The walking and cycling path on the new bridge, announced for Halloween, has been delayed till the end of autumn – basically, until it’s too iced up to be useful.
Updates from October, 2019 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts
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Kate
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Kate
The old Royal Vic buildings will reopen as an emergency shelter on December 1. The facility helped more than a thousand men, and 150 women, when other city shelters were full on cold days last season.
Ephraim
Anyone know… was this a dry or wet shelter? We really need wet shelters, too many of these people get turned away.
Kate
I’m pretty sure it was not a wet shelter, if only because recent news about a new wet shelter talks about it as if it’s a new thing in town.
Faiz imam
Given how useful, arguably critical this is turning into, I hope this becomes apart of whatever Mcgill will do with the site. With how much space they are gaining, and their claims about created multiple public spaces, a shelter can and should be a part of that.
But their snobby elitism may or may not get in the way. Really depends on the people in charge.
SMD
This op-ed from last Friday suggests that the province make sure McGill maintains the public and social vocation of the heritage site before handing it over. I don’t know all the ins and outs, but the authors seem well-versed in the topic.
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Kate
The death of Zombie Boy in summer 2018 was widely reported as suicide, but a coroner’s report says it was accidental, Rick Genest having fallen to his death from a third-floor balcony while very drunk.
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Kate
A part of Van Horne was repaved recently, but on the weekend was the site of both a water main break and a gas line break.
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Kate
At the halfway point of her term, during Projet’s weekend council, Mayor Plante gives herself 7 out of 10, citing the great western park and the creation of more social housing (ongoing) as achievements. It’s only mentioned in passing, but the city’s involvement in the redevelopment of the Molson lands – rather than the hands-off developer free-for-all in Griffintown fostered by Tremblay – will be seen in retrospect as a positive change for the city. If you want to shape the urban landscape, profit can’t be the only motive.
vasi
I’d give her extra points for the law preventing sales of dogs from puppy mills!
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Kate
People in the know say methamphetamine is a neglected problem in Montreal.
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Kate
The planned anti-racism and anti-Loi sur la laïcité march was held in Park Ex on Sunday afternoon despite the relentless chilly rain.
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Kate
Besides the Jean Drapeau archives, the major history thing this week, Radio-Canada looked at the use of computers in its election coverage starting in 1963. There’s also a piece about the appearance of video arcades in the 1980s.
The Gazette’s retro-specs looked at the 1995 pro-Canada unity rally, among others.
The Centre d’histoire piece this week is about the Indians of Canada pavilion at Expo 67, which, as they note, would not be called by this name now. The totem pole still stands over on the island, but the teepee-inspired pavilion is long gone.
On a different indigenous theme, the city’s Centre d’histoire page looked recently at what we know about the way of life of the St Lawrence Iroquoians, the longhouse dwellers Jacques Cartier encountered when he first landed on the island that would become Montreal. The Wikipedia article about this culture makes it clear that their identity is an educated triangulation made by anthropologists, linguists and others, as they left few traces and we don’t know which groups either absorbed them or killed them off.
Anonymous
Holy shit did I waste my youth in the arcades along Ste-Catherine. I walk down there now and think about how every other storefront used to be an arcade or stripclub (which looked the same and was very confusing to me as a child).
Kate
I spent time in the arcades too, playing those old Konami and Sega games, with occasional breaks for pinball, which they also had. Some of the arcades eventually added peep shows, which brought in a clientele that created a nasty atmosphere for a young woman, so I lost the habit.
Pinball had only stopped being illegal here a few years before the era mentioned in the article. But that’s another story.
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Kate
The SPVM numbers homicides based on the island of Montreal, but here’s another way to look at it: 16 deaths blamed on organized crime in the urban area so far this year – this includes the whole agglomeration. There were 21 such killings clocked up last year.
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Kate
I was mistaken in a recent post: Archives de Montréal already has the Jean Drapeau archive online, and journalists must be sifting through it. One nugget so far is that Drapeau oversaw a response to the Malouf report, made by judge Albert H. Malouf to report on cost overruns during the 1976 Olympics. The 300-page response has not been seen till now, and includes a copy of the original report with marginal notes by Drapeau.
Another nugget is the details of Drapeau’s obsessive desire to build a tower. He wanted to bring the Eiffel tower to Montreal as early as 1963, a notion turned down by the French. After that he wanted a tower for the city’s 325th anniversary in 1967, which didn’t happen either. I’d be willing to wager that Roger Taillibert got into Drapeau’s good graces at least partly by promising to include a tower as part of the Olympic site.
Michael Black
A few years ago there was a story about a McGill librarian who visited the Montreal Antiquarian Book Fair and came across some binders of material be!onging to Drapeau. I thought that’s what you were talking about the other day, but I looked and found it was separate. The main archive was left by Drapeau on the condition it not be voewable until 30 years. The binders, including a Malouf report with capacitors mkents by Drapeau, went to McGil, where it was on public display and now available for study.
Michael
Kate
The Drapeau archive wasn’t meant to be seen till 20 years after his death. I had not heard about the McGill discovery.
Alex L
Here for the McGill archives: https://www.mcgill.ca/newsroom/fr/article/mcgill-dans-la-ville/des-archives-personnelles-de-jean-drapeau-luniversite-mcgill
Thanks for the info Michael, I didn’t know about it either.
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Kate
The SPVM put up a few roadblocks this weekend and found several drivers under the influence. Seems they want to make it clear this is not only done during the Christmas season.
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Kate
Public consultations are considering what to do about the Publisac. It’s alleged in this Gazette piece that Publisac accounts for 11% of the material sent to recycling. That’s a lot, but the piece also considers the downside of outlawing the delivery of menus, coupons and local papers which are included in the Sac.
Michael Black
I suspect many who don’t like the flyers ignore them in the first place, so it’s easy to want them banned. Others count on seeing the sales. Even without a car, I can afford to walk to various stores to get the best deals.
But that 11% figure is probably leverage, someone who doesn’t recycle much. A week’s worth of Gazettes will take up more space than a publisac. A week’s worth of crushed cans and plastic containers is more than a publisac.
Michael
YUL514
The issue is, where do you draw the line? Do we also ban advertising delivered by Canada Post? It’s still an effective method of advertising, there’s a reason it is still often used and along with parcels it’s what keeping CP in business these days.
Bill Binns
The little sign on my mailbox saying “pas de publicite” has been 100% effective for over 3 years. If it’s that easy for everyone, I don’t see any reason to ban the Publisac. I only wish junk mail was as easy to prevent. Feels like more environmental directionless flailing about.
Chris
TFA says they want to make publisac opt-in, not opt-out. That’s a great idea, because there’s no ban exactly.
Transcontinental argues that it’s they, not the City, that ultimately pays the cost of recycling. It’s irrelevant who pays: it wastes energy and CO₂ recycling, reprinting, retransporting, and retossing those things.
As for the newspapers, they are in desperate need of reinventing themselves anyway, for many more reasons.
Politicians, governments, media, scientists, academics, just about everyone say we’re in a climate emergency. If that’s so, then we should at the very least make a lot of that wasteful crap opt-in, instead of opt-out.
Great grassroots activism work by Montpetit, forcing application of current bylaws.
DavidH
I keep hearing the argument about the local press needing the publisac for their distribution. My publisac hasn’t come with the local paper for years. (I think that paper went 100% online but in other places the paper simply shut down). If that’s the argument, ok fine, keep the opt-out system for those very specific places on the island where they do render that service. But, only for those places and only for the time that they keep doing it (not much longer I would guess). Why keep the opt-out system everywhere else?
The other argument I hear is about the poor needing their rebates. Yet, the rebates apply whether you get them on paper or not. We use coupons in online form (through our grocer’s app but also through a digital publisac-type app that aggregates online flyers). The publisac is not necessary the learn about specials or get coupons.
While on a walk some time ago I saw a police officer berating a local cuban sandwich shop owner for putting flyers in people’s windshield. It’s against the bylaws and rightly so. Why does publisac get a pass? The harm they do is so much worse.
Chris
DavidH, why keep it opt-out even for them? Why should a corporation’s “right” to litter on private property trump everyone else’s right to have a cleaner environment?
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Kate
Five individuals accused in the Fronde inquiry that caught Frank Zampino in its clutches now want a stay of proceedings based on the same reasons Zampino received one, a month ago. A high city fonctionnaire and four engineering firm executives are accused of fraud and corruption, and apparently see no reason they shouldn’t walk away scot-free.
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Kate
There was a vigil Friday evening at the Tétreaultville corner where Jonathan Pomares killed his kids and then himself. Although the CTV headline says the community is searching for answers that’s straight out of Journalism Clichés 101, because there’s no secret here. We’ve seen the storyline before: a marriage is breaking down, one of the parents goes off the rails and punishes the other by killing the kids – suicide optional. It’s atavistic and shows a side of human nature we’d rather not contemplate, but it is not a mystery. CTV piece mentions support groups and gives some links and phone numbers.
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Kate
CBC has an item about some Rosemont folks undertaking a zero waste challenge. I’m all for the aspects involving re-using clothing and toys and furniture, but I have several reservations about this as a goal. One is the assumption that people’s time is valueless, and another is the sad fact that this is still an elite choice.
A zero-waste bulk grocery, Loco, is handy to my place. Last time I emptied a bottle of laundry detergent (La Parisienne unscented, listed by IGA at $5.29 for 1.52L, but which I can usually find at Jean-Coutu for under $5) I brought the bottle to Loco and bought some of their cheapest laundry stuff (they have 3 options). I didn’t even fill the bottle, but it was evident that the product was going to cost me nearly twice as much as the La Parisienne. Can’t imagine how the priciest would compare.
I’m about to run out of dish detergent and am not sure whether to experiment with the Loco product, since it’s also very likely to cost twice as much as the usual stuff I get (Biovert, listed by IGA at $2.49 a bottle).
I’m not knocking Loco, which is doing a good thing, but it’s irrational that we should pay twice as much for a product without a container as with one. Zero waste will never be a generally viable concept till people can save money by doing it.
My main concern, however, is that damage to the ecosphere is carried out on a grand scale by corporations. Getting individuals to pursue zero waste is not completely pointless, but it’s a drop in a very big bucket when keeping pressure on politically is what’s called for.
John B
The products at places like Loco are often local/organic/ethical/whatever in addition to being zero-waste, which can really drive up the cost, (look at oils for sticker shock – Canola oil is about 10X more expensive at Loco as buying a bottle from the bottom shelf at Metro). There’s a hole in the market for “normal” products without packaging. Bulk Barn helps fill the hole if there’s one available.
Loco & Bulk Barn are great for people who really want to change their lives, but for most of the world incentives need to change on the supply side. When it’s cheaper to buy a kilo of pasta in plastic than it is without, people are going to choose the no-cleanup plastic-wrapped pasta almost every time.
Michael Black
It seems like a lot of these things are stunts, or fodder for a book. It’s easy to live with a limitation for a limited time, harder if it’s forever. We hear about people living without electricity or garbage or buying nothing or eating within 100 miles, and it makes for a good book or tv show. But how much do they keep after the period? Do they revert to old habits? More likely it’s somewhere in between.
It may set an example, but I suspect most people can’t meet such standards.
I suspect also that people involved may have different philosophy. If they already think “clutter” is a bad thing, it’s easier for them to limit what they buy, or tell people their children don’t need more toys.
We can look at the past. Fifty years ago food coops were big, in part because whole foods were hard to get at the time. So it was more like buying in bulk, and dividing it up to members. Membership required participation. But with time, people didn’t want to participate, so the rise of natural food stores.
Those started out as a for-profit version of the food coops, but with time the bulk buying went away. Health codes came along, so no more scooping yourself. And people wanted less effort, so the stores would prepackage, though usually just a plastic bag rather than multiple layers of packaging.
If people change “because I should” they may revert. How many people go back to eating meat over time? I’ve seen people who think they need to live a certain way, and hate it.
People need to change for their own reasons, so when they start to do it, they keep with it. That’s why I’ve never driven a car, and haven’t eaten meat in forty years. I do both for my own reasons, and thus never felt like I was missing something. I knew when I stopped eating meat I’d never go back.
Michael
Tim S.
I think the time issue Kate brings up is really under-discussed. Just as an example, when my wife was unemployed for a few months, she found all kinds of great clothes, for practically nothing, in church basements. Now that she’s working 40 hours a week, it’s back to online shopping, with all the attendant packaging and delivery trucks and so on. There can’t be a serious reduction in waste and consumption, never mind degrowth, without a reduction in the work week, or the return of individual salaries that can support a family.
CE
@Kate, do they not have Biovert in bulk? They were one of the first companies to offer it so I’m surprised that they wouldn’t.
Chris
It’s all further illustration of how our entire economic system needs major reform.
Kate
CE, Loco didn’t have Biovert last week. I didn’t see the brand name on any of their stuff.
I might go by the Maison Ecolonet on Bélanger and see what they have, sometime.
EmilyG
I try to cut down on waste, but often gluten-free food comes in rather extensive packaging.
Faiz imam 17:46 on 2019-10-28 Permalink
Unfortunate, i live pretty close and have been looking forward to checking it out.
But it should be pointed out that unlike Jacques Cartier, this one will be open 12 months out of the year. They built in some design features to make it safe and easy to clean snow and ice. So winter cycling enthusiasts will be able to use it even if it opens at a bad time.
I read elsewhere that the issue is they need to shutdown the highway for a night to finish off the pedestrian overpass, and they can’t do that in time.
Kate 09:24 on 2019-10-29 Permalink
safe and easy to clean snow and ice
That’s seasonal amnesia talking, lad.
Faiz Imam 23:25 on 2019-10-29 Permalink
We shall see. I was talking to a guy from Velo quebec and he seemed pretty happy with the design.