"