Friday, January 16, 2009

10 Bridges of Verdun

Why not make a short tour of the Aqueduct and it's 10 bridges in  the photo section of my site. At one of the meetings of the group Verdun Memories, someone brought up the subject of how many bridges there were over the Aqueduct. No one seemed to know the answer so I decided in June 2007 to take my bike and my camera and drove along the bicycle path along the Aqueduct and took pictures of all the bridges. This fitted in well with my own involvement with the SHGV. To my surprise, I discovered 10 bridges, including the LaSalle Boul. complex (10 a-b-c-d) wich consists of 4 photos of the road and the pumping station complex. I also discovered that a major pipe wich runs along the aqueduct burst in 1913 requiring major repairs as shown on the photos wich ocurred facing the Douglas hospital where there is still a narrow bridge called the Cow Bridge (6A). The Knox bridge (8) at Bishop Power boul .has to be the best kept secret as it is the most beautifull bridge around Montreal, bar none. My research led to my writing an article for our society's magazine Les Argoulets. I have also added a 1918 photo of the Aqueduct wich I think Les posted on the old site. The Latour bridge (9) was renovated last year but I did not see it since. So take the short tour and if you have any comments, I would like to hear from you.

Guy

9 comments:

Diane Roberts said...

GUY...COULD YOU TELL ME THE NAME OF THE BRIDGE AT THE END OF 4TH AVE VERDUN.
I WALKED ACROSS IT HUNDREDS OF TIMES TO VISIT MY PARENTS ON 3RD AFTER I MARRIED AND LIVED IN COTE ST PAUL. THANKS FOR YOUR INFORMATIVE POSTS...DIANE

Diane Roberts said...

GUY, THERE ARE SO FEW POSTS ON THIS SITE SO FAR, I THINK IT WILL BE DIFFICULT TO CONVINCE THE VERDUN CONNECTIONS MSN MEMBERS TO MAKE THE EFFORT TO JOIN UP.
BETWEEN YOU AND LES, THANKS FOR GIVING IT YOUR BEST SHOT!...DIANE

Guy Billard said...

Diane,
I think Les is doing a great job to get the members of the old site to join the new site so lets be positive and in time we should get back to normal. As far as the bridge is concerned what you refer as the 4th ave. bridge I call it the Jolicoeur bridge. It may have an official name but I don't see it on my map.
Guy

Sandy Walsh said...

As the saying goes "Rome wasn't built in a day" - great album of the bridges too! Thank you.

George Edwards said...

Sooner or later the people that want to be part of VC2 will join the group and we will be wondering what all the nervousness was about. Collectively we have scared some away by the postings we have done about the Multiply site. i.e., different, hard to learn,etc. We all have to be more positive about the new site and stop comparing the old vs new.

Les F said...

Hi Guy , as kids the bridge was referred to as 'Rainbow Bridge' for obvious reasons.but I remember that from being very young:
As for members switching over to here,We have to remember that everyone can read these posted messages,and as with the other site ,we did have a lot of members numerically speaking,but relative to the people that actually posted,it was rather disproportionately low,.We also know that we had several cases of Multiple ID's,and Unfortunately We also had a significant number od members who had passes away ( and we chose to just leave their ID's intact, over a 6 year period ,and being predominately all in that Baby Boomer Age group & above,we will experience losses like that,.
but Interest always grows, just stick with it.
One of the other things too, is that it always looks like we have new Blog Topics added ( & we do ) but the responses are not directly laid out like the old MSN site,we actually have to rely on our individual 'In Box's,.or we have to look at the bottom right hand side in small letters easy to miss, the word 'comments' & clicking that opens this sequence of responses,..I would like to see ,where when we click on any topic,that the whole topic & responses are laid out,also I would like to see ,the ability in these response to post pictures & use different fonts & copy & paste articles,That would make any one thread more interesting looking & perhaps generate more activity,....
In any case for now this is what we have,and it does have it's benefits ,& detraction's,....
havefunandrememberverdun

Diane Roberts said...

Hi Les, I like the name "Rainbow Bridge" so I think I'll stick to that!
I agree that the method of responding directly is not as obvious as the old site and that might be part of the problem of members being hesitant to respond. Up to now, I've found it easier to post directly to member's individual sites, but of course, that doesn't create the activity needed to help this site grow. I'm finally catching on to this and will persevere as I don't want to let all the other "Baby Boomers" down!...Diane

Guy Billard said...

Diane,
I'm glad to hear that the Jolicoeur bridge "Rainbow Bridge" brings back memories for you. I took that bridge yesterday on my way to the society and it is impressive and a real landmark in the area. It is actually right in the middle of 4th and 5th ave. on the Verdun side. I'll have to find out what is the official name.
Guy

Victor Coveduck said...

February Greetings from Florida and Victah of the '30's. '40's and '50's! (and of course V.H.S.)
A fantastic site we have here! Many thanks to all those who made it possible. As for the 4th Ave. bridge over the 'aquie' , that's what we called it and most of us 'olde timers' still do. Most of us from the Avenues, have the Avenues forever logged in our memories. I was not one who climbed and crawled over the arch, but saw it done. Many a bicycle ride over that bridge headed for Lachine. For those of you still in Verdun, hang in there, Spring isn't that far away. "Memories are made of this!"