Andrew Emond , a Montreal - based photographer , amateur geographer , and DIY gonzo spelunker of the urban center ’s sewers and lose rivers , has just re - launched his excellent internet site , Under Montreal . The revamped site now comes complete with a fascinating , interactivemap of the metropolis ’s subterranean stream , document Montreal ’s unseeable river for all to see .
“ Beneath Montreal , Canada , ” Emond ’s site excuse , “ lies a sewer system comprehend a combined length of over 5,000 km . With some sections dating back to 1832 , this meshwork offers a unique framework through which one can research a city and its history . ” These buried waterways — and the infrastructure that holds them — are thus a history example in spatial form , Emond suggets .
Luckily for us , they are also spectacular .
TheCote St. Paul Collector , for example , is a like a sewer from another world .
Emond describes its over-the-top geologic formation as a kind of quasi - natural cave in the fashioning : “ I ’ve encountered calcite deposits inside sewers in the past . Stalactites , stalagmites , ‘ soda straw ‘ andflowstonesare all to be found in just about any toilet or violent storm run out that is more than a decade or so old . make partially by the limestone in cement , these formations can serve turn over a running - of - the - manufacturing plant system into something quite fantastic . ”
But the Cote St. Paul organization takes it to another level : “ In fact , ” Emond add , “ I ’ve never seen anything else like it … For roughly 100 meters , the bulwark of this century - old sewer make for a breathless spectacle . Nature has entirely taken over to the breaker point where you ’re easy tricked into believing you ’re not inside a man - made complex body part any longer . rather , you are in a cave deep beneath the control surface of the earth in some exotic country . ”
In fact , I ’m reminded of an amazing verbal description in Peter Ackroyd ’s recommended ( and refreshingly unforesightful ) book , Under London , where he describes the tunnels beneath the city as genial oftropical wonderland , a Borneo of the subcity .
Referring to the humid cloaca and overgrown current of London , Ackroyd suggests that any attempt to describe the metropolis ’s underside , its shadow self , “ might be a narrative from the swamp of Borneo rather than the City of London . ”
Ackroyd ’s own limning of this urban netherworld is worth re - reading , describing clandestine cathedrals and titanic architectural forms that , in the shadows and grime , resemble “ a ulterior monastery ” :
The surreptitious William Chambers are compared to cathedrals , thoroughgoing with pillar and buttresses , arches and crypts . One visitor , discover an arch through which a cataract whirl , remarked that it was as wondrous a scene as “ a dream of a subterranean monastery . ” The traveler take the air along tunnels that may reach a acme of 17 feet , the nerveless tainted pee lapping at about human knee - peak around their waders . Many are disconcerted by the pull of the water , and feel disorientate ; they lose their equilibrium . They feel the sediment beneath their feet , as if they were walk on a beach at humbled lunar time period . Great iron doors hover up at time interval , actings as valves . The stochasticity of roar water , somewhere in the distance , can broadly be heard . It is the speech sound of cataracts and waterfalls .
This spate — both of adrenalin and of distant water cascade down artificial falls — is something Andrew Emond is quite conversant with , having stood amidst these intersection of rivers and cataracts fortify only with a flashlight , kicking , and digital camera .
Emond , of course , is already widely known for his oeuvre . He was featured in the recent film , Lost Rivers , for example , which was very recently released on DVD by Catbird Productions ( and is deserving seeking out ) .
That photographic film , a farsighted look at attempts around the human beings to “ daylight ” lost urban rivers — that is , to deliver and expose them from beneath the pavement — expend several scenes exploring Montreal alongside Emond , making it profusely clear how a city ’s story can be found in this , least potential of property .
After all , Emond ’s employment is prompt not just by the thrill of it all , but by a deep interest group in the city ’s historical geographics .
Like his compatriot , Toronto ’s Michael Cook , author ofVanishing Point , who also treats hislong journeying undergroundas a kind of cartographic ground - truthing of the city ’s riverine past , Emond is literally casting light on the forgotten , buried landscape painting of the metropolis , from its earliest compound day to its industrial blossom .
Hismulti - part exploration of the Rivière St. Pierreis a good representative of this .
We set about , for representative , with some historic context and quondam mathematical function of the urban center , before progressing horizontally up the drain pipes , passing beneath the landscape into Emond ’s own spelaeology of the caves and tunnel beneath the streets .
In fact , theRivière St. Pierreactually passes underneath another channel , turning it into a delirious , M.C. Escher - like naut mi of waterways passing beneath waterways , more topology than municipal substructure .
“ In a golf course to the west of downtown Montreal , ” he writes , “ you ’ll find the last remain portion of Rivière Saint - Pierre that still be above ground . 200 meters are all that are leave of a river organisation that once flowed freely over the landscape painting . The eternal rest of it ’s been retrofitted into the city ’s sewerage organisation or lost entirely . ”
lose , that is , yet Emond has made it a power point to serve reveal this proportion of the city for us to see .
And what he shows us is sinful , like some glisten and mysterious portal to another macrocosm .
divorce of their historic context of use , Emond ’s photos quickly take on the narrative feel of an unreleasedAndrei Tarkovskyfilm .
encounter purely as urban sci - fi , these photos suggest a gang of anonymous urban IE marching ahead through the crossing streams , a tripping - free zone of source and tombs .
We watch as human beings — almost always in the sameCaspar David Friedrich - comparable mannerism , seen from behind as so - calledRückenfigurenlooking out at some beautifully strange and restrain landscape — wander through this maze of strangely compressed spaces , following echoes , fudge beneath monumental overhangs and arched entry .
Always pressing forward , they wander on , further and further up toward the source of these undercover waters .
Turning recession , take photographs , uncertain of what they ’ll discover .
All picture courtesyAndrew Emond .
CitiesInfrastructureunderground
Daily Newsletter
Get the best tech , science , and civilisation newsworthiness in your inbox daily .
News from the future , delivered to your present .
You May Also Like
