Urbania has a nice interview with the granddaughter of the eponymous Pataterie Chez Philippe in Centre Sud, about to close next week.
Updates from May, 2022 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts
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Kate
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Kate
I had to check the calendar after seeing the CTV headline Montreal says au revoir to spring, thinking I’d lost six weeks somewhere. It’s just a piece on nice weather to come.
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Kate
An arrest was made Thursday of a suspect in a fatal 2020 shooting in Villeray. I’m mostly struck here by the headline of the Radio‑Canada account of this story: Le meurtrier de Frantz Louis est arrêté par le SPVM. A suspect is not usually called a killer in the media until the court verdict has come down.
MarcG
It’s already been updated to “présumé meurtrier”
Kate
Ha. I should charge for my editing services.
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Kate
Somehow we’ve all been bamboozled to believe that we can shove glass bottles, paper and plastic together into a bag and that this is mysteriously no longer trash, but recyclable, even though evidence shows it really isn’t. There are answers, but getting everyone to keep their recyclables separate from the beginning is going to be necessary – even if it’s a hard sell.
Joey
Sure, our entire recycling program is wasteful theatre, but at least overzealous boroughs can ticket people for putting their bags out half a day early…
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Kate
The city is planning to rework a section of Gouin Blvd. in Ahuntsic‑Cartierville with a sidewalk on one side and a bike path on the other, but residents say that isn’t good enough and the bike path has to go. Is a second sidewalk really needed there, or is this just generalized anger against bike paths?
In tangential news, TVA headlines this piece on roadwork difficulties Pas d’amélioration pour la circulation à Montréal. Who exactly do they think the roads are being repaired for?
Ian
There are some pretty long stretches of Gouin through that neck of the woods that have no sidewalks at all but do have a bike path. Mostly the ultra rich mansions part but hey, some of them must walk now and then even if just for the novelty of it.
qatzelok
The tacky McMansions along the Jean Bourdon zigzag are depressingly beige and artless, as opposed to the beautiful forest of Saraguay Park where the new bike link will be.
For now, only SUVs can speed through that stretch of Gouin, making the current path next to Saraguay useless for most people. And I guess that’s how some of the waterfront homeowners want it to stay.
Scorched-earth nimbyism.
Joey
I wonder if there is a formal, or perhaps informal, policy that says that every street that is being redesigned/rebuilt should have some kind of dedicated bike capacity built in (ideally, but not necessarily, separated unidirectional bike lanes on either side). These stories come up and are treated as one-offs, when really there ought to be transparent objectives for improving road safety and infrastructure that fully incorporate cycling and prioritize pedestrian and cyclist safety.
Thomas
That stretch of Gouin is a nightmare. As qatzelok notes, when cycling you get sent on a detour through some of the ugliest mansions this side of suburbia. And when you opt to remain on Gouin, as a cyclist or a pedestrian (I’ve gone on runs through there, staying in the shoulder) you don’t feel safe even for a second.
One protected bike path and one sidewalk is a perfectly fine solution, one that actually exists elsewhere on Gouin. But apparently nimbys run this town now, so…
steph
If more road only bring more car traffic, is it logical to assume that bike paths also bring bike traffic? (I hope this tongue in cheek comment doesn’t gain traction, I’m personally for more bike paths.)
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Kate
Metro reports that a city committee is promising local newspapers for every city neighbourhood, a somewhat bittersweet report for the platform whose M Local section (divided into subsections like Mercier‑Anjou, Lachine & Dorval, Pointe‑aux‑Trembles & Montréal‑Est) does something like this already. This aspect of Metro’s content deserves to be better known.
There’s a historical thread from the collapse of papers like the Monitor and the West Island Chronicle after ownership by (I think it was) Transcontinental, to the current management by Metro. And microlocal news deserves to be covered – but can it be made to pay enough? In recent years, efforts like ruemasson.com and Pamplemousse have tried and failed. People don’t want to pay to advertise on sites like that when they can reach a bigger population for free on social media.
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Kate
Joseph Facal shits all over Montreal as he says he’s glad to go live in the country. Bye bye Jos.
Joey
The feeling is more than mutual. Predictably, his second complaint about Montreal is that it’s too hard for people from the north and south shores to park.
Kevin
Ethnic nationalists hate Montreal, so that’s no surprise.
To quote the fine cashiers at H&M when they were mocking Sophie Durocher over her linguistic prejudice, “Au-revoir, Goodbye!”
https://www.journaldemontreal.com/2022/04/29/francais-quand-les-artistes-petent-leur-cocheIan
I dream of the day every JdeM reader that hates “what Montreal has become” just picks up and leaves for the country. It will be almost as refreshing as when most of the anglo angryphones split because of the referendum(s).
Michael
The main reason he hates Montreal is for the same reason they blamed losing the referendum: immigrants and anglophones.
Now he can be at peace where there is more people of his skin colour and language.
Kate
The irony there, Michael, is that Facal was born in Uruguay.
Robert H
How nice to see that Joseph Facal has found contentment in «La vraie campagne» somewhere near Saint Paradis de Nullepart. Otherwise, this is the francophone variant of the well-known angryphone rant. The former tends to be more focused on the headaches of big city life anywhere–you’ll encounter the same complaints about Toronto, New York, Paris, or London, for example–, but with the specific local flavour of language conflicts (i.e., clueless, unilingual anglos). The latter usually make a more comprehensive critique about lost glory, lamentation of halcyon days, bemoaning/gloating about longterm decline, and again language (oppressive, hysterical french-only regulations). Montrealers can have their choice of being compared unfavorably to La Capitale where well-tended beauty, order, and good governance reign, or, say, Calgary where you don’t have to be ashamed of speaking english and you can concentrate on making money and having fun. Mind you, I think I could enjoy a few days in the country lying in a hammock outside my cabine with a view of forests and lakes, my time filled with my books, music, and films, as I try to identify the various kinds of birds stopping by the feeder. But that novelty would wear off very quickly for me and back to town I’d run. I’d rather swat mosquitoes in Montreal.
@Kevin: regarding Sophie Durocher’s column, I actually think that Serge Denoncourt and Guy Nantel have legitimate gripes: a business operating in Montreal ought to be able to serve its clients en français. But I’m not about to pète ma coche about Bonjour-Hi. That’s simply hospitality, and as you implied, she was just being petty. So, right, “Au-revoir, Goodbye!”
Kevin
Robert H
I agree with you that client-facing staff should speak French. But these are low-paying, physically-demanding, whoops you’re only working 4 hours today jobs, so the pool of applicants is small.It reminds me of pre-Brexit England when I encountered many pub and wait staff who barely spoke English because they were from Poland
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Kate
A good CBC piece looks at the Airbnb crisis and why they can’t be held back in Quebec: other cities have been able to challenge Airbnb directly in court over unlicensed listings, but Quebec is protecting Airbnb by only allowing individual hosts to be challenged. Why? I think fundamentally the neoliberal CAQ are simply not interested in people who rent.
Ian
Somebody is getting fat, regular, “political contributions”. Same as it’s always been chez nous.
Lise
Not true. Donations are illegal. Airbnb helps people afford their rent
SMD
@Lise AirBnB makes rents go up and leads to displacement, as landlord evict tenants to make more money renting out homes full-time. In 2018, a full 65% of AirBnBs on offer in Montreal were full-time rentals. I can only imagine this trend has gotten worse. Source: https://comitelogementpetitepatrie.org/conference-de-presse-cest-non-a-airbnb/.
Kate
Lise, also, while Airbnb may have started out as a way to let individuals make a little cash if they were planning to be away from their apartment for a time, by now it’s mostly corporations doing the selling, not so much the little guy.
Ian
“Donations are illegal”, how quaint. I guess those plain brown envelopes stuffed with cash come from the tooth fairy.
MarcG
LOCK HER UP
Ephraim
AirBnB has been helping people avoid paying their fair share of taxes for years. The property, if rented other than by an owner should be taxed as a commercial property, pay income taxes, GST, QST and Tourism tax. Until they do… it’s simply a tax dodge. Most rentals on AirBnB now are commercial…. and often cost more than if you stayed in a hotel or a real B&B. And if you really want to know some of the games, just read the messages on reddit about hosts cancelling their rooms days before arrival because they can get a better rate from someone else… great way to ruin a vacation
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