Hahaha - porn theatre. Le Beaver. Good times.

It is a paradox though. Dalhousie Street near the Byward Market in Ottawa had a lot of lovely second-hand bookshops, though they are getting forced out now. I'm impressed that there are still quite a few second-hand bookshops along Mont-Royal, mostly just a few streets east of St-Denis, and a very good one just south of St-Denis on rue de la Roche. The best, though, is a bit west of St-Denis, Porte de tête, mostly used, some new, mostly French, some other languages including English. Intellectual, artistic and contestataire orientation.

There is a nice independent bookshop on Bernard near the Outremont intersection, appropriately a bit messy and eclectic. La Librairie d'Outremont? Hasn't been pushed out yet by the sellers of "lifestyle" dross.

Oh how I wish S.W. Welch stayed open past 7 pm! After-supper book browsing is one of life's great experiences.

Also, there is a low-budget used-bookstore on Parc between St-Viateur and Fairmount.

The main lost a major cultural asset when S.W. Welch moved north to St-Viateur. I feel that the main is at risk of being turned into a corporate-chain dominated urban minimall, thus losing it's uniqueness and vibrancy that makes it so important to the life of Montreal.

The bookshops on Beaubien near the cinema are worth a look.

Yeah, there was a serious attempt at corporate takeover on St-Laurent, but American Apparel has failed, as has the ridiculously pristine bonbon shop Sucre Bleu. With some luck some of the chains hawking trendy but poorly-made clothing will also go belly-up with changing trends. Hope local businesses can return.

I was sad to see the loss of a particular Portuguese shop just south of Segall and Frenco, on the same side of the street. Sure, they had some gordorful overdecorated kitsch, but they also had good Portuguese earthenware dishes.

The hardware at the corner of Marie-Anne has some, but not a very complete line.

Way back in Death and Life of Americn Cities, Jane Jacobs pointed out the problem of grocery stores in "designated space" in housing projects. You need just the right mix of clientele and low rents.

In the medium run, I suspect that a lot of the dead shopping centers and aging light industrial space in the suburbs could be used for retail like bookstores. But that would also require densifying the neighborhoods to increase the clientele for the stores. And that, as we know, is a long process.

Thanks for the other book stores suggestions, everyone. I wanted to limit the stores I talked about to a few within a couple of blocks of each other. But the Librairie d'Outremont is a place where we've spent many an evening browsing, and the other used bookstores are good to know about.

Mary

I don't know Guelph, but I don't imagine that the heirs of the original developers still control the stock of commercial buildings. Over time buildings have probably aged differently, some must have been replaced, others have changed use. All of this allows for a variation in rents, including some which are low enough for a book store to be viable. And Guelph was designed in the day when no one went faster in a city than a horse could travel. That meant a much more compact urban fabric--a walkable city--which is conducive to the kind of foot traffic and book browsing that contribute to the health of bookstores.

In Irvine, the developer controls most if not all commercial space, setting rents and mandating what kind of client is good, and what kind is not. This means more or less uniform rents--too high for the kind of risky endeavor a book store is. And you have to drive everywhere in Irvine. It is not a walkable city, even if the walking trails are lovely.

Mary