The Mount Royal Funicular Railway, also known as the Mountain Park Funicular Railway and the Mount Royal Elevator, was a funicular railway serving Mount Royal Park in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, from 1884 to 1918. [1] [2] [3]
Montreal is the most populous municipality in the Canadian province of Quebec and the second-most populous municipality in Canada. Originally called Ville-Marie, or "City of Mary", it is named after Mount Royal, the triple-peaked hill in the heart of the city. The city is centred on the Island of Montreal, which took its name from the same source as the city, and a few much smaller peripheral islands, the largest of which is Île Bizard. It has a distinct four-season continental climate with warm to hot summers and cold, snowy winters.
Quebec is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is bordered to the west by the province of Ontario and the bodies of water James Bay and Hudson Bay; to the north by Hudson Strait and Ungava Bay; to the east by the Gulf of Saint Lawrence and the province of Newfoundland and Labrador; and to the south by the province of New Brunswick and the U.S. states of Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, and New York. It also shares maritime borders with Nunavut, Prince Edward Island, and Nova Scotia. Quebec is Canada's largest province by area and its second-largest administrative division; only the territory of Nunavut is larger. It is historically and politically considered to be part of Central Canada.
Canada is a country in the northern part of North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic to the Pacific and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering 9.98 million square kilometres, making it the world's second-largest country by total area. Canada's southern border with the United States, stretching some 8,891 kilometres (5,525 mi), is the world's longest bi-national land border. Its capital is Ottawa, and its three largest metropolitan areas are Toronto, Montreal, and Vancouver. As a whole, Canada is sparsely populated, the majority of its land area being dominated by forest and tundra. Consequently, its population is highly urbanized, with over 80 percent of its inhabitants concentrated in large and medium-sized cities, with 70% of citizens residing within 100 kilometres (62 mi) of the southern border. Canada's climate varies widely across its vast area, ranging from arctic weather in the north, to hot summers in the southern regions, with four distinct seasons.
The railway consisted of a horizontal section that brought travellers from the ticket house, located near what is now the George-Étienne Cartier Monument, to a transfer station at the base of the mountain, where riders boarded the funicular cars. [1] [2] Both sections were steam-driven, with cars pulled by cables.
The Sir George-Étienne Cartier Monument is a monument in Montreal, Quebec, in the Mount Royal Park to George-Étienne Cartier by sculptor George William Hill (1862–1934).
The funicular was inaugurated in 1884, a year before its official opening. Rides initially cost 5 cents for adults and 3 cents for children. It transported visitors to the summit of Mount Royal, facing east. Frederick Law Olmsted, the designer of Mount Royal Park, was opposed to the funicular. His plan was for people to take a leisurely stroll up the mountain and to enjoy the views along the way instead of being whisked straight to the top by a machine. [4] It was declared structurally unsafe and closed in 1918, and dismantled in 1920. [2]
Frederick Law Olmsted was an American landscape architect, journalist, social critic, and public administrator. He is popularly considered to be the father of American landscape architecture. Olmsted was famous for co-designing many well-known urban parks with his senior partner Calvert Vaux, including Central Park in New York City and Cadwalader Park in Trenton.
