The availability of water has always shaped urban development. There are few cities, though, that have developed such an intrinsic relationship to water as Montreal. This is the central theme of Michèle Dagenais’ monograph, which is an excellent and welcome addition to the field of urban-environmental history. Dagenais, whose text is well translated by Peter Feldstein, uses a combination of archival sources, newspapers and specialist publications, as well as good illustration throughout, in order to highlight the keen relationship between Montreal, situated on an archipelago at the confluence of the Ottawa and St Lawrence rivers, and the water that surrounds it. Dagenais surveys the modern development of the city from the early nineteenth century up to the present day where issues relating to water remain, such as long-standing pollution. After providing an overview of the work of urban biographers and geographers on Montreal and water, she moves to analyse the importance of watercourses to the development of the city. Key actors in Montreal's development emerge early within the narrative, most prominently the St Lawrence River and the Port of Montreal, both of which were transformed in order better to serve urban interests over the 200-year period examined. The issue of weather is also a key factor in early chapters of the book, as the annual snow and ice experienced in Montreal was a significant obstacle to overcome in order to drive urban development and trade.

Another way in which hydrological factors were felt was through flooding, a consequence of melting snow and ice. Dagenais highlights the effects of flooding on further urbanization, particularly the flooding of the St Lawrence, which led to a greater integration of water. Not only were pumping stations built to try and redirect abundant water, but the river was engineered in order to protect low-lying parts of the city. This also led to the transformation of the Port of Montreal, controlled by a private authority rather than the municipality, which allowed for larger ships to enter the port in greater quantities. Dagenais then shows the negative consequences of urban attitudes to water, highlighting the issues caused by the prevailing belief in the sanitation agenda. Polluted water ran into the St Lawrence river and the city's other main river, the Rivière des Prairies, which led to blockages that affected transport in the Port of Montreal as well as the greater issue of public health. A theme that emanates from this analysis is the short-termism taken by the municipal authority regarding polluted water, which crucially gave a greater role to doctors and engineers in transforming the natural and urban environments of the city. Dagenais deftly shows not only the way that the city's relationship with water generally was transformed by scientific and technological changes, but how actors other than the local authority were key.

Dagenais then turns her attention to changes wrought on the waterways of the city in the twentieth century, which were driven by competing uses of water. The Rivière des Prairies, seen as the backwater of Montreal, was utilized for hydroelectric power. The taming of the river, though, led to residents increasingly using it for leisure, despite the river's further use as a vessel for sewerage. The Montreal Island Power Company, which built their dam in the 1920s, were given powers by the municipal government compulsorily to purchase land that would be adversely affected by the damming of the river. However, alterations to the river were worse than expected, which led to the further flooding of properties upstream. Thus, changes made to the river produced energy, but also led to a change in technical, natural and social relations. The post-war period saw further alterations to the rivers that highlight the centrality of water to Montreal's development after 1945. Changes after World War II, though, were couched in environmentalist language. Concerns about the pollution of the St Lawrence were raised in the 1970s, led by angling and hunting associations. However, jurisdictional conflicts within the municipality of Montreal meant that action to tackle the water quality of the river was difficult. Indeed, efforts from the Quebec government with the ‘One River, One Park' project down to the local community have helped to address, in part, the issue of pollution.

The problems raised about the health of the city's waterways made residents realize how interconnected Montreal and water were. The success of Dagenais’ argument is that she successfully shows how attitudes to water have changed throughout the past 200 years: from a tool to utilize in order to sanitize the city, which relied on the constant flow of water, to an environmentalism that recognized that the health of the city, and its residents, was inseparable from the health of its watercourses. Even after shipping and industry had declined in the city during the late twentieth century, water continued to drive economic development through shoreline urbanization and recreation. While the environment continues, incrementally, to be integrated into urban history, Dagenais’ monograph is an excellent example of showing how nature affects urban development and vice versa too.