What is this a picture of?
UPDATE: Just about everyone guessed correctly that these are decomposing railway ties, but Frank was the first to properly guess that these are decomposing tramway ties, uncovered because of excavation work.
Exposed tramway rail and ties on Sherbrooke St. W. near Loyola, taken in September 2006.
The city is littered with tramway rails that were merely paved over after the network was dismantled. Some are later exposed through potholes, others because of excavation work, and are slowly being removed. But much of the vast network still remains, just inches below the surface of the street.
No idea, but would it help to guess that that's a very old railroad track running across the picture?
An old abandonned train track obviously...hard to tell wich one tough!
Decomposing railroad ties.
Looks like the old tracks for streetcars.
A tramway track under a open street...
I'm thinking it's one of these "holes" around Ste-Catherine where a building once stood, burnt down and was eventually demolished. Maybe the Seville or something similar, but I can't say for sure.
Dried-out and rotten rail beam from under a no-longer used rail track.
An excavation site that has revealed an old tram rail, wooden ties and supports.
the old turcot yards?
An old tramway track wood tie ??
Not sure my comment went through so let me try again: Is is a rotting rail roard track? But here's my other thought: A tramway track that is peaking though the asphalt?
Old streetcar ties?? exposed during road work? saw some on cotes des neiges once
Railroad ties and tracks under Ste-Catherine. Probably the hole that was at the corner of de la Montagne all summer.
the remains of the wooden supports(ties) and streetcar track they support...on Sherbrooke W.
Railroad tracks. Dorin-Rigaud line
Is it the demolition site at the old Spectrum?
Some old tram/train tracks that were under the street in Old MTL?
Old streetcar tracks?
Wasn't hard to guess, I remember when they tore Ste-Cath to repave it a few years ago. And on some stretches you can still see them peaking through...
LOL...wow was I off! There could've been tracks under the Spectrum.
> and are slowly being removed.
Maybe they should fix them up and reinstate tramway service, or a modern version of one.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Light_rail_in_North_America
Check first shot on right, Huston TX.
Fixing them would probably mean entirely replacing them, since they've been left rotting for half a century. It would essentially be starting from scratch.
Those sure are funny-looking spliffs!
Boul. St-Joseph near St-Denis?
The BNQ has a couple of old tramway maps online if any of you history nerds are interested...
1923: http://services.banq.qc.ca/sdx/cep/document.xsp?app=ca.BAnQ.sdx.cep&db=notice&id=0000231105&n=4&dbrf0=xtgpleintexte_fr_FR&dbrv0=tramway&qlang=fr-FR&db=notice&dbrn=1&sortfield=titre_trie&order=ascendant&col=*&chpp=20&dbrqp=search_notice&qid=sdx_q0
1941: http://services.banq.qc.ca/sdx/cep/document.xsp?app=ca.BAnQ.sdx.cep&db=notice&id=0000335641&n=5&dbrf0=xtgpleintexte_fr_FR&dbrv0=tramway&qlang=fr-FR&db=notice&dbrn=1&sortfield=titre_trie&order=ascendant&col=*&chpp=20&dbrqp=search_notice&qid=sdx_q0
Let me know if the links don't work and I'll try to repost.
I have two maps of the Montréal streetcar network on my own website at
http://emdx.org/rail/MTC1941/index.html
(the first is the route map, and the second the topology of the rail network itself)
Also I have an hypothetical map of what the streetcar network could have become had it been decided not to build the Métro, but instead run the streetcar through downtown tunnels:
http://emdx.org/rail/metro/pasDeMetro.php
Holy crap! It's another tramway map geek!
Will you marry me, emdx? I promise to be gentle in bed. "Sort of".
In the late 1990s, I remember tripping (fortunately, not actually falling and hurting myself) on exposed streetcar tracks that had popped back on the surface in the middle of the street on Sherbrooke at the corner of Elmurst (so, a few blocks from where the above pics were taken). I don't know if the city actually removed that bit of tracks since or just repaved over it...