Updates from November, 2019 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts

  • Kate 21:40 on 2019-11-01 Permalink | Reply  

    Wind slowed down the Exo trains Friday. Bricks fell off a Park Ex façade and injured a man passing by; a man was killed by a falling tree in Bromont. Part of a church roof was ripped up in the Village.

    The Hydro-Quebec power outage map is a crazy quilt Friday evening. Andy Riga says on Twitter that there are more than 2000 separate breaks in Quebec, and some people may be out for days. Hydro-Quebec says this is nothing like the 1998 ice storm because the main grid hasn’t been affected. It just takes time to go around and fix all the minor breaks from fallen trees and other wind damage.

     

    • Kevin 08:06 on 2019-11-02 Permalink

      There are now 3,500 separate breaks, and still more than half a million houses in the dark-but amazingly not my place. (For years I used to lose power every two weeks, rain or shine, so I am glad about the work Hydro has done to beef up its network.)

    • Uatu 08:06 on 2019-11-02 Permalink

      Did the REM people say how they will handle bad weather? Just wondering because the non compete clause makes them the only option to cross the bridge and that’ll be a lot of people stranded

    • Faiz Imam 21:21 on 2019-11-03 Permalink

      I don’t know about any particular policies, but they have said that the system is powered from Brossard as well as near DM, coming off two completely separate parts of Hydro Quebec’s transmission network. If one side goes out, the other can power the whole thing.

  • Kate 18:42 on 2019-11-01 Permalink | Reply  

    As of Monday, the city’s mobility squad will be able to ticket mis-parked scooters although I doubt whether those will be able to operate for more than another week or two.

     

    • jeather 09:12 on 2019-11-02 Permalink

      When I am downtown it is rare to go more than three blocks without seeing at least one scooter blocking a sidewalk, either parked in the middle of a sidewalk or fallen down blocking it — I am regularly tempted to haul them into the street. I see slightly more green ones than black, but it is both types.

    • JONATHAN 21:32 on 2019-11-02 Permalink

      I don’t understand why people act as if they can’t just pick up the scooter and put it to the side. I’ve never seen one blocking the sidewalk, but I don’t mind moving it. I’ve done that many times before with store sandwich boards.

    • CE 23:44 on 2019-11-02 Permalink

      I like the tactic that I’ve seen a few times of picking them up off the sidewalk and moving them directly into a garbage can.

    • jeather 10:31 on 2019-11-03 Permalink

      I could pick them up, but if so I’d toss them in the street to irritate people wanting to park (I also bet they get ticketed like that). Garbage cans work too. But sometimes I am not: the mood to lift them and move them, I have a bag or it is cold or raining.

      Not everyone is able to bend down and pick up something weighting 40 pounds such is what Google suggests they weigh.

    • Tim S. 10:38 on 2019-11-03 Permalink

      Jonathan, I do move them all the time. They are heavy and awkward, and I move them on behalf of people who can’t: older people, those with shopping carts or strollers, disabled people. But I shouldn’t have to be cleaning up after people’s discarded toys. Because let’s be clear, that all that these are.

  • Kate 12:28 on 2019-11-01 Permalink | Reply  

    Daniel Renaud profiles a retiring police officer who has been involved in work against the mob, notably Vito Rizzuto.

     

    • ProposMontreal 15:10 on 2019-11-01 Permalink

      If this was a movie, he would get shot the day before his last day of retirement while training the rookie hot head.

  • Kate 08:17 on 2019-11-01 Permalink | Reply  

    A criminology professor at UdeM is worried about the surge in firearms as incidents of shootings are reported around town, although our homicide rate is still very low for a city this size. As mentioned in the Gazette piece Thursday, although the popping of caps is all gang-related, there’s always the risk of a stray bullet injuring or killing someone not involved in their dangerous games.

     

    • Blork 09:47 on 2019-11-01 Permalink

      *Still* being the key word. For how long? Toronto has had 400 shootings so far this year (33 fatal). How long before things skyrocket to a similar level here?

      And at the risk of starting a flame war, handgun bans do next to nothing to reduce these numbers. There needs to be money and resources put into community work that discourages gang activity, as well as very harsh penalties for gun-related crimes (including simple possession of a gun) to discourage kids from pickiing up guns.

    • Ephraim 10:52 on 2019-11-01 Permalink

      @Blork – Penalties only work if you actually catch people… it’s not the punishment, it’s the apprehension. But maybe it’s time for some of these clubs to put in metal detectors and clear policies that police are called if an illegal weapon is found. But the police need to actually come… not put this on a low priority and never bother to show up. They may need to station a few officers in close proximity from 11PM until 2:30AM on weekends.

    • qatzelok 13:25 on 2019-11-01 Permalink

      Eph, militarizing the police has done nothing to reduce shootings in the USA, so you’re suggesting a pre-failed strategy.

      Bjork is much better by suggesting prevention through social programs and aid to communities that are struggling to integrate into general society. I’ve worked in community centers for 20 years, and these do a lot more to preventing social violence than cops carrying AK-47s.

    • Ephraim 20:14 on 2019-11-01 Permalink

      @qatzelok… again with reading things that I never said? Where did I suggest militarizing the police? Suggesting that they come to pick up an illegal weapon is militarizing them? I didn’t even suggest arresting or stopping them… just collecting a weapon.

    • Chris 15:26 on 2019-11-02 Permalink

      Blork, you’re likely right that handguns being illegal wouldn’t make gangs decide ‘oh, it’s illegal, I guess we better not own guns’. But it might help in other ways. For example, if less guns were owned generally, there would be less guns for gangs to steal. There would be less guns for children to use accidentally. It’s not like hunters need handguns, why should they be allowed? The only reason I guess is self-defence.

    • Michael Black 15:56 on 2019-11-02 Permalink

      Interestingly, I’ve seen the suggestion of handguns for bear country. There may not be much warning before they are close, and if people aren’t hiking, they don’t want to carry a rifle.

    • Blork 18:23 on 2019-11-02 Permalink

      @Chris: Existing handgun regulations pretty much keep that in check. My understanding is that virtually none of the handguns being carried by gang members in Montreal (and Toronto, etc.) are stolen guns from B&Es. There is a river of black market guns flowing across the border from the US, and that is where almost all of them come from. Black-market handguns are plentiful in the US and they are very easy to smuggle.

      @Michael Black: that sounds insane. You would need a very high calibre handgun to stop a bear, and the bear would have to be very close, and the person would have to be very calm and highly trained. Given how rare fatal bear attacks are (four in Canada since 2010), the idea of promoting handgun use for bear protection sounds like some NRA bullshit excuse to just loosen up handgun regulations.

    • Ephraim 13:35 on 2019-11-03 Permalink

      @Blork – There is just 1 legal gun store in Mexico… almost every single gun in Mexico is from the US.

  • Kate 08:14 on 2019-11-01 Permalink | Reply  

    It will be May next year before short people have straps to hang onto in the metro. The bars in the Azur are higher than in the old trains, being 6’6″ from the floor, out of the reach of many.

     

    • Kate 07:59 on 2019-11-01 Permalink | Reply  

      Hello, November. Wind and rain have done their best to mess with us Friday morning. My street has gone from autumn to near-winter in a day. Lots of folks have lost power and there’s been some flooding in underpasses.

      More: CTV says we’re being asked not to call 911 for residential damage, which apparently some people have been doing. They also have photos and videos of storm effects and TVA has video of a flooded underpass in Hochelaga. October beat a record for rainfall here, too.

      The video CTV has showing the shattered bus shelter is quite startling. I was standing under one a few hours ago and feeling it being pushed and pulled this way and that by the wind.

       

      • Blork 09:49 on 2019-11-01 Permalink

        The wind has come a few days too late for me. On a good year, we get a wind storm in late October that blows all the leaves from my two maple trees all over the neighbourhood. On a bad year we get rainstorms, and the rain knocks the leaves straight down into my yard. This year it was rain. #owmyachingback

      • CE 10:59 on 2019-11-01 Permalink

        Why not just leave the leaves on the yard and let them become mulch for the grass? It’s also supposed to be good for insects, birds, and tree roots (and will save your back).

      • Kate 12:19 on 2019-11-01 Permalink

        CE, do you know if there’s any point in letting leaves pile onto an area with concrete flagging rather than dirt or grass?

      • CE 12:41 on 2019-11-01 Permalink

        I’m not an expert but from what I’ve read, any leaf debris left in the winter can be used by insects to find shelter which is then good for birds who have limited food sources in the winter. Birds and small mammals may also use the leaves for shelter. So if you want to have more biodiversity around you, it might be better to rake up the leaves in the spring rather than the fall.

        When I lived in a house with a lawn, I used to just mow over the leaves in the fall and spring and let them decompose. Much easier than raking them and better for the lawn.

      • Blork 13:41 on 2019-11-01 Permalink

        CE, it’s a matter of quantity. When there are so many leaves that you can’t even see the grass it ends up killing the grass. We’re talking a solid carpet of leaves at least 10 leaves thick across the whole yard. That said, we don’t clean it up as thoroughly as we used to; we do leave a fair bit behind, but there’s way too much to leave it all there.

      • Kevin 15:56 on 2019-11-01 Permalink

        Leaves on concrete make for a slippery mess.

        Leaves (probably mulched) can be good in your garden but too much will kill your grass.

      • Kate 08:54 on 2019-11-02 Permalink

        Kevin, I would clear the leaves off the walkway but the other space around where I live is paved with concrete blocks and leaves pile up there. I’ve tidied them away generally since living here but now that I read about them being of value I may pile ’em there till next spring.

      • Tee Owe 12:41 on 2019-11-02 Permalink

        Leaves on the lawn, walkway or sidewalk get raked and go to the city composter (I live in a city that gives everyone a free load of compost in Spring). Leaves on grow beds/non-lawn or walkways, can stay and rot = mulch.

      • Blork 18:26 on 2019-11-02 Permalink

        The wind not only knocked out my power for 31 hours but it seems to have blown some of the leaves away from my yard. Today I filled 12 of those paper composting bags and that pretty much does it. That’s about 50% less than some previous years, but we were also less thorough this year, on purpose.

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