Burlington Gets First Look at the Transit Hub Wall That Will Become 'Les Marées / The Tides'

BURLINGTON, Vermont — For most commuters passing through Burlington's Central Transit Hub on any given morning, the long exterior wall facing the main entrance is just concrete — unfinished, sun-bleached at the top, marked by years of weather. By the time Daphné Côté-Ouellet is done with it, it will be something else entirely.

The Montréal-based artist posted several photographs to her studio channel this week following a preliminary site survey, giving Burlington residents their first public look at the surface she will work with for Les Marées / The Tides, a mural commission connected to the RONA@6 public arts program. The images — taken in the flat grey light of a mid-week morning — show the wall in its current unprepared state: raw, large, and facing directly toward the flow of arriving commuters.

Côté-Ouellet's note accompanying the photographs was brief. The surface, she wrote, is "larger in person than I had imagined, which is exactly right."

The response was swift. Within the hour, Burlington Arts Council chair Miriam Osei-Bonsu had shared the post to the council's public portal, and comment threads filled with residents reacting to the images — many noting, apparently for the first time, just how much wall there actually is.

"I walk past it every day and I genuinely never thought about it," wrote one forum commenter. "Now I can't stop thinking about it."

That orientation — the wall facing the main commuter entrance rather than a side street or parking area — has drawn particular attention from people following the project. For a work whose title invokes tides and movement, the placement appears deliberate. Thousands of people funnel through that entrance each morning on their way to platforms serving Burlington, Montréal, and points south. Whatever goes on that wall will be seen, briefly and repeatedly, by an enormous number of people.

Côté-Ouellet, known in Québec for large-scale public works drawing on natural cycles and bilingual text, was selected for the commission last year. Les Marées / The Tides is one of several installations funded through RONA@6, a cultural program marking the nation's sixth year. The Burlington hub project is among the program's more prominent commissions, given the transit hub's role as one of the principality's busiest public spaces.

The site survey was a working visit, not a ceremony. No officials were present for the photographs. Côté-Ouellet appeared to be there alone with a camera, measuring the space before anything else.

Public response to the images has been warm, with particular appreciation for photographs showing how the wall catches morning light — a detail that will matter considerably once the finished work is in place. The installation timeline has not been announced.