The Plateau is a neighbourhood in Montreal. Municipally, it extends east-west from the mountain to St. Denis, and north south from Mont Royal St. to Sherbrooke. Socially, it is the three blocks of St. Laurent from Sherbrooke to Pins, and at any given time is crowded with the widest variety of residents: squeegee punks, french yuppies, students, dealers, homeless, artists, buskers, and recent immigrants. In 1997, Utne Reader selected the Plateau as the fourth hippest neighbourhood in North America, but cited a downward trend due to the arrival of a Gap signalling the imminent gentrification of the area.