Here are a few various photos I took the other day on a stroll I took from my house to the River and Back. Through the neighborhood just east of the Casino.
A sample of some of the fine housing stock.
A bankrupt, vacant former Nursing Home.
Vacant, overgown lots & ghetto palms with the Casino looming in the background.
An old brick home, this one appears to be vacant as well. It’s been in this state of “renovation” for about 2 years now. There are a few of these small brick houses in between the River and Wyandotte Street. They date to the 1850’s-1860’s.
Quite a few vacant lots in the area have been turned into makeshift parking lots.
The”Best Roofing Company” Building.
The backside of Casino Windsor. One of the cranes for the expansion is visible in the rear.
Glengary Confectionary. With the doctor shortage in Essex County, here’s a business run by a foreign doctor who’s license isn’t recongnised in Canada. The same goes for the real estate agent I bought my house from.
The downtown housing projects. The tower on the left is notoriously crime ridden. Drug dealers and prostitutes openly roam the hallways.
The front entrance of one of the buildings in the complex.
A vacant apartment building.
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I really like that little brick house from 1850-60s. Sad to see it rotting there. Reminds of a lot of homes in Helena, MT. Those ones are being put to good use though.
The first house use to be a store along time ago it use to have a pepsi sign on the side.... Yes they are very old homes! Once were very nice and a good place to live for those who use to catch the train station at the river which was called the grand trunk station. Too bad it looks so shitty now! Especially the casino being there! Looks terrible! One day they might"" tare em down""
Hey Andrew I was just going to say that first picture used to be a variety store but i see Lilly already pointed that out.
How long ago was that, I can't remember it as a store and I've been living here since 2001...
Im going to say about 15 years ago. I was in grade 5 & 6 and im 27 now. But if im not mistaken it closed in that time too.
ummm i think it has been about 15 years ago as a store.. Hi Nikki i am glad you remember it as a store also. Or people would think what! I am a nut case! haaa
I never did go when it was a store because it looked creepy and my grandpa would say to me don't go in there ! There's many other stores to go to.. well it came in handy i guess back then when it was a store "" for the people who would stop there on the way to the grand trunk station down the river" take care yall....
Hails from the day when variety stores were located in crummy old buildings or houses - whatever worked - instead of cinder block boxes with gleaming steel frame windows and corporate ownership. Very few of those independant variety stores left around town!
Nice pics . I use to live in the Glengarry projects back in the day, from grade 5 to grade 9 bad memories, and your right about all the crime, thats gotta be the worst area in the city. I'm now 20 years old and livin in Devonshire heights.
The first picture is of a house we rented yrs ago back in the mid 90's we had it looking so nice, lawn was trimmed yard was neat gardens were growing all the broken windows taken out and most of all we kept up on the repairs of the house, we had painted it the hunter green it once was and there were new screen and safety doors both front and rear of the house :( so sad to see it like that now the owner is Davinder Gill aka real slum lord as you can tell by the house's outer look by the way he owns the house next to it also with the for rent sign posted, the house was a store back in the late 70's but not since then it was vacant and those that rented the house had no access to the front area until we moved in and gutted it and made it into a living room ...the rest home was known as University Rest Home I worked there as a teen in high school in the kitchen it was owned by the Woods family *really creepy man* as for the Glengarry apts what do you expect when no one is put through a screening process in order to rent .... as drug dealers and postitutes live there it is geared to income housing should be geared for every penny made not just their welfare cheque
Wow, I have spent hours looking at all your pics and this was the section I was looking for. I grew up in this area in the late 60's and 70's living on Glengarry right across from the projects and on Alymer. (you took a pic of a vacant lot, my house once stood there.) Both are long gone now. My parents were dirt poor and the rent there was cheap. Eventually moved to the projects in the mid 70's and it was rough then. It was stil nice to see the neighbourhood though(not much left) . I even knew a lady when I was a kid that lived in that small house you have posted (in "renovation") she lived there with her dad who was a pretcher.
And the fires in that neighbourhood when I was small, you wouldn't believe how many homes were set ablaze around there, very scary for a 5yr old. The store in the first pic is correct, I went in their all the time on my way to school, it was ok back then a family owned the store and lived in the rear of the building until they closed. My father lived in that rest home when my mom died in 1979 and I hated that place they didn't take care of the residents very well. Thanks for all the info on your site and the great pics, I miss home.