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Simeon Mitropolitski is a Canadian analyst, of Bulgarian origin, and a former syndicated columnist with the Bulgarian News Agency (BTA). He is the author of several hundred articles dealing with hot political and economic topics, both national and international.
He was part of the first group of Bulgarian intellectuals and students that began the opposition movement that finally put an end to the communist regime in this country in 1989, and in 1996-1997 participated in international observation teams during the elections in several Balkan countries - Romania, Albania and Bulgaria.
In 2002 Simeon and his family moved from Bulgaria to Canada where they live now in Montreal, province of Quebec. Simeon is a Master of Political Science from McGill University and a B.A. of Political Science and History.
Global Real Estate Project
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Can the culture save the Montreal downtown?
The last 250 years in the history of Montreal is a history of relative but constant downfall. Once, among the largest urban and trading centers in the continent, Montreal's development felt a sudden shock first after the American Revolution, when the new republic made it unnecessary as commercial link to Europe. The second shock came after the establishment of the Canadian confederation, when the central government didn't spare money to establish the alternative industrial and commercial center in Toronto. The third shock came much later, when the francophone nationalists put their ethno-linguistic concerns ahead of economic reason. From one of the richest cities in North America, and as late as the late 19th c. still the largest and richest Canadian metropolis, Montreal descended into the less comfortable second place. The arts and culture go with big money, although sometimes after a significant time lag. Even after Montreal has retreated from its indisputable first place for doing business in Canada, it still for quite some time continued playing prominent role in the Canadian cultural life. The other Canadian cities were looking how to attract the money that fled Montreal. They were less concerned about the cultural life, considered up until recently as elitist. But the times change. What once was elitist now becomes democratic thanks to the general improvement of the quality of life. The cultural tourism provides important income for any city that has something to offer in this field. So it wasn't long before Toronto decided to challenge Montreal on yet another front. Strong after decades of unprecedented economic growth and envious of seeing its citizens going to spend their dollars on cultural events in Montreal, Toronto is on the fast track of catching up. More than a billion dollars will be invested in order to make Toronto the first destination for cultural tourism in Canada. We can be sure that people in Toronto are serious about this. Montreal can only offer a rearguard fighting. Weak after decades of economic and financial bleeding, supported by financially weaker provincial government, arguably less attractive because of the language policy, still part of a province pending the final decision of its political identity, Montreal is really no match for Toronto in the battle for dollars coming from cultural tourism in long run. The most recent investment in arts and culture can revitalize to a degree the eastern part of the downtown that, with a different economic policy in the last 30 years, could have been developed as an enlarged area of the business downtown. Giving this part of the downtown for the arts and culture, the local authorities tacitly acknowledge that the prospects for business development in this direction are rather grim. This part of Montreal can arguably be saved from erosion and criminality, but the city is losing yet another battle of development.
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