A man is walking the perimeter of the island of Montreal to pick up trash from the riverside.
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Kate
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Kate
Christine Fréchette has named her cabinet; both Montreal CAQ MNAs have jobs, Karine Boivin Roy (Anjou–Louis‑Riel), as housing minister, and Chantal Rouleau (Pointe‑aux‑Trembles) doing Social Solidarity and Community Action, responsible for the Metropolis and the Montreal region.
Some thoughts about our new environment minister.
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Kate
Le Devoir explores Radio-Canada’s extensive art collection, although without enough images. Interestingly, half its pieces are still in the old Maison Radio‑Canada because, for various reasons, they can’t be moved.
DeWolf
I’m not sure if half the pieces are still in the old building:
« Il y a pratiquement autant d’œuvres ici que dans l’ancienne tour »
To me, that implies that nearly all the artworks were moved, except for the four pieces that couldn’t be moved, and the tapestries donated to the Musée des métiers d’arts.
Incidentally, the piece mentions the artworks that are still in the old building are now under the responsibility of the new owner, but doesn’t discuss their fate. The studios have already been demolished and the tower is currently being completely gutted, so it would great to know exactly how the artworks are being preserved.
Kate
Right, I read that to mean “there are about as many pieces here as are in the old building” whereas it probably means “as were in the old building in the past“.
Thank you.
Harvey
As long as are on the topic of Quebecois Art, what’s up with Hydro-Quebec’s collection?
Kate
What do you mean “what’s up”?
CE
I’ve been inside the old building and there are a few very large pieces of art that are built right into the building. It would be impossible to move them. Hopefully they’re saved and incorporated into whatever the building becomes because I remember the art being quite interesting.
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Kate
The big spring cleanup seems to have been an empty promise as many city streets are still festooned with post‑winter trash.
DeWolf
If you have no grand vision as a governing party, and instead your entire campaign was based around the promise of “going back to basics” as Claude Pinard put it, you’d better not screw up the basics.
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Kate
In 2024, a Superior Court judge ruled that the city is liable for racial profiling committed by its cops. The city is appealing the ruling.
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Kate
Paul St-Pierre Plamondon is facing a dilemma: polls show that he can win the October election easily, but only if he gives up the promise of a referendum on the Quebec independence that’s the raison d’être of his party.
MarcG
Surely there’s a German word for this.
Kate
MarcG
Gonna send this video to PSPP
bob
In this the best of all political systems the PQ can maintain a funtamental position rejected by 2/3 of the electorate, have the electoral support of less than 1/3 of the electorate, and still win the election without giving up on its fundamental, unpopular position.
What this should reveal is that voting is no longer so much *for* things, rather than *against* things, like people or parties or positions. If you hate the CAQ, hate the Liberals, and hate QS, you can still vote for someone you hate slightly less, even though they might do something you don’t want, because you can vote against that when it comes.
Recall the Orange Wave, where the masses of Quebec did not in any way become more progressive or more left leaning, but saw fit to punish the parties that they perceived had wronged them with their scandal, ineffectiveness, corruption, etc. It was a kind of win-win, though not thoroughly good – you could bench the people you wanted to punish, but you would not get an actual NDP government doing all kinds of lefty things you don’t agree with – and in any case by that time the NDP had developed its policy of leaving Quebec alone to do its thing, party principles be damned (cf. @MarcG’s video).
So here we’ll have a government made up of people whose party was conceived for one main purpose, but that purpose will be put on a shelf. What is left for the party to do? Wallow in neoliberalism (i.e., theft), and all the usual corruptions. It is reminiscent of the old trope about the communists being the best dressed deputies in the post-war Italian Parliament.
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Kate
The STM bus network will be changing as of May 18 when the Anse à l’Orme REM opens, and not just in the West Island. The list of routes changing is a long one (but the map being used to show certain routes is disorienting, with west at the top).
Joey
That comparison tool is needlessly complicated. Can anyone figure out what the difference in, say, the 51 route is?
MarcG
If you download the “Understanding the redesign -> Summary document” at the bottom of the page it has more details than the individual route documents. For the 51 for example, on page 41, it says “Qu’est-ce qui change? Aucune modification de parcours, Rééquilibrage des fréquences sur la ligne 51 au profit de la ligne courte (51X) entre la gare Montréal-Ouest et la station Snowdon”. Pretty cumbersome.
jeather
Oh they might be upgrading the buses near my work so I can take the metro again.
Joey
Thanks, MarcG. Not sure why they couldn’t represent that visually, but whatever. More to the point, it would go a long way to distinguish between the kinds of changes on that summary table, rather than treat “addition of extra buses for part of the route” with “completely new trajectory”… That 51X is a good idea; Snowdon Metro is a huge bottleneck for that line.
EmilyG
I think the route for each bus is shown as a left-to-right line, which would lead to differing orientations of the map (with different cardinal directions at the top.)
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Kate
A branch of the REV bike path meant to go along Lacordaire has been put on hold. Alan DeSousa’s claim that this branch “goes nowhere” doesn’t fit with the map, where the path was designed to link Montreal North, St‑Léonard and Hochelaga‑Maisonneuve.
DeWolf
It would have been a crucial link in a part of town that is fairly dense but completely deprived of safe cycling infrastructure. It’s not like there is a shortage of space on Lacordaire, which has six lanes of traffic.
Oh well. Maybe in another few years if the anti-bike crowd is voted out of office.
dhomas
So disappointing. There are depressingly few North-South bike links in the eastern part of town. It’s almost impossible to cross the 40. There is a bike path on des Galeries d’Anjou that crosses over the met, but that one leads nowhere. It kinda just ends at St-Zotique, so there’s no route to an East-West path or to downtown. I need to take a lot of unprotected paths to bike to downtown, sharing the road with motor vehicles, until I get to the Notre-Dame path. The Lacordaire REV would have filled this gap quite nicely. 🙁
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Kate
The Word bookstore is holding a fundraiser to restore their very old, singular building on Milton. I have no connection with the store but would not like to see it go away, so I’m passing this on.
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Kate
The number of aggressive dogs reported to the city has risen by 41% since 2021, a trend blamed both on the growing popularity of dogs, and on owners who have no idea how to train or discipline their animals.
Bert
… or people reporting said events…..
jeather
I bet people bringing their dogs everywhere so there’s a lot more interaction between dogs and strange people also isn’t helping.
Blork
…including on the Metro.
Ian
Well Bert, people are more inclined to report incidents if there are more dogs.
Probably even more inclined to report incidents if the dogs bite.FWIW, there was a large uptick in dog ownership after covid.
“The number of cats and dogs residing in Quebec homes increased by more than 200,000 18 months after the start of the COVID-19 outbreak, according to a recent Léger survey commissioned by the Association of Quebec Veterinarians in Small Animal Practice (AMVQ)”
https://globalnews.ca/news/8432565/update-quebec-cats-dogs-covid-19/“Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, the number of cats and dogs in Quebec has increased by about 200,000 to about 3.25 million, a Léger survey shows.
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Quebec’s cat population is estimated at 2.134 million and the dog population at 1.118 million.”
https://www.ctvnews.ca/montreal/article/52-per-cent-of-quebec-households-have-a-cat-or-a-dog-the-highest-rate-ever/jeather
I think this is a cat blog and not a dog blog. I have 3, but one of them is big enough that he probably also counts as a fourth.
Kate
This is definitely a cat blog, although I have only one. The 3 main cats in my life have all been territorial females who didn’t want competition in the house, which has limited the numbers.
MarcG
My wife was attacked by a stray cat that we took in, don’t underestimate those cute little bastards.
jeather
I’m not underestimating them, they just aren’t allowed outside to bite people. And I certainly wouldn’t call the police on my own pets, though they aren’t biters anyhow.
jeather
Talking about cats, a news article an American friend shared with me:
https://www.ctvnews.ca/montreal/article/muffin-the-cat-visits-the-dorval-library-every-day-now-hes-a-card-carrying-member/LJ
Thanks jeather, this is going to get me on my bike for a trip to the Dorval library. I have just one cat, but he is 16 pounds without being overweight. He wants to go outside and I do not want him to get run over or into any trouble, so I walk him on a leash several times a day, a compromise he accepts. I had too many cats disappear and/or run over to ever let one outside on its own again. My only semi-hit recording told the true story of my cat who got run over by the 161 bus on the corner of Van Horne and Westbury circa 1970.
jeather
My cat should be around 16 pounds to be normal weight but despite having been on a diet he is still rather large. I periodically search for harnesses for very large cats but the truth is I think he’d hate it.
LJ
You may well be right. I have been walking cats on a leash since 1988, and the two comments I receive most often are “how do you get him to do that” and “my cat would never do that.” So I have obviously been lucky, with many cats not taking to being on a leash. At the other extreme, search for “Adventure Cats” and you will find cats that enjoy being taken on canoe trips and up canyon trails while on a leash.
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Kate
People who bought a house in Hudson in 2024 are demanding money back from the seller after finding out that an intruder had been killed on the premises by the previous owner during a home invasion. Previous owners are sticking to the point that the intruder was declared dead in hospital, not in the house.
I had no idea you had to check off an item saying that no suicide or violent death had happened in a house you were selling, and that such an incident reduces its value.
CE
When I bought my house a couple years ago, I remember seeing that section in one of the many documents I had to sign. I thought it was odd but I guess there are people who care about it.
Joey
I guess this is still a legit thing – I suspect there are a lot more real estate agents who advise clients that they can get a big discount on a home that had a gruesome event occur inside it than there are homebuyers who sincerely believe that such a history legitimately decreases the value of a home (though we shouldn’t underestimate the number of superstitious people out there). Anyway, my sympathy for the sellers – who basically experienced a terrible home invasion that had the net effect of diminishing the value of their home by 15-25% – started to run out when they tried to loophole their way out of the disclosure. Didn’t help their cause when they were quoted saying that the onus was on the buyer (to not accept their checking a box indicating a violent death hadn’t occurred there despite a Coroners’ report to the contrary?). Leave it to the agent, who should have an ethical and profession obligation not to allow their client to mis-represent the truth, to come out looking worst of all, referring to the buyers: “La courtière Shareen Quraeshi avance même qu’ils sont les « seuls responsables de la malchance qu’ils allèguent ».”
I doubt TVA will follow up, but my sense is the buyers have a strong case here…
azrhey
A friend selling their duplex close to Sauvé metro 10 or so years ago got the buyers arguing for a rebate because they could see a bit of the cemetery from the front door. I’d been there and you’d really have to stand at the corner of the stoop to see a bit of the fence on Berri. But, apparently, that was enough for some people…
People are strange.steph
When we bought in 2021, during the heart of the bidding wars, we put an offer on a house which had a suicide. Our agent told use the suicide would keep some of the competition away. She said “it’s about a 10k devalue. lets just lower our bid by 5k”. It made no difference, it still sold 100k over asking, 25k over our offer, we were in 5th place.
IMHO cemeteries make for the best neighbors and would be an added value.
DeWolf
In Hong Kong, it’s almost impossible to get a mortgage for a property where there has been a suicide or violent death. The banks consider them to be a total write-off because the vast majority of the population follow traditional Chinese religious/spiritual practices:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hungry_ghost
I can only imagine there are a lot of people here in Montreal who, because of their particular cultural background, would not be comfortable living in a space where someone died of unnatural causes. I don’t know if I would be, either. I’m not religious, but when you spend enough time surrounded by certain beliefs and cultural practices, they seep into your consciousness.
Meezly
Same if you watch enough of The Conjuring movies…
bob
So, let me get this straight. There are people who would not live in a house where someone died, therefore the price is lowered, because those people will not buy the house? It is like saying that milk should be sold at a discount because there are lactose intolerant people who won’t buy it. Scam.
Kate
When I lived in the Plateau, it was in a building dating from 1880. It occasionally crossed my mind that people must have been born and died in the rooms I was living in, as would be true of any residential building of that age or older. Unless you move into a brand new building, it’s the chance you take.
Kevin
I suspect this requirement is part of Quebec’s Catholic heritage, since there’s no obligation to make a disclosure in the rest of the country unless specifically asked.
jeather
Could also be related to stronger consumer protection laws.
Ian
I co-signed a lease for someone that killed themselves in the apartment, now I am realizing why the landlord basically broke off all contact with me instead of demanding further payment.
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Kate
Pretty much the only local news Monday morning is the Canadiens winning their first playoff match on a hat‑trick by Juraj Slafkovský, and Habs fever taking over the town.
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Kate
Plans are finally going ahead to build a new swimming pool in Baldwin Park. As previously reported, the old pool needed to be replaced, but was found to be built in an old dump, so it had to be rebuilt in a new location.
The old reports suggested a new pool could be ready for 2026. I don’t think it looks likely.
Baldwin Park is one of the city’s lesser known parks, and has always been a quiet refuge in the eastern Plateau. The article talks about more additions beyond a new pool, which I hope don’t cram it with too many aménagements.
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Kate
Spring flooding is happening all over Quebec; sandbags have been piled along the Back River in Pierrefonds and on the other side in Laval.
EmilyG
I live near the river in Pierrefonds. I’m worried about that area, even if my home isn’t quite in a flood zone.
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Kate
Artists love a cartoonable face like Christine Fréchette’s, with her big eyes and arched eyebrows. Ygreck shows her accepting a dud torch and crossing the desert with two familiar vultures looking on. Côté brings in Legault’s compass (it’s been a recurring motif for a long time) and Ygreck gives Fréchette her own compass too.The best editorial cartoons cross two news threads. Côté offers a good example as PSPP sells his brand of maple syrup, while Godin links seasonal flooding and potholes.
Floor-crossing and the federal Liberal majority was another theme this week, Godin making it a hockey joke and Côté showing us the Liberal bus.
Mark Carney makes a gift of cutting the gasoline tax and Godin hints at where the funds are coming from.
The only cartoon that made me chuckle this week was Côté’s kid getting around a rule forbidding kids to go online. He also had a pertinent visual about the attractiveness of fake news.
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