Red Roof Church closing its doors
The Church of St John the Evangelist, the red roof church on President‑Kennedy near St‑Urbain, is up for sale as the parish is no longer able to sustain its expenses. It had sheltered a mission for the homeless for many years, but that was displaced in December.
Will the building be repurposed, or will it be torn down and replaced with another condo tower? Church buildings are hard to refashion for other uses, as we know.
DeWolf 11:10 on 2023-05-07 Permalink
Demolishing it for a condo tower would be a very long and arduous process, since it would require obtaining approval for demolition (not guaranteed for a landmark like this), then rezoning the site from religious to residential, then obtaining a derogation to go beyond the prescribed 30 metre height limit (about 10 storeys). There would probably be obstacles and opposition every step of the way.
On the other hand, I can easily see this becoming condos if a developer found a way to incorporate at least some of the church structure into a new building that was about 10 storeys high, which seems to have been chosen as a limit because it matches the neighbouring UQAM and Bell buildings.
Best case scenario: the city or a non-profit buys the church and turns it into a cultural/community venue with room for the homeless mission that was there for many years. That’s what church buildings are for, really: culture and community.
Moon 15:39 on 2023-05-11 Permalink
I think this is the loveliest idea I’ve heard.
Be assured, the variance headaches are largely why it has come to this. Otherwise, the church would have sold its saleable assets long ago and kept itself and the mission on site.
I don’t see that municipal lethargy becoming easier for developers to negotiate. The determining “what constitutes a historic wall,” and so on, is years of red tape.
The community centre idea feels less exploitative than the omnipresent condos for rich people (who would probably find themselves needing to live part of the year elsewhere due to the deafening noise during festival season.)
I hope so much that the beautiful stained glass and historic character are preserved and that good homes are found for such treasures as its Wolff organ.