Matthew Hollett wrote up René-Lévesque Park for Atlas Obscura. This site doesn’t put a date on articles, so I don’t know whether this is recent, but it just bubbled up in my searches.
Updates from May, 2020 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts
-
Kate
-
Kate
A man was stabbed in Cartierville Monday afternoon, and is “entre la vie et la mort” in the slightly dramatic turn of phrase. Police don’t know who or why.
JP
I don’t live too far from there. Quite scary that the suspect is still at large.
Kate
I wouldn’t worry, JP. These things are usually personal, or the result of a little fuss between two-bit gangsters. It doesn’t mean any more risk to ordinary people going about their lives.
-
Kate
Bordeaux Jail prisoners, locked in 24/7 these days, haven’t had showers in weeks. Cruel and unusual?
-
Kate
Montreal businesses will start to emerge from lockdown starting next Monday. François Legault is sanguine about conditions in Montreal.
Raymond Lutz
Social distancing (and tracing apps) won’t cut it. We know since start of April (via preprints) that transmissions occur at farther distance than 2 meters, by people simply TALKING (not sneezing nor coughing). Mists of infectious droplets stay in the air (and transported by HVAC airflows) for minutes! #FUCKINGMASKS4ALL For those arguing masks are impractical with facts like “N95 masks last only 4 hours” I’ll reply volcanologists and firefighters don’t wear the same protective equipment… Those N95 specs are for first line health care workers who literally swim in viral droplets pools. For mere mortals crossing in buildings, reused (homemade or bought) correctly worn masks will do the job of lowering Ro (below 1.0 hopefully).
Sources: “The airborne lifetime of small speech droplets and their potential importance in SARS-CoV-2 transmission” and “COVID-19 Outbreak Associated with Air Conditioning in Restaurant, Guangzhou, China, 2020” bonus link: How To Disinfect Your N95 Mask at Home
-
Kate
Some Montreal restaurants are closing, some are adapting to a world of takeout and pickup only.
Long ago I started a list of vegetarian restaurants for montreal.com, and while I wasn’t a vegetarian for long, I’ve kept up the list over time. Just now I updated it, cutting it down solely to establishments offering delivery or pickup options.
Blork
What saddens me most about all this (at least in terms of culture/economy) is that so many small, locally-owned restaurants will end up closing permanently, and they will sit empty for a year and then as things start to go back to “normal” all those empty places will get snapped up by the chains.
This process is was already underway, but slowly. Covid-19 is basically going to cram 20 years’ worth of franchisation into two years. Get ready to see Tim Hortons, Pizza Pizza, and goddamn Thai Express on every corner of your favorite neighbourhood (as in, ten times more than now). Downtown and Old Montreal will be nothing but Madisons and Ruby Tuesday and goddamn Vinnie Gambinis.
Spi
@Blork That’s a bit too doom and gloom, the reality is that chains and franchises have a very established and inflexible model and have very specific requirements for their restaurants, there’s a reason why certain locals are just a series of chains while adjacent or nearby ones stay empty.
While downtown lends itself to supporting a high concentration of the same franchised restaurants (because of the concentration of office workers) but there’s a limit of how many chains a neighbourhood can sustain. Also, many franchise models offer a certain amount of geographical exclusivity so the franchises don’t compete against each other.
There are ridiculous examples of two Starbucks being across the street from each other but those are generally owned by the same person (corporate or the same franchisor) and are usually in response to the excess demand that their single location couldn’t handle.
I wouldn’t be worried about franchises being shoved down our throats if anything Montreal has a very healthy generation of young restaurant entrepreneurs.
JaneyB
Maybe if the City decides to penalize empty storefronts with some kind of tax, we’ll see the small restos staying or new ones returning quickly. I’m pretty sure my borough has a bylaw against large chains.
I’d like to see some restos become hourly rental kitchens for different culinary entrepreneurs who want to get into take-out but not deal with a lease just yet. I think there’s some pent-up demand for such an option.
Ian
The city has proved fairly powerless in this and many other regards, apparently all they can do to save our ne8ghbourhoods is put up temporary street barriers. They have already expressed an unwillingness to penalize empty storefronts.
qatzelok
New restaurants will eventually open up or re-open. People aren’t going to start loving junkfood more than they did three months ago, especially after a health crisis.
-
Kate
City hall is flying the flag of the Patriotes Monday, to celebrate the holiday.
-
Kate
Michelle Rossignol, another grande dame of Quebec theatre, has died at 80 although apparently not of Covid.
-
Kate
Radio-Canada talks to Dominique Perrazino, the man behind Chez Ménick, currently closed. Some may be puzzled by the description of the barbershop as being “emblématique du coin” in the Plateau, since it’s possible to live in the Plateau for years and never set eyes on it, but this is because Chez Ménick is on the little spur of Masson Street between Papineau and the tracks where one doesn’t tend to stroll without a reason. I did some work for a studio in the old Cadbury building, or I’d never have seen it either.
One thing the Radio-Canada photos don’t show is how the barbershop’s floor is painted to look like a hockey rink, too.
EmilyG
It’s near me. I used to be in that area all the time when I used the laundromat right next to it, before I gave up on that laundromat.
It’s a part of the Plateau that I think most people don’t consider part of the Plateau.Kate
I think most people equate Masson Street with Rosemont, yes. But it’s not Rosemont till you’ve gone east of those tracks.
EmilyG
It is quite an obscure corner of town. I probably never would have been there if I didn’t live in the area.
-
Kate
In St-Michel this weekend, till the end of Monday, anyone can be tested for COVID-19 even if they don’t explicitly have symptoms nor have been in contact with someone who’s tested positive. And they’ve found people with no or very mild symptoms, who test positive.
Meezly
That’s good news – better late than never, right? If there is data about the results of those tests, please share! Quite interested in knowing the percentage of the St-Michel population who tested positive for COVID-19 but were asymptomatic.
I’m hoping this will be seen as a kind of trial to open up testing for the rest of the city.
Alison Cummins
Sigh. Still not doing it right. Maybe hire an infectious-disease specialist from Rwanda to do some conference calls?
+++ +++ +++
Discouragingly, I have a cold. HOW THE FUCK DID I GET IT? We’ve been social-distancing like mad, wearing masks outside to keep our filthy paws out of our faces in case we touch something, and hand-washing diligently upon coming home.
My partner is more self-aware than I am so has been doing most of the errands, so presumably this is a case of household transmission, but if he caught a cold then we’re doing it wrong.
Tee Owe
Alison – don’t beat yourselves up – it’s a virus, it finds it’s host (= us). These pathetic masks don’t stop all infection, and you can’t hand-sanitize every single thing you touch. These viruses (common cold (multiple viruses), flu, corona) lock onto us because we are their host – nothing you can do about it. I hope your colds get better, they are an occupational hazard of being a human being. Trying to be an optimist here …
Kate
Tee Owe, this reminds me that, near the beginning of the lockdown, someone was surmising that determined social distancing would also have the tendency to reduce flu transmission. I know this isn’t peak flu season, but has anything borne this out?
Tee Owe
I can’t give you a link but Chris already commented a couple of days ago that flu cases are way down this year. I have heard this from other sources as well. It makes sense.
Kevin
Alison
The cold is more infectious than other diseases.
But it could be allergies
-
Kate
There was a fairly serious fire overnight in a condo building in Verdun, although nobody was hurt.
-
Kate
On nice days it can be hard to maintain distancing in the parks.
Global says “restaurants and bars” want to reopen, but the article suggests the headline might read Peter Sergakis wants to reopen his businesses.
dwgs
When will local media stop giving a flying fig what the f*ck Sergakis thinks? Laziest. Journalism. Ever.
Kate
Sergakis also got namechecked by the CBC.
Matthew H 23:32 on 2020-05-18 Permalink
Oh, thanks for noticing, Kate! Yes, this just went live today. I’ve done a bunch of these over the past few months: the Chalet squirrels, Di-Octo II, the CCA sculpture garden, the Calder sculpture, the Twilight Sculpture Garden, and La Leçon. There’s one on the Charlevoix stained glass windows that should appear soon. I’m a photographer and writer (and I love public art and writing about places) so I enjoy giving myself little assignments like this (I’m not paid by AO, this is just for fun).
Dhomas 01:04 on 2020-05-19 Permalink
That page was first indexed by Google about 15 hours ago, so it looks to be quite recent.
nau 10:23 on 2020-05-25 Permalink
If you run out of public art to cover, there’s a modest sculpture park at Douglas Hospital (in front of the main building, to your right when you approach from Lasalle Avenue). If you go now, their redbuds (a relatively rare tree here) are flowering photogenically.