Taras Grescoe, who has experienced a lot of public transit systems around the world, reviews the SRB Pie‑IX.
Updates from May, 2023 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts
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Kate
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Kate
The World Health Organization has declared the Covid emergency over. The initial declaration of emergency was made on January 20, 2020, and the pandemic has killed more than 52,000 Canadians. But experts are emphasizing that Covid remains a threat to health globally and in Canada.
Blork
Important to emphasize that it’s the EMERGENCY that’s over, not COVID.
MarcG
Yeah the messaging is horrible. In the same breath they say “An estimated 1 in 10 infections results in post #COVID19 condition, suggesting that hundreds of millions of people will need longer-term care” and “The worst thing any country could do now is to use this news as a reason to let down its guard, to dismantle the systems it has built, or to send the message to its people that #COVID19 is nothing to worry about”.
jeather
Countries don’t need to use this news to let down their guard, as they’ve already done it.
Chris
Important to emphasize that COVID will never be over.
jeather, if you were king/queen, what would you do different today? Still have everyone locked in their basements and masking if they deign to venture outside? No one wants to live like that. 90% of us took our vaccines, now life goes on.
jeather
Yes I would have some masking rules (health care settings, public transit, perhaps employees at some care homes or rehab, I’m speaking off the cuff here and haven’t thought through the exact locations I would require it), I would probably still have vaccine mandates for some places but perhaps not, I would allow employers and businesses to mandate either or both.
MarcG
I love how Chris our resident enlightened centrist is suddenly incapable of finding a middle ground between everyone in prison and pretending it isn’t happening. (For anyone interested, here are all the oh-so-difficult things that scientists have been suggesting we do.)
Chris
MarcG, I’ll ignore your snark, but please consider applying the most charitable interpretation rule in the future. I was literally asking jeather if that’s what she was advocating. I was not advocating it. / Thanks for your straightforward answer jeather!
MarcG
Chris you were clearly advocating that we continue to do nothing.
nau
Chris, people who start sentences with “Still have everyone locked in their basements” aren’t generally going to find that other people think they’re engaging in the sort of calm, reasoned discourse in which one applies the principle of interpreting the statements of ones interlocutors in the most generous manner possible. Respect is a two-way street.
Kevin
If you’re sick, wear a mask and stay at home. Nobody wants your germs, and not everyone can afford to be exposed to you.
Tim S.
At the beginning of the pandemic I figured that it would just become the permanent norm that we make an effort not infect each other with anything. I’m happy that to some extent people are doing a better job of staying home when sick and wearing masks, but more would be nice. I also thought the hand-washing and sanitizing trend was generally a good one (with the nicer sanitizers, at least) and it faded quite quickly.
Kate
Tim S., I think the hand sanitizing thing faded when it was understood that Covid is transmitted by respiratory droplets, not by surfaces. People went on sanitizing as a gesture for a little while but it was never going to stick.
I imagine that sanitizing would reduce the transmission of norovirus and other nasties, but they were always already around.
I have to admit, that when I’ve gone out to shop, especially directly from home when I’ve had a wash and brush‑up before going out, I’ve usually made a pantomime of hand sanitizing because a) I know it isn’t needed and b) some hand sanitizer has a cloying smell I hate having on my hands.
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Kate
The city is giving $8 million to 126 festivals to support the free events offered to the public. Thirty new events will get funding but so will some of the major ones.
jaddle
I’m curious about the other 100+ festivals not mentioned in either article. Is there a list somewhere on a city web page showing where this money is going?
Kate
I’m not aware of any such list. But this one is more or less official.
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Kate
The Palais des congrès had a record year last year, with 300 events bringing in nearly half a billion dollars.
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Kate
Weekend activities from Metro, CityCrunch, CultMTL, Sarah’s Weekend List.
We’re expecting sunny weather all weekend, and for seven days after that.
Here are the road closures of the weekend.
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Kate
Lizzo cancelled her Bell Centre show Thursday night at the last minute, leaving a lot of people disappointed.
Update: Show to go on on June 11.
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Kate
At a sentencing hearing this week, a road racer who killed a taxi driver when he burned through a red light on a November 2020 evening blamed the empty pandemic streets for his temptation to speed. Ilias El Azali will be sentenced next month.
Tim S.
1) in a street race scenario, I don’t see why both drivers aren’t charged. It’s pure chance that 1 driver made actual contact, but both were driving recklessly. El Azali clearly knows who the other guy is, it’s unacceptable that he’s not arrested and charged.
2) El Azali had already had his licence suspended for driving 90km/h over the limit, yet the defence claims he is a low-risk to re-offend?
3) I leave it to people more up on the latest ideas about rehabilitation to comment on the appropriate length of a prison sentence, but even the prosecution is only calling for a 7 year suspension of his licence? If you go into a driving test and drive 50 km over the limit through a red light you don’t get a licence, so why are we so reluctant to take one away from people who do that in real life?
Kate
The story is certainly unsatisfactory about the identity and fate of the other racer.
jeather
I’m not sure if they could prove who the other driver was? I don’t really know what kind of other videos are around. I watched that one and holy shit, the taxi was really smashed. (Other articles suggest that Jones-Bynoe was thrown from the car, which presses me to remind everyone to wear a seatbelt in a taxi.)
I can’t see a SECOND huge speeding offense, plus a fatal hit and run, followed by lying to the police that his car was stolen, being a particularly sympathetic defendant. He did plead guilty which probably reduced some of the sentencing, but I also think 7 years is startlingly low to lose his license.
Blork
I echo Tim S’s concerns.
Also; not only were they racing, he ran a red light at more than double the speed limit. The level of recklessness there is mind-boggling. Given that he has a history of speeding, this should lead to a lifetime ban on driving.
Also: HE FLED THE SCENE and claimed his car was stolen. That’s a whole crime in itself. Is there a separate trial for that, or are they just shrugging that one off?
Also: it’s one thing to talk about the pandemic and empty streets, and being goaded by someone to race, etc. as part of your process of reconciling with what you did and as a way of taking responsibility. But I’m not convinced that’s what’s happening here. It sounds like he just cannot fully accept responsibility. But that’s based on me reading this one article so probably not fair.
Meezly
Reminds me of a case in Vancouver several years ago where a speeding driver (140 km/h in a 50 km/h zone) sped through an intersection and slammed into a car killing a beloved doctor who had close ties with the community and his family.
It took three different courts, provincial appeals, and then the Supreme Court of Canada to finally convict the killer with an 18-month jail sentence and being banned from driving for only 5 years.
Let’s hope the sentencing will be appropriate for that road racer, but I won’t be terribly surprised if they go easy on him. I don’t know why the justice system generally tends to go light on drivers who speed and kill.
Kate
I think it’s felt that depriving people of permission to drive is cruel and unusual punishment because it limits how and where they can work, besides the social embarrassment of not being allowed to drive.
I’m not saying it’s fair. Taking someone’s life with your vehicle needs to have serious consequences.
Blork
Well… I agree that taking someone’s life with your vehicle needs to have serious consequences, but there’s a wide range of things that can cause fatal accidents to happen. For example, sometimes it’s just a miscalculation, or a moment of carelessness. Contrast that with wonton disregard for anyone’s safety by speeding excessively on city streets and blowing through red lights, along with a proven history of such recklessness. I can see some wiggle room on those first two things, but not the third.
Kevin
I generally believe in rehabilitation, but not when to comes to driving infractions. I’d be quite content to see dangerous drivers subject to the lash or a stint in the pilory.
Driving is *serious*. Treat it as such.
Meezly
I think that the punishment is heavier if you use a gun unlawfully. And a vehicle is very much a weapon if someone abuses that privilege when they were issued a license to drive.
One can change their life around not being able to drive, ie. take public transit, bike, carpool, even move closer to work. A small price to pay for taking someone’s life away.
vasi 23:30 on 2023-05-05 Permalink
Thanks for finding this, Kate!
DeWolf 11:52 on 2023-05-06 Permalink
Surprisingly optimistic! I suppose the bulk of what makes it BRT is there, but there definitely needs to be improved frequency and prepayment at the stations instead of on the bus.
shawn 20:12 on 2023-05-06 Permalink
On Mastodon, user @MelMScow@mas.to in the Point gives thumbs down to the REM, which they is LOUD:
“Montrealers: Is anyone else hearing the testing of the new REM? We’re in Point St Charles, and they were testing extensively yesterday. So loud! A rushing noise like air being drawn back into a vacuum in the aftermath of an explosion… It fundamentally changes the soundscape of the neighbourhood. And to add insult to injury, we don’t even get a local stop!”
Orr 10:23 on 2023-05-07 Permalink
This completely redesigned and rebuilt street could have been designed with an active corridor/bike lane in each direction, but well, you know Montreal’s priorities under Coderre when this design was approved.
Ian 21:04 on 2023-05-07 Permalink
Coderre hasn’t been in power for a long time. It is ridiculous to blame him for current traffic woes. We know bike paths can be installed pretty much whenever.
Kate 14:06 on 2023-05-08 Permalink
That’s true, but the SRB Pie-IX project is one of a kind. It took a very long time to build and I don’t think the addition of two bike lanes part way through the project would’ve been possible.