Historical Winnipeg discussion

[peg]

Originally Posted by Authentic_City

There was a recent discussion about this in the Facebook group "Manitoba History: A Public Discussion Forum of the MHS".

Built 1907-1908 for the Canadian Northern Railway, it also accommodated pedestrian and vehicular traffic until 1935-36 when the first span of the St. James bridge was opened.

Steamboat traffic on the Assiniboine seems to have ended in 1885, but Federal legislation regulating 'navigable waterways' required swingbridges well after this time. I don't believe this bridge was ever opened. As mentioned, it accommodated streetcars at one time. It is still privately owned by a retired architect (Alec Katz), but there appears to be no plans to do anything with it (like turn it into condos).

Great info, thanks! Its too bad that condo project never went through. I found some of the plans and renders of it and it seemed like a really neat idea.

[Curmudgeon]

Interesting that the rights of way for future streets had been cleared. Looks like Kenaston south of Tuxedo (or was Tuxedo still called Van Horne?) was a mud road!

Centennial and Beaverbrook Streets look to be already somewhat developed but yet there's nothing to the east. I wonder if that's due to to the early streetcar service that accessed Tuxedo (and Charleswood) via that bridge. Right around the time of these photos the Academy Road line was extended to Doncaster and service over the bridge was discontinued. I guess increased auto traffic was resulting in streetcar traffic becoming unsafe over a narrow bridge, and then of course with no Polo Park there was no reason to need to go over that bridge when you could get downtown via Academy and the Maryland Bridge.

Trolleybuses ran out that way too, Academy-Edgeland buses turned around at Tuxedo and Edgeland, The loop is still there.

Awesome photos!

[alittle1]

Originally Posted by WpG_GuY

Does anyone know why the office tower at 220 Portage sits on the podium at an angle?


https://scontent.fybz2-1.fna.fbcdn.n...20&oe=5BB4BCD9

Makes a better windbreak for Portage and Main!

[BubberMiley]

Originally Posted by peg

Does anyone have any information on the old train bridge in the background? I know it was a part of the Oak Point Subdivision and was abandoned by CN in the early 2000's. And used to have a streetcar line cross over it too. I also know it is a swing bridge as I have been on the bridge and seen the old gears and stuff. I have tried to find out when it was built and if it ever actually swung but can't find anything.

My dad took this picture of it in about 1938.
[IMG][/IMG]

[Andy6]

Originally Posted by alittle1

Makes a better windbreak for Portage and Main!

View of Portage and Main plus it was fashionable and modern.

[peg]

Originally Posted by BubberMiley

My dad took this picture of it in about 1938.
[IMG][/IMG]

Very cool! Thank you!

[Riverman]

Wow lots of river there.

[Authentic_City]

^cool photo! Thanks for sharing. Must be shortly after spring break up? Looks like ice in the distance near the CPR bridge at Omand’s Creek.

[alittle1]

Originally Posted by BubberMiley

My dad took this picture of it in about 1938.
[IMG][/IMG]

It is very unlikely that this bridge would swing, based on the central pivot (which is anchored in bedrock at this location) is not high enough to support the two bridge girder spans, namely because of height and girth of the central pivot. More than likely, the engineer who drew the plan knew the bridge would never be open ( Federal regulations stipulated that all bridges must open to allow vessels to pass through), and was designed to have the appearance that it would open.

A properly functioning swing bridge would have a more substanstial central pivot base and a larger ring gear system, like you would see on CPR's Bergen Cutoff bridge. ( https://vimeo.com/205111337)

[buzzg]

Originally Posted by WpG_GuY

Does anyone know why the office tower at 220 Portage sits on the podium at an angle?


https://scontent.fybz2-1.fna.fbcdn.n...20&oe=5BB4BCD9

It's because Portage was built at an angle compared to the rest of the street grid – buildings downtown are built parallel to the N-S streets. If you look at Newport Centre, the whole building is built like this, with the flat edge along Hargrave. Because of Portage's angle, no large squared building could ever be flush to all sides, so it makes sense to have it off-line at 1 place instead of 3, and makes more sense to have the extra space on Portage as opposed to the side streets or weird angles in the back lanes.

For 220, if the building followed the Portage angle instead of Fort, it would have to be smaller as otherwise the building would hang over the property line.

[peg]

Originally Posted by alittle1

It is very unlikely that this bridge would swing, based on the central pivot (which is anchored in bedrock at this location) is not high enough to support the two bridge girder spans, namely because of height and girth of the central pivot. More than likely, the engineer who drew the plan knew the bridge would never be open ( Federal regulations stipulated that all bridges must open to allow vessels to pass through), and was designed to have the appearance that it would open.

A properly functioning swing bridge would have a more substanstial central pivot base and a larger ring gear system, like you would see on CPR's Bergen Cutoff bridge. ( https://vimeo.com/205111337)

The bridge does have gears and mechanism under the deck though, there's a cool sitting place on one of the concrete supports where you can see the rusty gears and cogs and stuff and how it would have "unlocked" to open. I cant see a reason why they would have opened it but i just find it so fascinating!

[wardlow]

Originally Posted by buzzg

It's because Portage was built at an angle compared to the rest of the street grid – buildings downtown are built parallel to the N-S streets. If you look at Newport Centre, the whole building is built like this, with the flat edge along Hargrave. Because of Portage's angle, no large squared building could ever be flush to all sides, so it makes sense to have it off-line at 1 place instead of 3, and makes more sense to have the extra space on Portage as opposed to the side streets or weird angles in the back lanes.

For 220, if the building followed the Portage angle instead of Fort, it would have to be smaller as otherwise the building would hang over the property line.

I think it's more just a matter of Modernist design, where there's less importance of having the building elevations conform to the property edges. Buildings could stand out and "relieve" the "monotony" of a hard urban edge by being set at different angles, while also creating more ordered floorplans by avoiding oblique angles. It's not a necessity. Remember that basically every building on Portage Avenue built before 1945 conformed to the oblique angles caused by the surveys of the Portage trail and the HBC Reserve subdivision.

[Wolf13]

Originally Posted by wardlow

I think it's more just a matter of Modernist design, where there's less importance of having the building elevations conform to the property edges. Buildings could stand out and "relieve" the "monotony" of a hard urban edge by being set at different angles, while also creating more ordered floorplans by avoiding oblique angles. It's not a necessity. Remember that basically every building on Portage Avenue built before 1945 conformed to the oblique angles caused by the surveys of the Portage trail and the HBC Reserve subdivision.

True, but also because it's cheaper to build a square than a, well, non-square...

So they picked to be parallel with Fort rather than Portage. Agreeably likely for design concerns you mentioned.

[Andy6]

The Free Press has a daily link to a past front page ... today’s is a 1975 edition in which one story is about a plan to build a new civic administration building south of city hall. The plan was to demolish the Leland Hotel, the Royal Tower (Paterson Global Foods) and Ashdown’s (Crocus).

https://archives.winnipegfreepress.c...ss/1975-06-26/

[esquire]

Originally Posted by Andy6

The Free Press has a daily link to a past front page ... today’s is a 1975 edition in which one story is about a plan to build a new civic administration building south of city hall. The plan was to demolish the Leland Hotel, the Royal Tower (Paterson Global Foods) and Ashdown’s (Crocus).

https://archives.winnipegfreepress.c...ss/1975-06-26/

That's interesting, and it's somewhat surprising that a plan like that never came together. I would imagine that by 1975 there was a lot of pressure on the City to find more office space given that the 1964 Administration Building was built for a much smaller, pre-Unicity municipal government.

But what did the City end up doing? I know it ended up putting departments in some heritage buildings (Confed, Bank of Hamilton) and new projects (the one just north of City Hall, Fort Garry Place, possibly the Mandarin Building?), but I don't think that happened until the 1980s. Where did they house all of their bureaucrats from the 1970s until the mid-80s?

[borkborkbork]

Originally Posted by Andy6

The Free Press has a daily link to a past front page ... today’s is a 1975 edition in which one story is about a plan to build a new civic administration building south of city hall. The plan was to demolish the Leland Hotel, the Royal Tower (Paterson Global Foods) and Ashdown’s (Crocus).

https://archives.winnipegfreepress.c...ss/1975-06-26/

Jesus. Thank god they didn't have the money for every one of their toxic ideas back in the 70s

[Andy6]

Originally Posted by esquire

That's interesting, and it's somewhat surprising that a plan like that never came together. I would imagine that by 1975 there was a lot of pressure on the City to find more office space given that the 1964 Administration Building was built for a much smaller, pre-Unicity municipal government.

But what did the City end up doing? I know it ended up putting departments in some heritage buildings (Confed, Bank of Hamilton) and new projects (the one just north of City Hall, Fort Garry Place, possibly the Mandarin Building?), but I don't think that happened until the 1980s. Where did they house all of their bureaucrats from the 1970s until the mid-80s?

Maybe in the Metro building at 100 Main? Perhaps the idea was to consolidate everything up the street.

[Urban recluse]

https://www.facebook.com/VintageWinnipeg/

[Andy6]

Originally Posted by Urban recluse

https://www.facebook.com/VintageWinnipeg/

One of the mini-Orbits!

That doesn’t feel like very long ago but I guess it is 44 years now.

There’s the Eve theatre ... forgot that one.

[Urban recluse]

I want this back:


https://www.facebook.com/VintageWinnipeg/