Two chicks have hatched to the falcon pair nesting in the Université de Montréal’s tower box.
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Kate
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Kate
Lyme disease has reached its highest rate in 20 years here, a trend blamed on climate change and the consequent presence of ticks.
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Kate
La Presse has some views of the mighty Lisette boring machine and a discussion of what they might do with it after the blue line reaches Anjou.
With the REM station at Bois-Franc it makes so much sense now to extend the orange line to connect, but it’s impossible to predict what the government attitude to public transit will be like, when that day comes.
But now Laval wants a turn.
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Kate
Thefts of copper cable are becoming more common, and can put buildings at risk when it means removing the ground wire.
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Kate
Too-strict laws about renovation of heritage buildings are actually threatening them, as they make it too difficult and expensive to do the work. So buildings are left empty until their state of deterioration makes it impossible to save them.
jeather
The problem is that they are allowed to remain empty and deteriorate without any cost to the owner.
Ephraim
The Plateau has uneven laws in place. We wanted to replace our staircase with an exact replica… not allowed, we had to go to what they THOUGHT that they were like at the time they were built. The house next door… brand new… replica of what was there before. So, who do you complain about uneven enforcement of the rules?
Kate
Get hold of Dinu Bumbaru and get him to speak for you?
Joey
That would probably be counterproductive…
azrhey
I work in one of the oldest buildings at McGill… in winter we freeze because the windows are “dépoque” and they can’t change them for newer more insulating ones even if they would like exactly the same as the older ones… no double pane glass panels for us..just the flimsy thin panes en vogue in the 1920s. So in winter it’s like working close to an open fridge… we have a schedule to move the plants away from the windows in winter because they’d freeze… )
(OTOH if they let the university change the windows they’d have to deal with all the asbestos in the walls…so maybe that’s not a good idea either….)Meezly
We had to replace the exterior wooden window sills for our unit in a 100+ yo triplex because they were rotting away. The window company recommended concrete sills, which would’ve looked fine (neutral, innocuous) and more importantly, last a long time. Not allowed! Our only option was to replace the rotted wood with new wood and cover it with plastic-coated aluminum sheets. The metal sheets over wood look ugly as hell, but it’s needed to protect from the rain. The wood will likely rot again in several years. If we had been allowed to use concrete or stone, we wouldn’t have needed the ugly covering and probably never have to replace the sills ever.
Kevin
They don’t build ’em like they used to because they used to build them like garbage.
I know from experience that every decision made by your local permit office is random, and subject to how much you can get the bureaucrat to like you.
@Meezly those covered window sills sound like they have been designed to trap water and rot. Do they have drainage holes?
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Kate
The Victoire has won the Walter Cup with a 4-0 victory over the Ottawa Charge.
MarcG
Here’s a highlight reel. That second goal was pretty awesome.
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Kate
The new branch of the REM experienced its first outage Wednesday. It lasted 45 minutes.
The metro’s green line was also down for more than an hour around the same time.
I took the Anse-à-l’Orme line eastward Wednesday, and have to say it’s clearly meeting a need. The parking lot at Anse was full, and the train, while not jammed to the doors, was standing room only all the way to Édouard‑Montpetit, where I got off, and presumably beyond.
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Kate
Gilbert Rozon has thrown in the towel: he’s paying the Courageuses a total of $930,000 and waiving his right to appeal.
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Kate
An Air France flight to Detroit has been diverted to Montreal following an Ebola scare.
(Thanks to Blork who spotted this story while watching Flightradar 24.)
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Kate
The SPVM has announced zero tolerance for fireworks during street gatherings to watch hockey or anything else.
Ephraim
Yeah… how are they going to apprehend anyone. I’m still on week 3 of waiting for them to call me back on a case of identity theft.
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Kate
CBC has a short video on the 70th anniversary of Caffè Italia.
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Kate
Cute CTV story about city workers rescuing ducklings from a sewer.
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Kate
If you’re going to the Grand Prix, go by metro: the facility is only allowing parking for the disabled. Service on the yellow line will be increased and there will also be plenty of bicycle parking space.
There are a few changes in this year’s race but the sex worker strike is still expected.
The Canadiens will also start their series against the Carolina Hurricanes on Thursday, with an away game on Saturday evening. A week‑end mouvementée to start the summer. Radio‑Canada considers this unprecedented circumstance.
Bert
If you do go by Métro and are buying individual tickets, i.e. not a pass holder, buy your return trip(s) beforehand.
jeather
I am told you should take the ferry, not the metro.
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Kate
The Times of London runs a nice piece by Taras Grescoe about taking the Train de Charlevoix downriver from Quebec City.
PatrickC
Yes, nice piece, gently sliding over the fact that the trip takes 4.5 hours, plus the time it takes to get to the departure point, which is not, as I would have thought, Quebec’s Gare du Palais, but what sounds like a non-station some distance downriver. Does anyone know why that is? I have two friends who had summer jobs at the Manoir Richelieu when they were young, and I’d like to see the place myself someday.
James
The reason is due to Canadian railway regulations which the train is not compiant with. The train is operated on an experimental/limited basis with the condition that it does not operate on tracks where freight trains may also be present. This was the same restriction for the previous demonstration train (the Alstom Coradia iLint powered by Hydrogen) on the same tracks that operated in 2023.
Getting from the starting point (Montmorency falls) to gare du palais requires running on tracks that could have freight trains.
The train they use is an old european train (compliant with European regulations) but is not compliant with North American regulations (mostly crashworthiness in case of collision with a freight train).
The train is still safe – just compliant with a different set of regulations.DeWolf
Apparently CN owns the tracks leading up to the Gare du Palais and would have required the train to run at 16 kph on that stretch, if it allowed access at all.
But the terminus is right next to the Montmorency Falls so it’s a scenic location and not far from the city centre.
CE
There are lots of busses that go from Old Quebec to the falls (and many other places). Old Quebec gets lots of European tourists who expect to be able to travel around without a car so it’s well set up (compared to other places in North America) to accommodate them.
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Kate
Le Devoir has a piece Tuesday on the importance of urban agriculture in at least keeping heirloom varieties going, even if it’s unrealistic to think we could feed everyone on the island by growing things locally.
But I still have never seen a Montreal melon, even if it gets mentioned every spring during the mid‑May planting frenzy.
Kevin
There will be a planting of the Melons Wednesday at Blue Bonnets.
Kate
That has a pleasingly pagan sound.
Ian
FWIW Lufa Farms maintains that we could in fact feed the entire island of Montreal’s population handily simply by converting warehouse rooftops to urban farm projects. This assumes we go entirely vegetarian of course and I’m still not sure where stuff like beans and rice would come from, but hey. Montreal really could become self-sufficient for at least greenhouse veg if we really wanted to.
Kate
That’s true. Green veg and some fruit – berries, mostly. Somehow I don’t think it makes economic or agronomic sense to grow e.g. potatoes or apples in greenhouses. I don’t think they do.
But yes, we could become more self-sufficient, and we should – even if we can’t grow our own lemons or coffee.
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