MONTREAL -- For years, Montreal-West and Cote-St-Luc's Meadowbrook Golf Course has lived on borrowed time, as developers fight the city for permission to build on it. While its future as a green space seems secure for now, a stretch of river on the property with historical signifiance is under threat. Before Europeans came to Montreal in the 16th century, dozens of brooks and rivers crisscrossed the island. Among them was the St-Pierre River, which flowed from Mount Royal to Old Montreal, through what would later become Outremont, Cote-St-Luc, Hampstead, Montreal West and Lachine “It was instrumental in the history of Montreal," said activist and history buff Louise Legault. “Under the French regime, the lots were aligned along rivers, (including the) St-Pierre River, you can see that.”