Montreal City Weblog

Kate 12:03 on 2021-01-21 Permalink Reply  

• Alison Cummins 12:53 on 2021-01-21 Permalink

  Wonderful news.

• qatzelok 13:28 on 2021-01-21 Permalink

  It’s not many units (263) but it’s a start to a beginning.

• Alison Cummins 13:57 on 2021-01-21 Permalink

  That averages 22 units per complex, which is probably a doable size not requiring appropriation of large tracts of land with the associated bitter arguments and bad publicity.

  The previous administrations (including the late Susan Clarke) worked hard to keep Blue Bonnets out of the hands of the poor in CDN (supposedly the late Susan Clarke’s constituents), who desperately needed replacements for the shoddy, worn-out towers they are currently occupying.

  Even now, developers are pushing to make it friendlier to car-owners, claiming to be advocating for the indigent mobility-impaired.*

  Multiple small infill lots might even be better than big projects if they are well-integrated into their neighbourhoods and completed quickly. And if this initiative is ongoing and not a one-off.

  Politics is the art of the possible; developers are less motivated to fight for each individual scrap of infill.

• su 14:11 on 2021-01-21 Permalink

  More details about this much needed program, and who will qualify. https://www.newswire.ca/news-releases/nearly-57m-for-12-affordable-housing-projects-in-montreal-879505895.html

• Alison Cummins 14:18 on 2021-01-21 Permalink

  *Yes Ephraim, transportation is very much an issue for the mobility-impaired!

  We’ve done the math for ourselves and it would be cheaper to take cabs and rent cars as needed on those occasions that we need a car. We pay the premium and keep our ‘98 Subaru because as landlords it’s convenient to be able to lug stuff around in a car that we aren’t worried about scratching up. When it eventually dies we will probably not get a new one.

  Other obstacles to accessibility in Montreal are more significant. When I lived on Gilford in the ‘90s my neighbour across the way on the third floor of a triplex was a diabetic double amputee. I don’t think he’d left his apartment in many years.

  We need better access to public transit (we’re working on it), wider sidewalks (more possible with fewer cars), ramps to businesses (more possible with wider sidewalks), modern apartment buildings integrated with small shopping malls (I believe this is a thing in newer neighbourhoods but not nearly as standard as it needs to be; addressable with thoughtful zoning).

  Uber, as evil as it may be, is making cabs more accessible to people who don’t use wheelchairs or have STM handicapped passes. Most wheelchair-users don’t have driver’s licenses.

  More private car ownership for everyone in densely-populated areas is not top of the list and even works counter to general accessibility improvements.

• Ephraim 17:53 on 2021-01-21 Permalink

  I actually think that the STM’s Transport Adapté is excellent, even if it isn’t perfect. But even Transport Adapté needs loading/unloading zones. Look at the Jewish General, on Légaré… on what is supposed to be a loading/unloading zone, the city put up 15 minute parking and Transport Adapté has to let people off in the “no stopping” zone.

• Alison Cummins 19:44 on 2021-01-21 Permalink

  Ephraim,

  Good to hear that Transport Adapté is excellent! I haven’t been keeping up. When my clients were using it, it was terrible. That was then.

  My comment was wrt the developers wanting private cars and private parking in the planned Blue Bonnets eco-community “for people with reduced mobility.”

• su 09:41 on 2021-01-22 Permalink

  Susan Clarke was councillor for the Loyola district not the Blue Bonnets district. Not sure who was councillor for Hippodrome.