Montreal architect Vedanta Balbahadur writes about his hometown's fall from its status as Canada's premier city through the lenses of baseball and the built environment.
The first Canadian city to host a World's Fair and Olympic Games and the first outside of the United States to acquire a major league baseball franchise, Montreal's thriving economy, modernist building boom, and future-oriented outlook attracted attention from around the world in the middle of the twentieth century. Since then, however, the city has seemed to rest on its laurels. Despite its undeniable charms, it is now in some ways seen as an example of how not to build a city, with crumbling infrastructure that has become the butt of jokes across Canada.
Balbahadur explores this evolution in detail and describes his speculative vision for restoring some of Montreal's lost glory: a new baseball stadium and public park designed for the return of a major league team.
Thanks to Sarah Wesseler
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