A 15-year-old was stabbed in Rosemont on Thursday afternoon. TVA says it was a scrap among teenagers but neither account mentions an arrest.
Updates from April, 2022 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts
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Kate
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Kate
STM ridership dropped 3.6% between 2020 and 2021: numbers were rising in 2021 before Omicron hit. The rest of this piece outines that the STM is not doing badly otherwise.
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Kate
Valérie Plante has a wish list for the federal budget: land for parks, social housing, firearm controls, and help in reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
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Kate
Sébastien Simon, who killed 17-year-old Brigitte Serre in 2006, has been granted escorted day trips from prison. Simon stabbed Serre 72 times during a gas station robbery. It’s not mentioned here, but previous items on Simon have mentioned that he got married while in prison and has been allowed conjugal visits.
JaneyB
You’ve got to wonder. This is his third relationship while in prison and the latest lucky lady has two daughters. So messed up.
Kate
JaneyB, where did you see that it’s his third relationship while in prison? I missed that detail.
JaneyB
@Kate – Opening line of the second link: “Il s’agit de sa troisième relation amoureuse depuis son emprisonnement, en 2006”. How is this possible, ughh.
Kate
I missed seeing that. I don’t know how it’s possible. Can prisoners access dating sites?
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Kate
I can’t summarize this story better than Fagstein does here: “The SQ ordered a report on the Metropolis election night shooting, dictated its conclusions in advance, had the person in charge evaluate his own unit, and then tried to hide the report for years.” And now details are coming out.
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Kate
François Legault says Covid is just a cold, pretty much – although experts beg to differ.
But look what he’s achieved here. One, he’s a superman for whom Covid is just a passing indisposition. Two, by implication, anyone who suffers worse symptoms than him is weak, and it is probably their fault.
MarcG
Our very own Jair Bolsonaro. What a pack of dangerous idiots these politicians are.
Kate
Thursday’s tally: 42 new hospitalizations, 28 more deaths.
Joey
The ‘net hospitalizations’ number you posted (+42) masks the uptake in recent days: last Thursday, there were 151 new hospitalizations, meaning 151 people were admitted to the hospital with COVID. Since 113 were discharged, the net figure was 38. So it would appear that hospitalizations only grew by +4 in a week. Except that today’s figures show that 221 new hospitalizations (226 yesterday, 219 on Tuesday). The net figure takes a while to adjust to the latest trend – the new hospitalizations figure shows a 46% increase in a week’s time. Fortunately, those people just have a cold.
mare
And fortunately, only a very small percentage (say 10*) of healthcare workers are at home with that cold. (I’m sure a lot of them are actually happy to get a break, but at the same time feel guilty their colleagues have an even higher workload.)
The positivity rate is a whopping 19.2 %, and a lot of those PCR tests are mandatory—healthcare workers get tested twice a week—not people who decide to get tested because they have symptoms.
Blork
So 28 people died of a cold in Quebec yesterday. Right.
Those rapid tests are not very accurate, BTW. It seems like almost everyone I know has come down with COVID in the past few weeks, and most didn’t test positive until their illness was well under way. One specific case out of many: I know a woman whose boyfriend got quite sick and then tested positive. They had spent a lot of time together recently. A few days pass and then she started getting symptoms. She’s sick like with a bad flu now, and has been for four days. She’s testing daily and only today (day four) did it report “positive.”
I’ve seen some reports that the failure of rapid tests might be due to how people are using them. So tests of the tests might show they’re fairly accurate, but in real-world use maybe not so much.
qatzelok
“So 28 people died of a cold in Quebec yesterday. Right.”
Quebec has a large percentage of seniors; and for many of them, a cold can be life-threatening.
Joey
@Blork there was a story in La Presse yesterday indicating that we will likely be soon instructed to swab our mouths in addition to our noses when conducting rapid tests:
« Un comité d’experts dont je fais partie a décidé de recommander l’usage simultané de la bouche et des narines pour les tests rapides », explique Cédric Yansouni, spécialiste des diagnostics de maladies infectieuses au Centre universitaire de santé McGill (CUSM). « On savait depuis longtemps que le virus n’apparaît pas au même moment dans la bouche et les narines. La bouche vient en premier, mais on faisait le test dans la narine parce que la charge virale y est plus grande. Mais avec l’Omicron, l’intervalle est plus long. Il peut y avoir un ou deux jours de symptômes sans que le virus soit très présent dans les narines. »
Apparently adding a mouth swab reduces false negatives from 22% to 5%. So it’s not that the tests aren’t acccurate, it’s that the instructions haven’t kept up with the relative sensitivity of Omicron detection. That said, the first time I did a rapid test I was surprised that the instructions weren’t clearer – the steps are different depending on whether you have a nasal swab or a nasorpharyngial swab and there’s nothing written explaining what your kit contains (some googling led me to conclude it was the latter). Anyway, a couple of videos from other jurisdcitions’ public health departments were helpful, but it was obvious that not everyone is administring the same tests in the same way. Who knows wow error-proof these things are?
CE
I just got over a Covid infection and if it’s “just a cold” I never want to get a cold again. I was the sickest I’d been in decades! I can’t imagine what it’s like for the people who end up in hospital.
Meezly
I’m no medical expert, but last I checked, a cold didn’t require periodic vaccinations to mitigate its more serious symptoms in the general public.
Tee Owe
Debated with myself whether to join in here but my inbuilt pedantry won out – many people, and I know some of them, have had mild Covid, indeed just like a common cold – not to deny the Jair Bolsonaro authorito-personalities but to say, it does happen. Had it myself and I would agree with CE, was more my experience – technically ‘mild’ and I have recovered, but definitely not a common cold. Still, people’s experience varies.
As regards antigen tests, the routine I followed was throat followed by nose (your choice to do the opposite ha ha) and I had a clear positive before symptoms (PCR confirmed) with a clear negative after the acute symptoms were over, about 8 days later. So I agree with Blork and Joey, the reliability of these tests has a lot to do with the sampling, not the test itself – omicron is more throaty, if you only sample the nose you can miss it.Tee Owe
Should have added ‘ people’s experience varies’ but they shouldn’t impose their experience on others
Kate
Tee Owe, and they really should not when they’re leading a province with the highest Covid counts per capita in Canada, thousands of deaths, and messes like CHSLD Herron to their government’s account.
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Kate
CTV has the video of what the REM is supposed to look like on René-Lévesque downtown, with piano accompaniment.
So Quebec City is getting a street-level tram, finally – and we’re getting shafted with this?
Thomas
We’re getting a grade-separated, automated, regional light metro system. Which is not the same thing as a street-level tram. The Vancouver SkyTrain is not the same thing as the Toronto Streetcar; both are good and both serve completely different needs and use cases.
MarcG
I love how the CTV website looks like it’s from 1999 and the links are all janky. Here’s a direct one to the REM video: https://montreal.ctvnews.ca/video?clipId=2417541&binId=1.1332485&playlistPageNum=1.
MarcG
Will the structure actually be metallic white like that or will it be brutal grey concrete?
Daniel D
I notice it’s rendered with “midday sun” so the shadows are seen to be cast under the elevated structure.
We see a lot of artists’ renderings of these kinds of projects. Do they always come out looking like the idealised version they’re trying to sell?
(I have to confess, I do like the lookout above the tunnel portal though!)
Kevin
Can you spot the power lines in that illustration?
dwgs
Can you see the ugly fencing / barrier at the end of the belvedere to stop people from jumping / throwing crap on the tracks?
MarcG
In certain segments it seems to cast no shadow whatsoever – very deceptive. Regarding the inevitable fencing/barrier on the belvedere, do you think there is another real design hidden somewhere that includes it or are the people designing this thing out of touch with reality?
Dave
A tram isn’t suitable for this project. The REM is meant to bring people from suburbs to downtown quickly, which means it needs to be grade separated (separated from traffic). A tram would be less frequent, have less capacity, and be less reliable due to interaction with traffic.
mare
I think René-Leveque is one of the most terrible and ugly streets in Montreal, so whatever they do is an instant improvement. In reality however, especially in the winter, it is going to look very different, as it always does with these inspirational videos.
A new public square in Chinatown. Has CDPQInfra (or it’s real estate sister branch) already bought that empty lot? I bet the city has to expropriate it, and gosh, now it has suddenly gone up in value.
There is so much loss of parking and driving space, there’s no way this is going to look like that. RL is a highway at the moment with more-or-less 7 or 8 lanes. No way they’re going to bring that down to 4 lanes, one of them even suggested being a buslane. And then the situation sneakily changes halfway the video in 6 lanes, without any traffic lights at intersections.
All that gained space, and still bi-directional bike paths? I bet the city is on the hook for all the ground level infrastructure changes.
carswell
Amazing that CDPQinfra have discovered a way to keep all that concrete free of graffiti and to maintain huge swaths of lawn and meadow in such perfect condition (maybe they can give some tips to the parks department). Does anyone think for a second that people are going to want to work out in an open-air gym next to a major thoroughfare and under a dirty, noisy elevated railway, let alone do yoga? Such PR BS.
@Kate Your link goes to another video now.
Heading back to bed. F**k COVID and f**k the CDPQ.
GC
I was around Cremazie, where it does under the 40, last weekend. I fear the reality will look more like that than what’s in the video.
The lack of shadows in that video really stands out. There’s maybe one point near the end that the elevated part casts a shadow over the ground but, before that, it’s all lush meadows growing underneath. And people sitting on benches with the trains running overhead and cars jammed up on one side?
Kate
carswell, I fixed the link, thanks – used MarcG’s link.
DeWolf
I realize everyone is just venting their spleen here, and now that the CDPQ has officially paused the project, the REM de l’Est is unlikely to be realized in its current form. But once again I feel the need to point out that an automated electric train is not the same as thousands of diesel-spewing trucks. And a nine-metre-tall, two-track structure is not the same as a six-lane highway that is only six metres off the ground. The scale is completely different and the level of noise and pollution wouldn’t even be comparable.
Also, there are countless examples of the space underneath elevated railways being put to good use. Paris has markets and plazas underneath its elevated metro lines. Toronto has managed to create a delightful park called the Bentway that is directly underneath the Gardiner, which is definitely a noisy, overbearing highway. Right here in Montreal, there are very pleasant gathering spaces underneath the Notre-Dame viaduct and the Van Horne viaduct. I’ve been to music festivals underneath the latter viaduct and they’re fantastic. The REM de l’Est is a deeply flawed project, but the elevated structures are far from the worst things about it. Any comparison to the Metropolitan expressway is disingenuous at best.
I’m not defending the REM de l’Est in particular – the examples I gave are all spaces that have been retrofitted around an existing structure. But I think there’s an awful lack of imagination on display here. Not all elevated structures are the same, and there are many, many examples of interesting and well-used public spaces underneath and around elevated structures.
JaneyB
@MarcG. It won’t be metallic white or brutal grey. It will be graffitied with tags for blocks.
OTOH, if they do a mural festival all along it…I could be OK with that. That would be very Montreal and probably improve R-L.DeWolf
Just to belabour my point, this is the Metropolitan. It’s a beast:
https://goo.gl/maps/FxV7xrDfAk46aHYv9
The REM would be more like one of these structures. Again, I’m not trying to justify it, I’m trying to make the point that the elevated structure is not the worst thing about this project.
Paris metro – https://goo.gl/maps/Uq3CEkdXxmtriEv7A
Vancouver SkyTrain – https://goo.gl/maps/M7bXQ2SX2WunBvLMA
London DLR – https://goo.gl/maps/7zR44keXJGNMjoNX6
Notre-Dame viaduct – https://goo.gl/maps/s8u2BhXExsJQSDPH6Ephraim
Can someone redo the video with the tagging, please. Because if it’s white like that, it’s just an invite for tagging.
And those poor people living on the floors at the same level as the REM… woosh, a lovely train goes right by what used to be your streetview.
Tim S.
Along with Dewolf’s point, I once spent a day walking a path beside the suburban section of the Skytrain, and while it wasn’t super picturesque, it was reasonably pleasant. Of course this was without a 4/6 land road next to it.
Kevin
Here’s the REM in Kirkland. Not tagged, but not that pretty.
https://www.google.com.hk/maps/@45.4548662,-73.8515736,3a,75y,279.2h,101.1t/data=!3m9!1e1!3m7!1s6Xco4sDkr8jBAwqjFCAPmw!2e0!7i16384!8i8192!9m2!1b1!2i40CE
Why is it elevated along the highway where there are no obstructions at ground level?
James
@CE. There are lots of obstructions in this sector: multiple crossing roads. Only right after the Hwy 40 exit to Ch. Sainte-Marie there is 1000m without obstruction before arriving at the Saint-Anne-de-Bellevue station area. I suppose it was simpler and less intrusive to stay with the elevated structure. The structure is very close to the ground in this area.
Ephraim
Much of the downtown Skytrain in YVR is underground. And when it is above ground, it’s generally along ancillary streets. This is not comparable to having it run along Rene-Levesque at all.
The London DLR again isn’t downtown and was built as part of the redevelopment. It weaves in and out and is also underground in many areas. Imagine that they built an entire building between Complexe Desjardins and Guy Favreau that included the station flowing through the building, but no car lanes.
And in fact, they have a chance at doing some of that at the far end of downtown, before everything is finished. In fact, it could possibly make that part of it better. Once it is passed Wolfe, they could have worked with the company that bought Radio Canada and build a station within the area on it’s way down to the train tracks and/or replace the far side of Wolfe with the REM and build a station into the redevelopment of the Molson property, so right between the Aut-136 and then down to the train tracks, well before Parthenais.
Kevin
@CE
If you go a little bit further west on my link you can see the St. Charles overpasses. It’s daunting.DeWolf
Ephraim, I’m making an academic point that elevated railways aren’t the end of the world and they can be easily adapted to create interesting urban spaces. I agree that the REM de l’Est should run underground along René-Lévesque, albeit with a surface-level revamp so we no longer have an eight-lane highway bisecting our downtown. I’m less moved by the argument against the elevated guideway along Notre-Dame East because it will essentially be like the SkyTrain sections in Burnaby, which run through a green corridor. It’s hardly a blight because people are flocking to live right next to the tracks.
Ian
Worth noting that final station is just before the Morgan exit off the 40. Still a good half hour bus ride to Ste Anne. The only point of having that station there is specifically to allow Broccolini and other developers to build a ton of new developments right next to the ostensibly preserved marshlands. Also worth noting the 40 is part of the Trans-Canada highway, building a swooping concrete EL isn’t going to make it go away. There’s a reason we get raspberries in February at the grocery store, and the REM isn’t it.
Everyone’s talking about how the REM will prevent exurb sprawl but that’s utterly false, at least west of Dorval. The main point of the REM is not to solve current transit issues, but to create opportunities for profit. Anyone who thinks it won’t be the same if they are allowed to extend into the east end is dreaming in technicolor.
Uatu
It’s the same on the south shore. The rem ends at the Solar condo city smack in the middle of nowhere Brossard. If it they wanted to stop sprawl the rem would’ve run the length of taschereau Blvd and limited high density condo developments to that area
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