MONTREAL — It’s one of the oldest urban areas in North America, its cobblestone streets lined by historic buildings dating back to the 17th century. Now comes word that Old Montreal’s cobblestones are being paved over to make way for construction.

It’s not quite as bad as it sounds – the pavement on iconic Rue St-Paul is a temporary measure, to keep dust and noise to a minimum while the city continues with much-needed repairs and upgrades in the area. Once the work is complete – new measures are said to include wider sidewalks – the city will be repaving the middle part of Rue St-Paul with ‘new cobblestones’.

On mtlblog.com, comments ranged from “the new cobblestones have none of the historical character of the real ones” to “the ‘real ones’ were not so historical – having been replaced in the 1960s!”.