Ville de Montréal launches nationwide ideas competition for the redesigning of the area around Champ-de-Mars metro station.
The purpose of this competition is to illustrate a variety of potential development concepts for the area around Champ-de-Mars métro station, including highlighting of the glassworks by artist Marcelle Ferron, based on the assumption that the nearby Ville-Marie expressway will eventually be covered over and its exit ramps reconfigured.
Champ-de-Mars station, with its magnificent glassworks by renowned artist Marcelle Ferron, is one of the few landmarks remaining from the time before the construction of the Ville-Marie expressway. The immediate perimeter of the station forms a link between downtown Montréal and Old Montréal, and is one of the main pedestrian access routes to the historic district.
The competition invites entrants to submit development proposals that integrate smoothly with the existing public spaces and take into account the current and future built environment, including the impending Centre hospitalier de l’Université de Montréal. Proposals must promote citizen appropriation of the urban environment and provide a development framework that facilitates movement through the city.
Context
This competition is one of the five “shukôs,” or creative challenges, issued during the Pecha Kucha Night for Elected Officials by the Mayor of Montréal, Gérald Tremblay, as part of the commitments made by the Ville de Montréal and its partners in the Action Plan 2007–2017 – Montréal, Cultural Métropolis. One of the goals of this plan is to promote excellence in design and architecture by widening the use of competitions, which in turn will help position Montréal as a UNESCO City of Design.
The competition is:
- Anonymous;
- Open to all (professional or student);
- Canada-wide;
- Held in one stage.
The ideas competition is open to all design professionals, students or consortiums whose main place of business is located in Canada.
The jury members are:
- Melvin Charney, architect
- Odile Decq, architect and Director of the École Spéciale d’Architecture, Paris
- Jacques Des Rochers, Curator of Canadian Art, Montréal Museum of Fine Arts
- Michel Dionne, architect, Cooper, Robertson & Partners, New York
- Raphaël Fischler, urban planner and professor at the School of Urban Planning, McGill University
- Mario Masson, landscape architect and Division Manager, Service du développement culturel, de la qualité du milieu de vie et de la diversité ethnoculturelle, Ville de Montréal
- Alessandra Ponte, associate professor, School of Architecture, Université de Montréal
- Philippe Poullaouec-Gonidec, landscape architect and holder of the UNESCO Chair in Landscape and Environmental Design at Université de Montréal
A total prize amount of $50,000 will be distributed to the winners of the competition.
The prize amount is distributed as follows:
In the Professional category, a total amount of $40,000:
- First prize: $20,000
- Second prize: $12,500
- Third prize: $7,500
In the Student category, a total amount of $10,000:
- First prize: $5,000
- Second prize: $3,000
- Third prize: $2,000
However, the jury is sovereign, and it may re-allocate the prize amounts as it sees fit, as long as the totals established for the Professional ($40,000) and Student ($10,000) categories are respected.
Registration is free and mandatory. Each entrant must complete and return the form by January 15, 2010.
Proposals must be sent no later than February 10, 2010, at 5 p.m. (local time) to:
Ideas Competition
Redesigning of the area around Champ-de-Mars metro station
A/S bureau Design Montréal
303, rue Notre-Dame Est, 6e étage
Montréal (Québec) H2Y 3Y8
Entrants who have questions about the competition must submit them by e-mail to the Design Montréal office at @email, no later than January 15, 2010.