2. Authorization to apply to all proprietors of lots fronting on the proposed boulevards, the decrees of its Charter and of its By-laws relating to building, sewers, sidewalks and pavements, as well as by-laws relating to police and the maintenance of streets.
The opening of these boulevards is one of the greatest improvements that Montreal has made for years, and once they are completed, our City will be in a position to compare favourably with the most beautiful cities of America, in so far as its parks and boulevards are concerned.
CONCLUSION
THE LAST PHASE OF CITY DEVELOPMENT
In order to preserve the continuity of the historical pictures of the physical growth of this city from 1898 to 1914, the following picture summing up the confusing changes going on during the greater part of the last two decades of commercial activity, may serve as a review.
The city is now undergoing a reconstruction and remodeling that is confusing even to its middle aged citizens, who were born in the old humdrum city. Landmarks are disappearing; the buildings in the older part of the city and even parts of the new are being replaced with wondrous celerity, baffling the mind of one not a statistician. It is the age of the house-wrecker and steam-rivetter. Montreal is being modernized—becoming a second New York—but in spite of all, manages to preserve its unique, psychological and historical characteristics. Commenting on the changes, now undergoing in 1914, a writer in one of our daily journals (the Montreal Star of April 11, 1914, from which the following is adopted) describes the present period as the era of the house-wrecker and steam-welder.
This is a substantial description of the optimistic state of the city shortly before the war of 1914.
THE BOOM BEFORE THE WAR OF 1914
The dust of the house-wrecker, followed by the chatter of the steam-rivetter marks more than the mere replacement of building by building, it marks the gradual alteration of the very face of the city—and the house-wrecker and the steam-rivetter are abroad in the land six days in the week and fifty-two weeks in the year.