GONE! I think Pierre Trudeau (if that is his real name) hasn't been to Montreal in a while. Ben's ceased being legendary or second to Schwartz's more than a decade ago. The restaurant's slow decline (food became worse and worse, restaurant dirtier and filthier) culminated in a worker strike over a year ago (protesting conditions as much as salaries), a pretext with which the widow who owned the restaurant used to close the place so she could sell the building (now slated for demolition to make way for a new office tower). I guess back in the day it was something but even the first time I ate there in 1999, it was a pale shadow of what it was.