Toronto Star

Rising 45 metres from the banks of the St. Lawrence River, it's easy to misinterpret Grain Elevator No. 5 as a blight on Old Montreal's skyline, a crumbling vestige of another age. To be sure, this century-old monolith of rusting iron and hardened concrete cuts off the river view of condo owners and blocks people's access to the water. Ever since it was shut down in the mid-1990s, having outlived its purpose of storing ocean-bound prairie grain destined for Europe and beyond, there's been a steady call from developers that this relic be blown up and forgotten. That would be an enormous loss for Canadians. Now sealed off from the public by kilometres of chain-link fence topped with barbed wire, Grain Elevator No. 5 may no longer fit into our contemporary aesthetic of stucco, glass and rust-free living. Located on Windmill Point, at the entrance to the Lachine Canal, it's an ungainly thing from a bygone age, an architectural dinosaur taking up many hectares of prime real estate