[Rico Rommheim]

I loved Victoria's chinatown. Vancouver's was epic. Montreal's chinatown is historic and still very much busy, but the local chinese community has long moved on from what used to be an ethnic ghetto. The quarter chinois is also quite underwhelming if compared to other big North American cities. Montreal's current chinese community is now spread all across the island and the metro area. Chinatown itself is no longer a chinese specific area. Thai, vietnamese, Korean and Japanese stores share the space increasingly equally. I'd also argue that Montreal's true Chinese (asian) neighbourhood is now situated in the neighbourhood between Guy and Atwater streets (interchangeably called Shaughnessy village, Concordia Ghetto or Cjinatown II).

The south shore city of Brossard (pop 90,000) also contains a large chinese community (5% of the total population) and has plenty of highway strip malls with chinese lettering.

And yes, Chinese stores in Montreal (in or outside of the chinatowns) mostly abide by the language laws (Chinese is allowed so long as French lettering predominates).