Griffintown developer Devimco has added various environmental bells and whistles to its plans; Dinu Bumbaru of Heritage Montreal is saying this is all just a PR exercise and that the wider impact of such a major project still needs to be studied by the city's public consultation office.

The main problem as I see it is that handing over an entire neighbourhood to a single developer is a dangerous idea, regardless of the details. There's a project on the lower Main, a condo development called Sleb: the developer demolished some run-down but functional buildings a couple of years ago, leaving a gaping hole near de Maisonneuve, and gutted a big old industrial building at the corner of Ontario. And there they ground to a halt.

A recent news story indicated that the developer ran out of funds. The gaping hole has been there for awhile. Weeds are growing on it. The building is boarded up. That's a whole city block, defaced, empty, lost to any residential or commercial use for years.

I need hardly also evoke the fate of Overdale, once a crowded and busy downtown enclave, now a parking lot after developers lost their nerve. This country is on the brink of an economic slowdown as stories of soaring oil prices and worldwide food shortages percolate through the media. Is this the time to confide a significant piece of the city on faith to a single developer?

There's a march this Sunday starting at 2 p.m. at 1220 Ottawa, outside the Griffintown Horse Palace, to make its way east to City Hall. posted at 07:55