Urbania looks at the community fight for 700 Jarry West, where a garage and the Murad Supermarché used to be. A developer wanted to redevelop the lot with a four-storey condo building that would bring the march of gentrification into northern Park Ex, but the community is fighting to get the lot for social housing.
Updates from August, 2021 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts
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Kate
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Kate
So, Romados is going to reopen. It seems somehow typical of Montreal that it will be Portuguese chicken made by Greek owners.
Meezly
The new owner was a former manager and says that “everything is going to stay the same.” While I’m glad to see a local business reopen, I hope this doesn’t mean they won’t improve their less than savoury business practices in the past, which is what I recall someone had commented on.
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Kate
Shots were fired Wednesday morning at an apartment building in St‑Henri (not in Verdun, as the headline says). No victims have been found.
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Kate
We have 550 new cases of Covid in Quebec on Wednesday.
I downloaded the Quebec vaccination app, VaxiCode, and entered my information. Either it wanted to scan a QR code, or it wanted to get my information direct from the government. My QR codes were in my email, so I let it go looking based on my info, and it got my QR directly and installed it.
Media say the app will be available for Android soon, before it’s required.
On an iphone, you can also get the other half of the picture, VaxiCode Verif, if you need it. Presumably that too will soon be on Android.
Update: Quebec had been planning to bring government workers back to the office (not, please, “back to work” – these people have been working the whole time) starting September, but the plan has now been delayed till October.
CE
I plan to use the paper version as I often don’t have my phone with me when I’m out and about. I hope they make a credit card sized version available as the form they send by email is a bit unwieldy (the French version is two pages and English is 1, the formatting is kinda weird).
My brother is coming to visit next week from another province. I sent in a question about what he’ll have to do on Daybreak this morning and Sean assured me that his paper proof of vaccination will be sufficient. I have a feeling there might be issues as he won’t have a QR code that they’ll be able to scan.
Mark Côté
With one week to go until school starts, the government finally announced that students will have to wear masks full time, at least in Montreal, Laval, and other populous areas. It’s a good and necessary idea, but it’s a hell of a thing that this is the third school year to be disrupted by the pandemic.
Ephraim
And the data in Ontario showed that the common source of outbreaks were asymptomatic kids bringing it home. So each outbreak, when they sent the kids home and did zoom school, cases started dropping again.
What it proves is that what we really need is excellent ventilation systems in the school. Either using HEPA filters or using superheated air technology. I mean the largest aircare units can handle a room of 600 sq ft. And just sit there, lowering the virus count in the air all damn day and by the morning, the air should be bacteria and virus free, with no filter or parts needed. We need better air for the kids in school. We built schools out of cinderblock to keep them safe in a fire… but we don’t give them safe air to breath?
DeWolf
CE, I downloaded my proof again and they’ve changed the format. It’s much more efficiently laid out and you could probably shrink it down pretty well.
mare
Does the government supply stickers or signs I can put on my front door?
“VaxiCode verification required for entry”(A couple of weeks ago we had a prospective tenant who, after me asking, answered he wasn’t vaccinated. So I refused to give him a tour of the apartment, and then he threatened to go to the Regie because I discriminated against him. Good luck with that.)
Kate
Good going, mare. Solid policy.
GC
Thanks for the tip DeWolf. I also thought the formatting was very odd, but it didn’t occur to me that they might have reformatted them by now.
ant6n
I recently got a second dose when I did the first outside Quebec. They had a line where they checked documentation and put my first dose in the Quebec system. After I got that second shot they sent me the we code thingy, showing first dose abroad.
Anybody coming in from elsewhere spending a good amount of time in Quebec could probably do the same thing, although I’m not sure what happens if you never had a ramq number here.
ant6n
(This was at the Palais)
JohnS
It’s easy for a non résident to register. You don’t need a ramq number. The system asks for your mother’s first and maiden names as a substitute identifier. I know a few nonresidents who spend time in Quebec who have done this without issue and their vaccines work fine in VaxiCode
Kevin
I finally got around to downloading the QR code last night, and there are two options. The second one is a wallet-size image.
You can also put multiple people’s info on the same phone for the app.
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Kate
A woman was stabbed Tuesday evening in an apartment in St‑Michel, allegedly by her son.
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Kate
Tuesday, CTV reported that police had found no physical evidence of a shooting near the MUHC, and the policewoman who hurt her arm was not shot, but probably got injured as she took cover.
I can’t link to that version now because the story changed again last night after the police chief announced that two officers were shot at, and one officer really was grazed by a bullet.
walkerp
Montreal’s finest at it again.
David744 00:24 on 2021-08-26 Permalink
Ah yes, the political project that rejects the redevelopment of a strip mall into a whole bunch of housing (with replacement businesses) because of a pipe dream that the government will swoop in and give a bunch of non-workers free housing. Very logical for the literature majors, very illogical for the people who marshall resources.
Instead of this goofiness, let’s do way more housing to just get us back to the massive housing surplus we had when pretty much all of us grew up, which was what made this town so cheap and which created the culture we all love so much.
Raymond Lutz 07:36 on 2021-08-26 Permalink
Very logical for MSc in Physics too. And this summer we saw how good are the people who marshall (planetary) resources,,, Wearing a suit doesn’t give you a working brain, quite the opposite: ties cut the brain blood flow.
qatzelok 08:30 on 2021-08-26 Permalink
” let’s do way more housing to just get us back to the massive housing surplus we had when pretty much all of us grew up”
Property owners love homelessness and housing crises, because these things make them rich as their properties increase in value beyond what they are really worth.
Housing as a speculative commodity… leads to misery for many people.
CE 08:41 on 2021-08-26 Permalink
Literature majors? Really? Are you going for the uncle everyone rolls their eyes at during thanksgiving dinner vibe?
Ephraim 08:41 on 2021-08-26 Permalink
Yes, let’s have less housing, so that rents can go up. Supply and demand. Less condos, less apartments, higher rents…. and more people complaining about not being able to afford housing. It’s a vicious circle, not building more housing. More density, better planning, more green space (which is why you have to build taller and LEED, so the cost of ownership goes down as well. What ever we do, we need to build more housing, or the price of apartments will never stop it’s ever higher spiral.
Kate 09:41 on 2021-08-26 Permalink
I don’t believe the community wants fewer housing units there, just housing that the people who actually live in the area can access.
David, if you had any knowledge of the area, you would know that in no sense can the existing building be called a strip mall. That alone renders your criticism nugatory.
su 10:35 on 2021-08-26 Permalink
Population growth
policies favor middle class and upper middle class professionals as required to keep GDP growth rate above 2 % ( of which realestate and housing infrastructure are a major component). Given the finite square footage and limited unbuilt space of our city these situations are to be expected. It’s the economy.
Kate 10:50 on 2021-08-26 Permalink
But we can’t all be middle and upper middle class. When I read David I hear a background wail of “Why can’t everyone have the basic decency to be white and upper middle class?” It’s related to François Legault’s idea that Quebec should only welcome immigrants capable of getting middle management jobs of $50K and upwards.
su 11:06 on 2021-08-26 Permalink
Our employers are demanding middle class professional employees whether white or not. Back in the day we had more working class jobs available such as in the textile sector. Things have changed. David knows how our system works. The same economic system is creating the same housing crisis all over the “developed” world.
Ephraim 12:01 on 2021-08-26 Permalink
@su – of course it favours the middle class and upper class, they are 70% of the population and likely the lower-middle class, who are upwardly mobile you could include in that, so maybe 80% of the population is in that group.
That is why I said we need better planning. The planning in Montreal is dreadful. We need to move to taller buildings with more green space around. We may not need as much industrial space or commercial space as we used to. But we can use the green space. So taller, more green, very little asphalt…. which means cars and bikes get stored UNDER the building, preserving green space.
The other problem is that the city doesn’t or can’t use eminent domain to reclaim areas. The area of St-Laurent between Chabanel and Cremazie is a good example. There were not enough people in the neighbourhood for the stores and too much concrete. Now… some tall apartment buildings, parking under, LEED certified. Metro station isn’t too far, at Cremazie, easy highway access… could really change the area, bring in new life and new business in that little shopping centre. But you need eminent domain to take over the few commercial areas around there, rezone and redevelop. The parcels, once rezoned, could be sold on the market for a profit, too. Use the profit to buy social housing. Or keep 10% of the plots and have someone build the social housing.
Basically, we need to find a few strips, no far from the metro and on main streets and build a tall new neighbourhood into the area. The land near the metro stations is too dear for single level housing. We need more density in the area.
Kate 14:22 on 2021-08-26 Permalink
taller buildings with more green space around
Ephraim, history shows this doesn’t work. “Projects” of that kind have risen and fallen in American and British cities because – for whatever reason – people will live in them if they have to, but they don’t like it, and projects (“estates” in UK English) soon become crime-riddled and vandalized and eventually get demolished, if you’re lucky.
It’s probably one of the top examples of plans that can look good on paper but don’t work out at all in real life.
Jonathan 14:50 on 2021-08-26 Permalink
building taller buildings with parking underneath does little to increase density and affordability. It’s more complex than that. We need just to build better and have more mixed forms. We need smart density and better building codes… ones that don’t increase the cost of building so much that nobody can afford it. See the ideas behind the book ‘Soft City’…
link here: https://www.strongtowns.org/journal/2019/10/28/david-sim-of-soft-city
This is by a guy who works with Gehl.. one of the most celebrated human-scale architects in the world.
CE 15:40 on 2021-08-26 Permalink
Is this the kind of development you’re thinking of Ephraim. I’m sure it appeals to some people but it’s not much of a neighbourhood IMO. I’ve talked to a couple people who live there and none of them had much good to say about the experience of living in these buildings.
Tim S. 15:46 on 2021-08-26 Permalink
Has anyone spent much time in the developments near the Bell campus on Nun’s Island? Wandering around a couple of times I’ve thought it had potential as a planned neighbourhood with mixed housing types, but I don’t know what it would be like 24/7
Kate 18:27 on 2021-08-26 Permalink
Tim S., I had a very small part in working on some PR material for the area you mean. To give them credit, they were hoping to create something like a neighbourhood vibe there – they had a bakery coming in, I think, one or two restaurants, a fruiterie, maybe some other small businesses, and they planned some waterside green space that included a bike path toward other parts of the island. Some of the residential spaces were in three-storey townhouse formats but most of it was highrise.
It’s funny how much I still know about it although I’ve never set foot there, and I don’t know how well it has worked out for the people living in those buildings. I wonder whether their attitudes were changed by the pandemic, and the convenience of having a few storefront businesses nearby. Did they get more use out of having businesses in proximity, or did they just drive out somewhere else? Someone should study it.
Ephraim 22:40 on 2021-08-26 Permalink
I was thinking something between parts of Jerusalem and Toronto. They built a new commercial neighbourhood in Toronto around Yonge and Sheppard, though I don’t think it’s energy efficient enough, but they put in green spaces, trees, not giant parking lots… those are hidden. But they specifically put in trees in the back areas and left more land around the buildings, not building them into 100% of the land. Singapore is building green space into the side of buildings, but that likely won’t hold up in our weather. The area around Bar Kochva in Jerusalem, has too much parking, but they have a heck of a lot of trees and space for kids. But these are also older buildings. Newer buildings in Israel are built sort of like a square donut on the bottom floor, so that there is a place for the kids to play in the shade around the building. But always with green around the building. We don’t plan for enough trees and limiting asphalt when we design. But let’s be realistic, Nun’s Island has managed a lot of green space with tall buildings, like Vistal… except even that has too much asphalt, nevermind too much grass, when it should have trees.
I’m not saying that I have a perfect solution. But let recycling, we don’t need 10K people doing it perfectly, we need 1M people doing it 90% to make a real difference. We need to get this housing near public transit, so they can rely on it, if they want to. We need to get trees and other cooling around. We need to heat and air condition the building using geo thermal. And we need the mix of professional and residential to be better done.
And as I said before, we can look at a different ways of financing affordable housing, like subsidizing rent via a REITs or participation mortgages…. For example, you buy at half price and the city/province owns 50% of the value. If you sell in under 25 years, you get your percentage minus the mortgage and the city gets their 50%. If you get to the 25 years, the house is fully transferred to you.