Montreal road to stardom

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by George Maddux

If you believe Montreal's toponymy bureaucrats, you might conclude that Montreal-born tennis star Mary Pierce has a better shot at a boulevard than Jean Drapeau; that occasional Montrealer Omar Sharif will sooner get a street named after him than Maurice Richard; and that a Jenny Jones Avenue--after the talk-show host who spent some of her troubled youth here--is a likelier possibility than Pierre Trudeau Road.

According to Suzanne Lavigne of the City of Montreal's Toponymy Office, the upcoming campaign to eradicate confusing name duplications in the megacity will be resolved by renaming many streets in the honour of women and minorities, whose contributions thus far have rarely been noted on street signs. Lavigne, who spends much of her workday scanning newspapers for potential street names, says her office has a top-secret list of 500 suggestions ready to go. The list will soon be handed over to the megacity transition committee; they in turn will solicit public input at hearings and open a special phone line and Internet site starting this spring. To see if your suggested street hero has already been honoured on the map, check out www.toponymie.gouv.qc.ca. A cursory check reveals that no island streets have yet been named after such local heroes as Lea Roback, William Shatner, Jackie Robinson, Leonard Cohen, "Skinny" Minny Miller, Andrew Collard, Felipe Alou or The Great Antonio.