Description of Historic Place

The Canadian Pacific Railway Station at Shawinigan is a one-storey concrete and masonry railway station, built in 1927. It is located in the industrial sector of the city of Shawinigan. The formal recognition is confined to the railway station building itself.

Heritage Value

The Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR) Station at Shawinigan represents the continuing impact of the railway on the economic development of the city, transferring goods and people between Shawinigan and Trois-Rivières. The station reflects a period when Shawinigan had a dual role as an important industrial city and regional tourist centre.

The brick and stone exterior of the Shawinigan station reflects the CPR’s desire to erect a building in keeping with the city’s status as a prosperous industrial centre. The station is an interesting blend of traditional picturesque aesthetics associated with railway architecture and Chateauesque detailing of the railway hotels of the period.

The Shawinigan CP Station retains its essential relationship with the tracks. It continues to be surrounded by the industrial buildings typical of the city, and is itself an essential element in the industrial character of its setting.

Sources: Heritage Character Statement, Gare du Canadien Pacifique, Shawinigan, Québec, October 1993; Jean Provencher et Bergeron Gagnon inc., Railway Station Report 179, Gare de VIA Rail, Shawinigan, Québec.

Character-Defining Elements

Character-defining elements of the Canadian Pacific Railway Station at Shawinigan include:

-its picturesque design and domestic scale, consisting of a long, one-storey structure topped by adjoining hip roofs at two levels, and enlivened by a projecting cross-gable with elaborately detailed end walls
-its simple, elongated, rectangular plan, interrupted only by the projections of the cross-gable
-its highly articulated roofline, consisting of a bellcast hip roof, intersected by a prominent, central cross-gable, and joined to a longer and lower hip roof
-materials which produce contrasts in texture and colour, including brick for walls and smooth, pale, limestone for accents
-its stone detailing, consisting of limestone accents as corner quoins, as a horizontal band, as the perimeter of the cross-gable ends, at window and door openings, and as corbels supporting the brackets
-picturesque features rendered in wood, including: multi-paned windows with transoms; wooden eave brackets; and curved end-rafters
-its mixed structural system, including: the foundation and floor slab in reinforced concrete; and load-bearing walls in brick masonry, up on which the wooden roof structure rests
-the addition, executed in a design and scale sympathetic to the original building, including: brick cladding over a concrete frame; and concrete accents around openings, in imitation of limestone
-the expression of interior function through exterior volumes, including: public waiting rooms, ticket office and washrooms located under the higher, bellcast roof; and baggage and express rooms under the lower, hip roof
-surviving original interior partitions
-surviving original interior finishes, including: glazed brick wall coverings; terrazzo floors; some marble stall partitions in the washrooms; and varnished-oak woodwork