Fort Rouge, Winnipeg

Fort Rouge is an area in south-central Winnipeg, Manitoba, and was Winnipeg's first true suburb. The area prior to 1880 consisted of a few small farms and woodlots. In 1880, a bridge was built across the Assiniboine River south from Main Street, and the following year, another was constructed south along Pembina Road (later known as Osborne Street). Originally known as St. Boniface West, the area was annexed into the City of Winnipeg in 1882.

With the bridge in place to the city, a middle class residential area developed. Most houses in this area were quite modest in size and cost, although during the 1890s and 1900s, a Roslyn Road address was held by many of Winnipeg's most affluent and prominent families. Due to its proximity to central Winnipeg and the presence of the Park Line streetcar, Fort Rouge was attractive to a variety of families of the middle and commercial classes as well as the more prosperous from the skilled trades. Most residents were of British Canadian backgrounds. This sense of community was reflected in the large churches that were constructed in the early 1900s along Nassau Street.

Fort Rouge was also the site of the Canadian Northern Railway shops and yards. Working class neighbourhoods developed around the yards. Many of the residents were able to walk the short distance to work. A few factories and warehouses appeared alongside the tracks and near the Red River as well.

From the 1950s to the 1980s dozens of high-rise apartment blocks, many over 25 storeys, were built in the northern part of Fort Rouge, in the Osborne Village neighbourhood, which today is Western Canada's second most densely populated. In the 1990s Corydon Avenue was redeveloped and is now one of Winnipeg's most important cultural and night-life areas. Fort Rouge is home to about 28,000 residents as of the 2001 Census, compared to nearly 35,000 in 1971 (Statistics Canada). Like all of Winnipeg's older inner-city areas, it is declining in population.