Updates from September, 2019 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts

  • Kate 19:29 on 2019-09-04 Permalink | Reply  

    Radio-Canada talks to a woman who wants to bring back those familiar dark blue address plates with white numbers (text and audio). The city used to issue them, but now, if you want one, you have to get it from a company in France. La Presse reported on this latter fact in 2016 and pointed us to Émaillerie Normande, which offers two different Montreal-style address plates, the dark blue as well as the more recent white ones with black numbers.

    The city does have a law about address number legibility, which I had to investigate once for a client. I don’t have it to hand and it’s hard to find online, but it’s not too complicated: the address has to be a certain minimum size and legibility.

     
    • walkerp 09:48 on 2019-09-05 Permalink

      Those are really nice.

    • Kate 10:27 on 2019-09-05 Permalink

      Yes, if I owned a building and it didn’t have one, I’d get one.

    • Benoit 10:47 on 2019-09-05 Permalink

      I got my traditional address plates from Émaillerie Normande – my plex’s original address plates had been replaced in the 1960’s. I am very satisfied with the result, they are exactly like the old ones.

  • Kate 19:07 on 2019-09-04 Permalink | Reply  

    The city is putting up new money to restart its anti-radicalization centre. Some may recall that while the centre received praise after it opened in 2015, there was concern about how it went after that, and its director was given the boot last March.

    The city controller general had submitted a report that was mostly censored from the media. This twitter thread from journalist Les Perreaux, which I linked at the time, points out some very interesting angles in what little could be read of that report.

    I’m not sure exactly what the centre is meant to do – this article, which sounds like it ought to explain it, doesn’t really make it clear, except that it’s not meant to duplicate police efforts – but will be curious to see what turns up about it in the media.

     
    • Kate 18:47 on 2019-09-04 Permalink | Reply  

      The east end of the green line was down for an hour and a half at rush hour Wednesday after a knife attack on an older woman. Radio-Canada just says “at Assomption station” but TVA puts the attack on the metro train itself, followed by someone pulling the emergency brake. Police have caught a suspect, and the victim is all right.

       
      • jeather 20:01 on 2019-09-04 Permalink

        Oh, that’s what it was? I was at Guy-Concordia and after about 10 minutes with the eastbound train sitting there not moving I gave up and walked home (westbound, not really much longer a walk than the metro). The buses that passed by me were packed, but they just called it a use of the emergency break. A friend was caught (with kids and stroller) in it too.

        I’m not sure what happens, honestly — they said Pie-IX to Honore-Beaugrand but how can the rest of the line function? Obviously it barely did, but is there some way to switch tracks between stations or something? There must be a solution, otherwise they would have said the entire line was down.

      • Kate 07:43 on 2019-09-05 Permalink

        jeather, I don’t know every detail, but the green and orange lines both have spurs in several spots so that, in theory, if one end of a line halts for any reason, trains can stop short and turn back so the rest of the line goes on operating. I don’t know how often these are called on, but they do exist.

    • Kate 12:27 on 2019-09-04 Permalink | Reply  

      Azur trains are to get straps for real straphanging, the STM having finally caved in to complaints from short people who can’t reach the ceiling bars. (Thanks to SMD, who sent me the link, even though he’s too tall for it to apply to him.)

       
      • jeather 14:23 on 2019-09-04 Permalink

        Fucking finally. If the designer thinks this is such a massacre of his beautiful cars he should have taken actual human sizes into account. I am just about average height for women and I can’t reach the bars, I’m not even close.

      • Spi 16:23 on 2019-09-04 Permalink

        I agree with the designer the bars needed to be higher, you see it on busses and older metro’s when the bar is lowered to eye-level (or an average height male) everyone stands a few steps back from them because no one wants to be that close to a metal pole. What happens is that people that are standing back to back then end up blocking the aisle of the metro and if the whole point of having an accordion metro is to allow people to move easily from one end to the other then lowering it defeats the whole purpose.

        The solution was always straps or more vertical poles.

      • Kevin 17:20 on 2019-09-04 Permalink

        The bars were designed with the idea that people in the folding chairs would give up their seats.

        So maybe he should have just not have installed seats …

      • denpanosekai 17:54 on 2019-09-04 Permalink

        So what are we going to do about the screeching noises INSIDE the trains? Was that also part of the design?

      • Kate 18:52 on 2019-09-04 Permalink

        denpanosekai, if you read back a day or two, you’ll see that the STM knows about the noises, which are caused by an after-market device installed to keep the Azur’s doors from getting snagged on gravel tracked in by passengers in wintertime. Apparently the motion of the air inside the train is causing the screeching, and they’re already working on a solution.

        (Given the cussedness of things in general, whatever solution they find to the screeching noise will cause a different problem, which will need another new solution, and so on.)

        Kevin, people do give up their seats for the frail and the elderly. They also give up their seats to make room for people in wheelchairs, but I’ve noticed they’re not so fast to get up for someone pushing a baby carriage, although sometimes they do.

        But I very much doubt it crosses anyone’s mind that they should stand to make room for more standees. You stand up randomly, and someone else is going to grab that seat and sit down.

      • Chris 19:38 on 2019-09-04 Permalink

        Kate, maybe denpanosekai is referring to the same noise I’ve heard since day 1, a high pitch constant whistle.

      • Kate 19:58 on 2019-09-04 Permalink

        Chris, would you call that a screech? This sound we’ve been discussing is a real crescendo of a screech.

    • Kate 12:12 on 2019-09-04 Permalink | Reply  

      Simon Jolin-Barrette, who’s done a topnotch job at immigration, diversity and inclusiveness, is now on immigration, francization and integration. Hi, Simon!

       
      • Mare 13:08 on 2019-09-04 Permalink

        Bonjour/Hi Simon!

      • Kevin 17:21 on 2019-09-04 Permalink

        Minister of assimilation, amirite?

    • Kate 12:09 on 2019-09-04 Permalink | Reply  

      A judge has just struck down Quebec’s ban on growing cannabis at home.

       
      • Faiz Imam 13:47 on 2019-09-04 Permalink

        I’ve been expecting this since day 1, quebec’s restriction are clearly outside the bounds of provincial law as laid out by Bill 45. It was only a matter of time, even if this ends up getting appealed.

        I really don’t smoke much, but i was thinking of growing some, if only as a matter of principle.

        Also, if you have any sort of gardening skill, then weed at home is dramatically cheaper than buying it in store.

        People already do it of course, but it will be nice to be more open about it. Garden stores in the rest of Canada already have started catering to the new market, which is funny.

      • Michael Black 14:22 on 2019-09-04 Permalink

        I knew someone who grew his own, and he once said something about getting more out of the growing process than using the results.

        But if I remember properly, he was the one who pulled up to a Russian whaling ship in a Zodiac, and one of the sailors asked “have you got any pot?” .

        Mountain Girl once had the standard book on growing marijuana, but I don’t think it’s in print anymore. Though a search shows a strain named after her.

        Michael

      • Mark Côté 14:28 on 2019-09-04 Permalink

        Also looks like the island’s fourth SQDC outlet is now open: https://www.sqdc.ca/en-CA/Stores/s-montreal-metro-snowdon/77024

      • walkerp 18:31 on 2019-09-04 Permalink

        Wow justice and common sense actually prevail for once! This grow at home provision has been the only positive and sensible element in the legalization fiasco, so it was pretty dismaying that the idiots in charge in Quebec tried to shut that down. This is very good news.
        Now imagine if anybody could grow and sell weed how good that would be for the economy and the quality that would come from that? But no, we must ensure that big corporations and the state maintain their corrupt stranglehold.

      • Faiz Imam 19:03 on 2019-09-04 Permalink

        No private sales yet, but there is no law against giving it away.

        If one is skilled you can grow a serious amount yourself. even with 4 plants. Not hard to barter some in exchange for favours.

        Id be interested if the extreme regulation of production is something that can change in the decades ahead. A lot of the restrictions were to appease police and a skeptical older generation, I can’t imagine it lasting.

      • Chris 19:36 on 2019-09-04 Permalink

      • Kate 07:46 on 2019-09-05 Permalink

        Chris, that’s an absolute unit of a plant.

      • Michael Black 20:41 on 2019-10-03 Permalink

        By my count, it’s been thirty days, the time limit on filing an appeal (according to the articles a month ago). So either the update is late, I did a search yesterday, or there will be no appeal and it’s time to start growing.

        Michael

    • Kate 12:08 on 2019-09-04 Permalink | Reply  

      The city is gearing up for a lawsuit against Tony Accurso and Frank Zampino, challenging them for alleged bid rigging on municipal contracts between 2001 and 2009. They hope to get back $26 million for the city.

       
      • Kate 08:02 on 2019-09-04 Permalink | Reply  

        Another pedestrian down: a woman in her 80s was killed by a dump truck Tuesday afternoon in NDG.

         
      • Kate 07:57 on 2019-09-04 Permalink | Reply  

        Le Devoir talked to a man who inherited a house on Île Bigras and has worked on it, but the REM came along and has been doing construction work 20 feet away – and will soon be sending trains past, every 15 minutes. Mario Mordente thinks he should have been expropriated but REM management doesn’t actually need his lot, so nothing doing.

         
        • ant6n 16:24 on 2019-09-04 Permalink

          Not to diminish this guy’s suffering, but I could imagine once the REM opens, it’ll be a watefront property with direct metro access to downtown (travel time of 30mins). I could imagine that the lot could get much more valuable, even with the building restrictions.

        • Tom 19:33 on 2019-09-04 Permalink

          How quiet (or loud) is the rolling stock that they are buying for this REM?

        • Kate 12:53 on 2019-09-05 Permalink

          I don’t think there’s ever a simple answer to that. It’s light rail, but the acoustics are bound to vary.

        • ant6n 14:37 on 2019-09-05 Permalink

          In Vienna, I’ve come across _trams_ with really annoying noise profiles (like loud high pitches). First order approximation is that the sound is maybe a bit quieter than existing trains, but you’ll hear it for a shorter time, since the trains are 1/3 as long. Then again, this particular house is near a station, where trains accelerate/decelerate, which the REM trains will likely do a bit more quickly, so all bets are off.

        • Faiz Imam 15:53 on 2019-09-05 Permalink

          The fact that this Île Bigras Station even exists is pure political expediency.

          It’s a tiny island with about 300-400 single family houses and nothing else, not as much as a dep.

          The next station is St Dorothy, which is not very far away. You could cut it, save a ton of money and impact almost no-one.

          Île Bigras is NiMBY central. Not a single new house will ever be built there, and so you are spending tens of millions of dollars for basically a few hundred wealthy homeowners.

          But cancelling that station would have created a political crisis, so they just kept it to keep locals happy.

        • Blork 17:13 on 2019-09-05 Permalink

          Um. While it’s true that the Ste-Dorothée station is really close (barely more than a kilometre), the tracks run through Ile-Bigras, and there’s a podunk little station there already. There is no way they’re spending “tens of millions of dollars” on upgrading that station. They’re likely doing little more than upgrading the signage.

          So yes, it’s a tiny island that’s already full, but it isn’t costing any additional money (at least nothing notable) to run the line through there on the existing tracks. Any money that’s being spent there is (I assume) being spent on upgrading the infrastructure such as being spent all along the line.

          And AFAIK the bridge that’s being built is a bridge for cars, possibly due to some road re-routing or whatnot. I might be wrong about that, but I really don’t think any significant amount of money is being spent on the actual station.

        • Faiz Imam 17:49 on 2019-09-05 Permalink

          Every REM station is a enclosed, climate controlled building, with massive glass and wood paneling. Stairs and elevators, ticketing station and lobby. its not just a platform. Each station is a much more substantial project than the previous platforms were. I read a budget document at one point, which I can’t find again. It’s definitely in the tens of millions each.

          Regardless, as I said not having that station would create one more political crisis. I understand why adding a station was the easy choice.

      • Kate 07:36 on 2019-09-04 Permalink | Reply  

        Pierre Nadeau, a longtime journalist with Radio-Canada, has died. He was 82.

         
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