Valérie Plante says the city should have a place at the table when decisions are made about the REM de l’Est. She also wants money from Quebec to pay for integrating the REM better into the cityscape.
Now that’s the way I want my mayor to talk to the province.
A Trinidadian man accused of a 2019 shooting has been extradited to face attempted-murder charges in Montreal. The victim endured serious consequences from the shooting, which happened a few days before Christmas 2019 in Old Montreal.
The city is promising pothole repairs in all parts of town.
The pothole on the highway are impressive too, even sites finished as recently as 2 years ago. Cote-de-Liesse has a few jaw clackers in around the circle that will easily flatten a tire.
I don’t usually pothole-spot, not being a driver, but in a short walk yesterday from my place down to Jean-Talon, I was struck by the size of the potholes at intersections, and I saw one car dragging itself along on a flat tire.
It feels like there are more potholes and that the potholes are worse, but that feeling could just be recency bias (or a bunch of other biases). I wonder if there are any statistics on potholes. Assuming things are indeed worse, it would be interesting to know what explains the deterioration – presumably some combination of climate change (more freeze-thaw cycles, I guess) and increasingly poor repairs from previous seasons.
We’ve had a number of freeze-thaw cycles this winter which always makes things worse. Last year was consistently cold and then consistently warm and there were very few potholes (I seem to recall Kate linking to some news stories about this). Previous years were pretty bad – I remember riding my bike in May 2017 and the number of potholes and cracks in the road that hadn’t yet been repaired was pretty incredible.
>I don’t usually pothole-spot, not being a driver…
You’re clearly not a cyclist either then. 🙂 We cyclists hate potholes even more than motorists do.
Do report potholes to 311, they actually fix them pretty quickly, because once they are aware of them, they become liable.
I have been a cyclist. One time, a few years ago, I was going along Milton near Park, and wanted to go up an alley there (I always chose an alley rather than a busy street if it was an option). There was a puddle between the sidewalk and the alley, which didn’t look very deep, so I cycled through it – but what I couldn’t see was that there was a narrow, deep pothole under it, which swallowed my front wheel. Came off the bike in a spectacular endo. So I know.
Metro looks into the Ukrainians of Rosemont, noting that an estimated 4% of the Canadian population is of Ukrainian ancestry.
I’d love to see a series of articles like this about all the different cultural communities in Montreal.
Mes amis, DeWolf has just done a great article on Eater about Uyghur food in Montreal. That’s an excellent way of approaching cultural life!
Seconding the applause for DeWolf’s article. A couple of decades ago, there were two Uyghur restaurants in the city: one in NDG and one here in CDN (with home delivery!). Both soon closed and I’d come to believe we were a Uyghur (food) desert. Chuffed to learn I’m wrong.
Thanks so much! I’m verklempt. It’s great to be doing Montreal stories again, just like the good old days.
carswell, I recently came across an old post of yours on Chowhound discussing Arzou Express in CDN! That was my first-ever experience of Uyghur food and it left a deep impression. My wife and I spent years chasing those flavours and it took several visits to mainland China (when we were living in Hong Kong) before we found a Uyghur restaurant that was as tasty. (Hong Kong has only one Uyghur place, run by a famous Uyghur singer, and somehow it just isn’t as good as you’d expect.)
Interesting about your needing several attempts to find an equal, DeWolf. Though I don’t have your experience of the cuisine, Arzou Express always struck me as exceptional, so it’s good to have that confirmed.
Speaking of Chowhound, just heard it’s shutting down on March 21. So a week and a half left to rescue any posts and recipes before they disappear into the ether. Apologies if the link is paywalled.
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/03/10/dining/chowhound-closing.html
Unfortunately none of the four restaurants is super accessible by public transit, especially the non-bus variety. Fortunately it looks like that will change when the Deux-Montagnes line (re)opens, as the article says Miran is located near the Bois-Franc REM station.
There is a small but decent one on Sherbrooke West just a block north of Vendome with a 24 stop a short block away. https://www.facebook.com/sammisrestaurant/photos?ref=page_internal
Sammi’s is delicious and worth checking out… but it’s Mongolian, not Uyghur! The flavours are pretty different.
As long as we’re talking about very specific ethnic food, is there any good Tibetan in Montreal? All the places I’ve been here conflate Tibetan and Nepalese … not that I dislike Nepalese, but it’s not the same thing …
I’ve known a few Tibetans and, well, it’s not a terribly exciting cuisine. Like most parts of Central Asia they do dumplings (momos), a noodle soup, flatbreads and the famous tea with butter in it. In a world where you have Mexican and Greek and Indian food – for example – it doesn’t really stand out.
The Superior Court decision in favour of Sue Montgomery will not be appealed by the Quebec Municipal Commission with comments suggesting that she no longer matters because she lost the election in November.
CTV has a new story about family members involved in suing the Canadian government, the MUHC and the Royal Victoria Hospital over alleged brainwashing experiments in the 1960s, including an account from a woman whose sister is still alive at 80 but became permanently institutionalized.
The cost of gasoline is soaring and so are thefts at the pump.
2$/L is theft at the pump.
That’s the thing – gasoline can’t stay cheap, it has to get more and more expensive to push us into other technologies, but that push is going to hurt with increased costs for food and other necessities.
We’re lucky to live in a city where it’s possible to get around by transit, foot and bike. Because anyone living in the 99% of North America that has a crippling dependency of cars is screwed.
Gas prices have been over $2/litre in Europe and Asia for years. They can manage because they have transportation alternatives. Here we’ve destroyed our public transit and let the market be overrun by gas-guzzling monster trucks that are three times the size of the cars that people should be driving.
@DeWolf all that is true, but there is a ‘chickens coming home to roost’ aspect to things. Nobody *forced* all those people to upgrade from sedans to crossovers and SUVs (though the car companies are hardly blameless, given their shift in product offerings). Anyway, it seems that gas prices soar immediately when oil spikes but they don’t come down so fast when oil prices drop, so there is an element of greed involved. When the theme of the moment is inflation, corporations that aren’t necessarily experiencing an increase in costs might still drive their prices up to ‘keep up’ and not miss out on the once-in-a-generation chance to grab some money.
I think you’re right in terms of vanity pickups. Very few people need anything like a Ford F150, even if you’re hauling equipment around, and yet that’s the best-selling car in Canada. (Not in Quebec thank god, but I was in Ontario recently and every other vehicle was a pickup.) But in terms of SUVs, I’m not sure consumers can be blamed. SUVs are vastly more profitable to car companies and they’re almost the only thing on the market now. There are virtually no small cars left.
“Because anyone living in the 99% of North America that has a crippling dependency of cars is screwed”
In Canada, half the population lives in the big metropolitan areas where there’s some transit. Even in he US, more than 1% of the population has access to transit. Just NYC has like 10Mio ppl with access to transit.
Implying that only 1% in North America have access to transit is furthering the myth of the inevitability of the automobile.
There are very compelling reasons to simply ban (or at least severely curtail) the sale of pickup trucks. As for SUVs, their meteoric rise in North America can partly be blamed on a boutique tax credit passed by George W. Bush is 2003 that gave up to $100,000 to business owners who purchased a vehicle that weighs 6,000 pounds or more when fully loaded. So policy-makers can also take some of the blame.
Ant6n, I’m not suggesting that cars are inevitable, just the opposite. Policymakers on this continent made a choice to subsidize low-density sprawl at the expense of more sustainable options. Now everyone is paying the price.
Also, access to transit does not preclude car-dependency. If transit means taking two or three times longer to get to your destination, it’s not really an option for anyone who has alternatives. That’s not making apologies for the situation, it’s simply pointing out the dysfunctional state of affairs on most of this continent. I’m not saying “transit is terrible, but this is North America and that’s just the way it is.” I’m saying it needs to be better.
That includes most of Montreal and other big cities in Canada. 4.5 million people live in Greater Montreal, but I would estimate that only a million of them live in areas where transit is good enough, and streets are walkable enough, to avoid using a car on a daily basis. It’s a problem even in areas like Lachine, which has absolutely mediocre transit service, despite being relatively dense and not that far from the city centre.
I remember living in the city last year, and both sides of my street were a long line of parked cars. And at least half of those were SUVs.
I wondered why so many people, living right there in the city, needed those.
Now I live in the suburbs, and there are may pickup trucks in addition to SUVs and other big things. When you’re walking down a street without a sidewalk, it can be hard to see around the monster trucks parked on the street to see if another monster truck is coming down the road towards you.
I have no sympathy for people who complain about the price at the gas pump. Quebec and Canada have given $13k in incentives for EVs for a number of years. Add to that the 200-300$/month in gas savings for the average SUV, and you’ve more than made your money back in terms of TCO for an EV. Plus, we have some of the cheapest electricity in the world here in Quebec. It makes no sense for EVs to still be struggling to make a dent in new vehicle sales.
At this point, we’ve seen that the carrot obviously doesn’t work. Time to move on to the stick. Make it painful to drive a gas guzzler. Gas prices are one way, but unfairly penalize people who don’t own cars, in the form of increased prices of pretty much everything that requires transportation (especially groceries). I’d say we take a page from the Nordic countries and start taxing the shit out of ICE vehicles. You want an F150 that the dealer charges $40k for? Get ready to pay another $20k in taxes. You want an EV? No tax for you! There are now EV options. We don’t need to wait until 2030 to phase out gas cars.
@dhomas agreed, though the EV manufacturers can’t even keep up with demand from five years ago, let alone today
@EmilyG, ironically it’s us city-dwellers who drool over big crossovers and SUVs with all-wheel drive. The suburban dude with the garage/tempo doesn’t actually need AWD to get his car out in the morning; shovelling out your small EV after a snow dump on the other hand…
>>> from @DeWolf “Also, access to transit does not preclude car-dependency. If transit means taking two or three times longer to get to your destination”
I live exactly 1 km from a metro station, and my office is next to one.
Right now my commute in a vehicle is 12-15 minutes. It’s a minimum of 45 minutes via transit.
At this point in my life, I am willing to pay the extra costs for a vehicle in order to get more time in my day to be at home.
As for the SUV/pickup trucks — blame fleet fuel efficiency regulations set by the US (CAFE standards) which are duplicated by Canada.
“gasoline can’t stay cheap, it has to get more and more expensive to push us into other technologies”
The other technologies are already there but on which energy will they run on?
Fossil Fuels are an energy source and the alternatives (renewable energy, RE) are poor substitutes for FF. The best choice we had 30 yrs ago was solar (thermal + PV), but It’s now too late for PV (we won’t manufacture them fast enough before climate induced global famine and/or conventional peak oil disruption).
Let’s not forget the dominance of trucking over rail over the last 40 years – there’s a reason we get raspberries in February, and it’s trucking.
The price of EVERYTHING goes up when gas prices are high. Soy milk snack packs for my kid’s lunch went from $2.99 to $3.99 this week. Grocery costs affect me way more than having to party like it’s $1.99.9 at the pump, with my compact car with great mileage.
I drive to Ste Anne from Mil End 4 days a week, and that’s about one tank of gas for me, about 35 litres. It’s not a major expense if the cost of gas doubles, Groceries though? We all feel that.
Unless trucking goes electric or we go back to rail delivery of food gas prices are very much going to affect food prices along with everything else in the transport chain including all consumer goods.
Chinatown is getting a REM station at René-Lévesque which it doesn’t want, and which will use that empty lot they had better ideas for. The area already has a metro station, says spokesman Winston Chan, so why does it need this monstrosity as well?
It would be nice to know whether it’s actually true that Chinatown doesn’t want the REM station, but we don’t know because the CBC reporter only interviewed one activist and no residents or business owners.
How is this not utter nimby nonsense?
I feel like we’ve lost the plot in terms of the REM de l’Est. The most vociferous criticism has been aesthetic instead of focusing on the way it upends regional transport planning (see the ARTM report) or the CDPQ’s shady financing arrangements. When your main complaint is that you don’t want a new mass transit line in your neighbourhood because it will be ugly, you become very easy to dismiss as a NIMBY.
Chan had a relevant comment that Chinatown is well served by the metro already and doesn’t need a REM station too. That nice lot at the corner could – as he says – be used for a building, but it could also be kept as an outdoor garden to the benefit of local restaurants and shops, an area to make Chinatown more appealing in summertime. The REM will cut right across the view of the arch there, too. Observing these things is not merely NIMBY.
@Kate who exactly is going to build restaurants and shops there? How long should we wait for this person to come along? Why wouldn’t we want to make Chinatown more accessible as a destination by integrating it into the new REM (leaving aside the issues with the REM DeWolf raises)? The options are not REM station or grocery store/restaurant/social housing. They are REM station or vacant lot.
That lot has been used as a convivial gathering place in summertime for two years now. DeWolf, I was pretty sure I’d seen photos you took when they had lanterns and picnic tables out there.
The metro may serve the area well, but anyone taking the REM from the east may want to debark in that area instead of being forced further downtown.
I’m sure I’m not the only person who’s rode a bus that drives right PAST where you need to go, because the bus stop is 200m further up the street. That helpless feeling as you gaze out the bus window #FirstWorldProblems
@DeWolf agreed.
Also, “already served” is a stupid argument. If u build a new transit line that connects outlying areas with downtown, of course u need downtown stops. It’s the destination.
It’s pretty ugly though, and a couple hundred meters west there will be a giant ramp blocking north-south travel for hundreds of meters.
I agree, Ant6n, especially about “there’s already a metro station nearby.” Downtown needs at least a few more metro lines. Two is not enough.
Also about the tunnel portal – it will be an actual, literal barrier to movement, unlike the elevated guideway which can you easily pass underneath. To me, the tunnel makes everything worse, because it adds costs and cuts off north-south access without actually solving any of the concerns related to the impact of the elevated section.
Kate, the vacant lot has indeed been used for some very nice activities and I think that’s how it should always be. But the REM’s own renderings show it being preserved as a plaza. The actual station would be on top of René-Lévesque. In any case, it’s all window dressing, because the real problem here is that the REM is promising nice public spaces that the city would have to pay for and build, and there has been no funding commitment from the province. The empty lot in question isn’t even owned by the city or the CDPQ. It would have to be purchased or expropriated. That’s an example of where I think the criticism is missing the point. Winston Chan is putting the cart ahead of the horse.
I’m also not sure how the REM line would box in Chinatown any more than the eight lanes of traffic on René-Lévesque. If anything, removing half the traffic lanes would reduce the impact of the street and make for a more fluid transition from Chinatown to the north.
Downtown needs at least a few more metro lines. Two is not enough.
DeWolf, where would they go? I’ve always thought the parallel sections of the green and orange lines were quite enough for the downtown core.
I think the pink line was a great idea, with its diagonal axis connecting downtown with the eastern Plateau, Rosemont, St-Michel and Montreal North. And ideally there would be a metro line up Bleury/Park Avenue creating a north-south alternative to the orange line, while also linking the Old Port with neighbourhoods that don’t have any rapid transit, like Mile End, Marché Central and all the densely populated areas that flank the Laurentian autoroute.
Ah, the Pink Line. Such a sensible idea.
I suspect it failed as a concept purely because it would have gone to dense parts of the city where people already live, ergo few real estate opportunities.
Coming back to the REM, I wish they’d just agree to build the whole downtown section underground so it can behave like a subway line, and have it emerge much further East where the portal won’t be so disruptive. I wish we could all see the feasibility study they supposedly carried out on this issue.
The biggest problem with the metro lines is that since they got extended to Laval the west orange line is basically useless to anyone who lives in the centre of town. That was a serious failure in planning right out of the gate.
It feels like all the transit plans since have ignored that core error in planning, and none of the new plans take it into consideration… it used to be a real pleasure to take the metro to work on the orange line but after the Laval lines were brought in it has been utter misery, especially morning rush hour.
A classic Montreal March snowstorm is expected this weekend.
A man was shot near Place Versailles overnight and died in hospital. No arrests and no further details yet. It’s the 4th homicide of the year.
Minor update: TVA says police are at a loss why this man, Mehdi Douraid, with no known criminal antecedents, was gunned down in the street.
Spi 21:18 on 2022-03-10 Permalink
Essentially begging like every other mayor that came before?
Ian 23:07 on 2022-03-10 Permalink
News flash: the province doesn’t care what the mayor of Montreal thinks. The province hates Montreal’s culture and just sees the city as a source of revenue.
Will the REM de l’Est fuck up the urban landscape? Will it solve any real transit problems?
They don’t care.
What matters is that money is being spent.
Economy Economy Economy , as is the case with all conservatives. Culture is just a dogwhistle.
Daniel D 12:17 on 2022-03-11 Permalink
You said it Ian.
It’s gotten me wondering; Does Toronto benefit from being the capital of Ontario as well as its largest city? Would Montreal fare better if it were the capital instead of Quebec City?
Meezly 13:02 on 2022-03-11 Permalink
English-speaking organizations that support racialized communities should also have a place at the table when both the Quebec government and the city for disproportionately favour organizations that serve French-speaking communities by allocating the majority of crime prevention funds to Montreal East.
This may seem besides the point, but it’s really about power. And the province shouldn’t have so much of it. Those with less power will always be fighting for a place at the table, let alone what scraps they can get.
Kate 13:33 on 2022-03-11 Permalink
Meezly, was this comment intended for a different post?
Meezly 14:28 on 2022-03-11 Permalink
Not really, just making irrelevant connections as usual that don’t help to make my point. Though I do see now that you posted something about that funding.
Kate 16:32 on 2022-03-11 Permalink
That’s why I thought you were commenting on that issue.
ant6n 09:59 on 2022-03-13 Permalink
Well, the CAQ also cares about the votes in a couple of East end ridings where they figure ane expensive gift project may get them a couple of on-island ridings.