The Journal sifted through the BAnQ archives and found a series of snowclearing images of the past that demonstrate Montreal’s winter has always been a pain in the ass.
Updates from February, 2019 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts
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Kate
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Kate
We’re expecting more snow and/or freezing rain to start Wednesday night into Thursday.
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Kate
Two pedestrians were crashed into by vehicles and badly hurt in a parking lot in St-Laurent on Tuesday morning.
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Kate
Will the REM take pressure off the orange line? It seems nobody knows yet, and it could just as easily add more passengers to the line at rush hour.
Joey
«Quand on a une ligne diagonale, les gens savent moins où elle va. Elle a donc moins de potentiel de rabattement. Je crois qu’une ligne qui serait plus traditionnelle fonctionnerait davantage», a-t-il fait valoir, notant que le réseau routier le métropole représente un quadrillage où une ligne de métro diagonale pourrait difficilement s’intégrer.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Alex L
Peu importe son axe, je crois que tout le monde s’entend pour dire qu’on a besoin d’une nouvelle ligne de métro pour désengorger la ligne orange. On dirait que Québec regorge d’idées pour éviter le sujet…
Jonathan
I think that the ‘people will be confused about where the line goes’ has to be the silliest excuse not to build a diagonal line.
People are adaptable.
Daniel
It’s insane this wasn’t researched beforehand. I’m almost certain enough of the Mascouche users will switch at Sauvé with bad consequences for people South of Jean-Talon.
I was also of the understanding that the REM won’t be covered by a standard STM pass (I could be wrong). If so, most users are going to continue with the Blue Line to get Downtown rather than pay a surcharge.
Spi
@daniel the final pricing for the fares hasn’t been done but it will maintain the current zone structure. Meaning you have access to all the modes of transportation available to you for the zone you paid for.
Daniel
The Metro doesn’t really operate on zones though, only the commuter lines. Are you saying you’ll need a pass which covers the big trains?
DeWolf
Montreal’s entire transit fare structure will be revised later this year (see link below).
I believe the idea is to simplify and unify fares across the metropolitan area. Presumably (hopefully?) this will mean you will be able to load an Opus with cash value so you don’t need to buy separate tickets each time you go to Laval, Longueuil, or you take the commuter train/REM.
It’s kind of absurd that Montreal has maintained a ticket-based fare system even with Opus, which has the potential to allow for much more flexible ways of paying for transit. In many other cities, you load cash value onto your card and it is deducted each trip, with automatic discounts and rebates depending on how many trips you take, which connections you make, etc. This is what makes the smart card “smart” in the first place.
Daniel
Thanks for the link! I wasn’t aware this was happening, and it makes a lot of sense to use the opportunity to overhaul the fare structure. I wonder though if Opus will need an upgrade too in order to handle a more complex fare system? I guess that’s a discussion for another thread.
Faiz Imam
There’s a reason opus cards expire every few years. The newer versions have upgrades the initial model from a decade ago did not.
Hopefully they are following global standards and are up to date, if so its only a question of upgrading the machines (even there, I’m hoping a software/server upgrade is all that’s needed, and not replacing the machines.)
They have also been testing using Credit cards and cell phones directly to pay for fares. I am also hoping those tests work well enough that it’ll be built in to the new system.
This new fare system has a massive impact on how much people will use various sorts of transit. While its 100% that there will be losers as well as winners, I hope overall it does its job of promoting greater use of the system.
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Kate
The New York Times has an article in French about the culture shock for the French coming to live in Quebec, mostly in Montreal.
david100
I read the english version. Man, it’s cruel but I get a particular satisfaction whenever I read about the misfortunes and various travails of the french. I’d not want to do a wave of deportations, but it gives me pleasure to see them face the reality that they’re economic migrant scum, and looked down upon by a large number of Montrealers and people from Quebec more generally.
Kate
david100, that’s an offensive comment. I may delete it shortly but, either way, longtime commenter though you are, you’re on warning.
david100
Yeah, I don’t mind if you delete. It was maybe too arch to just write out, but I was definitely joking. Literally, some of my best friends are French. But yeah, delete.
david100
Ie. the joke is that the French have a specific attitude like the people in Quebec are sort of lower, and it’s always really funny to razz them about the disjunction between their attitudes and the fact of their being in Montreal for economic purposes.
Kate
I don’t know which French you’re meeting, david100. The French folks I’ve encountered – coworkers, neighbours, people serving in stores – have all been great. I’ve come away with a strong sense that this wave of immigrants is a major plus for Quebec, and certainly for Montreal, where I imagine most of them choose to settle. If some Quebec francophones feel sheepish about their use of the language vis-à-vis their French acquaintances, I’m inclined to suspect it’s their problem, and not the French being snobby. (I’ve seen similar attitudes in North American anglos when they encounter people from England.)
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Kate
My Villeray neighbourhood smells of smoke Tuesday morning and I think it must be drifting down from this major fire in Laval.
mare
Ha, the upstairs neighbours wrote me an email this morning accusing us of smoking in our apartment. I sent her the link to this page to prove it wasn’t us. Not often that a blog post can solve a neighbour’s dispute, so thanks!
She obviously hadn’t gone outside yet (-20°C), but when I just did the smoke smell was still strong, and we live 2 km south from Vileray.
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Kate
The STM has extended what it calls a final offer to its maintenance union.
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Kate
TVA says the city’s new mobility squad is handing out few tickets. The squad, created last summer, is meant to keep traffic moving in the busiest parts of town by getting illegally stopped or parked vehicles to move along.
But is counting tickets the way to judge whether this is working? I would’ve thought simply talking to drivers and getting them to move would be the ideal outcome, but success doing this can’t so easily be bean-counted.
In other traffic news, the city says the corner of Atwater and Tupper, where a woman died in December under the wheels of a dump truck coming from the Children’s Hospital construction site, has been made safer, but the only change mentioned here is that the pedestrian crossing light has been boosted to 18 seconds from 9 seconds previously.
Bill Binns
I don’t know how or why this “squad” would ever get off of St Catherine between McGill College and Guy. This major downtown artery is constantly limited to a winding, single lane goat path because of the huge number of double parked cars and trucks.
Kate
I think there’s a certain tolerance for delivery vehicles when it’s an old commercial street without back alley access in many cases.
CE
I often do deliveries as part of my job. I quickly learned that if your vehicle is painted white, is bigger than an SUV, an has four way flashers, you can do park pretty much anywhere you want for as long as you want.
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Kate
A CBC writer follows the snow-removal process from collection to snow dump.
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Kate
The city has embarked on building its first composting plant in St-Laurent with the aim of reducing the amount of trucking off-island that’s being done now.
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