It should not surprise us that hot weather is coming because summer is coming – should it?
Updates from May, 2023 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts
-
Kate
-
Kate
A group that speaks for the disabled says the city doesn’t offer enough parking spaces for the handicapped. There are 221 spaces now, and the group says there should be at least 1000.
Daniel
I don’t know what the number is, but I can state as the new owner of a disability and of a parking placard: It’s piss poor. I’m betting it helps more in the suburbs; here on the Plateau or in Rosemont for instance, it doesn’t do much good.
Yes, I know there is the notion that I can use the placard to park in resident parking or otherwise restricted areas; the city has assured me in writing that this is not the case. (Whether I do it anyway is a different question.)
New York City — not a place known for ample street parking — affords almost unbelievable leeway to holders of handicapped permits! (They’ll let you park in a plow zone, for instance! They’ll let you park in paid parking for free!) Quebec City also affords more flexibility for holders of placards.
I don’t expect miracles. But I have written to my elected officials on this subject. I know cars and parking are fraught topics, but we really need to do a lot better on this count.
shawn
There’s a handicapped car owner who must live near me in Mile End and they have fashioned a big home made placard for the rear window telling the agent to look at their sticker in the front. They’ve been hit with undeserved tickets before I suppose.
Ephraim
I’ve been saying this for a while. And in the case of where someone is in the car and the city tells the Green Onions to not be confrontational, they should just tell them to take a photo of plate, the front window, then a video of the spot, the sign, the front window and the plate and then write the ticket and have it sent. It’s not a loading zone or a stopping zone, it’s needed by those with a handicap.
And a handicap can be completely invisible. Don’t challenge someone. If they have the placard, they have the right. Let the cops worry about checking them. Many people who have them will avoid using them if they don’t need them, to let someone who needs it more to use it.
The worst assholes (forget my language) are rich people who park their cars in handicap spaces. They don’t care about the ticket… but the pain that someone may have to be, for going those extra 20 metres, is certainly not covered by the $300 ticket
Ephraim
The city will cancel them instantly. But a pain.
thomas
Is it against the law to tow vehicles displaying a handicap sticker in Quebec? Such an action is illegal in Ontario.
Daniel
Also, thanks for posting this, Kate. Every so often it’s good to see who’s agitating for causes that I value and sometimes it comes out in stories like this. One of your posts a while back helped lead me to a group that advocates for asylum-seekers, too.
Ephraim
I know that in Toronto/Quebec City, you don’t have to pay the meter. They have a much wider basis of places that they can park, except snow routes, emergency routes, no stopping, no standing, taxi stands, hydrants, etc. But can can park in No Parking zones or exceed the parking limit. And yet Montreal has meters for these? You can also park in any Reservé zone for up to 1 hour.
When I had a permit, I parked in a zone “debarcadare” on Jeanne Mance next to the Westin in Old Montreal. They come out of the hotel yelling at me. The permit in the window. telling me that the hotel OWNS that spot. I told him that he is welcome to call the cops. That’s the point of the zone… idiot… so I can let someone in/out of the car, especially because they are handicapped and it takes longer
Oh… the absolute worst one that I have encountered in Montreal… on Legaré, in front of the side entrance to the Jewish General Hospital. The parking is 15 minutes debarcadare with a no stopping bus zone for transport adapte. And people just PARK. Transport adapte comes and there is no way for them to let people on/off the bus. They need to park and help people get their wheelchairs and walkers off the bus. It’s a special bus! And there are people PARKED there. (Taxis can use it if they are being used as Transport Adapte)
-
Kate
The ambitious enlargement of the Musée d’art contemporain has halted for lack of funds, while scaled‑down exhibits continue to be mounted in Place Ville Marie.
-
Kate
The STM has put out an offer nearly reaching $1 billion for the major excavation of the blue line extension.
-
Kate
A row of buildings on St-Antoine – where Steve’s Music used to be – is felt to be an eyesore on one of the approaches to Old Montreal. The owner of that row is the Palais des congrès, which has expressed intentions to enlarge in that direction, but – as this piece says – Quebec’s in no hurry to fund the project.
Uatu
Tell Quebec that the land is going to be bought by Chinese investors who plan to build the biggest mosque for English speaking Muslims. Maybe that’ll get their attention… hahaha
Blork
Also where Russell Books used to be a million years ago. I loved that place!
Kate
Russell Books wasn’t in that block, it was a bit further west, facing that blocky building that had been the Montreal Star, then the Gazette. It’s a Westin hotel now.
The same 1994 list where I found Bibliomanie in a comment above gives 275 St-Antoine West for Russell Books. There’s no such address any more, that whole block is just back doors for the Palais des congrès.
carswell
“felt to be an eyesore”
Dilapidated, sure, but if I were looking for a subject to sketch or paint — or probably even photograph — I’d definitely choose the row of buildings over huge, soulless, unwelcoming, wind-tunnelly monolith that is the St-Antoine side of the Palais and will probably be the fate of this block once the Palais has its way with it.
-
Kate
As presaged, DNA has identified the killer in the 1975 murder of teenager Sharron Prior. Franklin Romine, who had a long history of crime both in Canada and the U.S., died in 1982 at age 36 at the Verdun General but was buried in West Virginia.
-
Kate
Another item Monday morning is the highway blockages over the weekend: blockages on the 20 and long delays at the border.
Update: The mayor is giving Quebec what for about the work on the 20, but Quebec says there will be weekend work on the 20 all summer.
Second update: Quebec has just announced the closure of the 40 eastbound in a section in the West Island all summer.
Third update: The Journal sees the 20 blockage, slowing access to the airport, as internationally shameful.
Nicholas
Everyone complaining that Google et al. didn’t update their maps fast enough and then got stuck for 3 hours is a perfect advertisement for the radio stations that can’t stop running traffic reports.
carswell
Biked out to Lachine on Sunday on a route that takes me through Ville St-Pierre and under the closed interchange. Was shocked at the traffic and tie-ups, and not just in the vicinity of the interchange. Traffic started getting heavy when I reached the Décarie and continued that way through NDG, Montreal West and even LaSalle and Lachine, where the lights at the Chemin du Musée, Chemin du Canal and Rue St-Patrick intersection were being controlled by a cop and where the hoards of cyclists and pedestrians waiting to cross — not to mention the lineup of cars — was like nothing I’ve seen in decades of biking the route. A royal mess.
Kevin
I do not understand the level of ignorance that allowed taxi and uber drivers to get on the road and not realize that a highway was closed all weekend.
Spi
Well it wasn’t communicated with nearly as much importance, when they close the tunnel for a weekend you’ll hear about it for the entire week leading up to it, in this instance I had no idea of the closure until the Saturday reports of people being stuck for hours. It doesn’t seem like they made any adjustments to the road network to make the alternate route most people would take (decarie north to 520) any more fluid.
Drivers even professional ones have become all too dependant on technology (waze/google maps), they don’t bother to look up road closures and construction zones. I still have the habit of checking travaux Montreal and quebec 511 before driving through the city because it’s so arbitrary and always changing.
Mr.Chinaski
The alternative route isn’t much better, it’s basically jampacked every day from 6am to 20pm.
When you think about it… there is pretty much only 4 roads in Montreal where you can go in between the St-Lawrence and the CN train yard : The A-20, Notre-Dame, St-Patrick and Bd. Lasalle. Close one and everything goes to hell…
Mr.Chinaski
Sorry, 6ix : The A-20, Notre-Dame, St-Jacques, Normand street, St-Patrick and Bd. Lasalle (St-Pat and Lasalle have the bottleneck from the Canal bridge).
This is also a great stress test for what’s coming in the next 10 years : The complete reconstruction of l’échangeur St-Pierre…
-
Kate
All our media Monday night and Tuesday morning are running pieces that are essentially a drumroll giving the information that police will give news on a cold case sometime Tuesday.
I don’t see the point of news articles like this.
shawn
Boy, a few years ago I was interviewed by SQ detectives at work about a cold case: a murder in some town north east of Montreal where somebody years ago, after a 2012 Montreal Gazette article had posted some sort of “confession” to the crime, which combined my Wikipedia username with someone else’s online ID, another Shawn. Anyway, it was very very weird. Of course because they’re SQ they don’t speak any English and my French back down was even worse than it is now, so we did the whole thing in French. I signed a statement. Very odd.
shawn
I just remembered one amusing detail, although it was pretty weird at the time. The murder had taken place in Mascouche. Now, as an English Montrealer, I don’t know where that is! No idea, but when I asked where the younger detective, a young woman, seem to eye me suspiciously. I had this vision of been brought up on charges of not knowing where Mascouche was.
shawn
Anyway, much more seriously, I remember reading/hearing about the Sharron Prior murder at the time. I guess I was about her age. Definitely shocked the English community….
-
Kate
Quebec is changing its law on expropriation of property, basing the price of a property on its current market value rather than its potential value. The city has asked for this for a long time.
The UMQ and CMM are all pleased about the pending change.
-
Kate
The victim of early Sunday’s pedestrian fatality has been named and two charges of impaired driving have been made in the high‑speed ricochet that took the woman’s life.
bumper carz
One long weekend in Quebec = 11 dead car victims in Quebec
Is this really acceptable to most drivers?
Kate
Evidently yes. And ongoing.
-
Kate
A storefront in St-Laurent was firebombed a second time this month, early Monday.
-
Kate
TVA says that reports of dog aggressions are up over the last year. But this was already reported last month by Radio‑Canada, with some owners theorizing that many dogs adopted during the pandemic had never been properly socialized.
Blork
The obvious solution is to LET THEM GO ON THE METRO.
Orr
I’ll vote for any politician who promises dog-free parks, most especially Parc Mont Royal.
Daniel
Have there been any reports of problems with dogs on the metro yet? I haven’t heard of any nor have I seen very many on there.
There are many dog-free parks, at least in Point St-Charles.walkerp
I suspect the issue is not so much not been properly socialized but that there are just so many more dogs owned now. It’s crazy how many people got dogs during the pandemic.
Kate
I can’t tell whether my impression that I see more dog walkers now is confirmation bias. Nobody I know personally has mentioned getting a dog recently.
Mark Côté
The first article says “Depuis la pandémie, 110 000 ménages ont décidé d’adopter un chat ou un chien, ce qui a fait augmenter la population canine de 37%.” So yeah, there must be many more dogs out there, even now (after many decided they didn’t want a pet after all, sigh).
-
Kate
People living in the Point have had it with the deplorable condition of the Wellington Street train underpass. But their demands have been heard, and CN is promising to make repairs.
-
Kate
La Presse’s Marc Cassivi tells us about the influence of Yannick Nézet-Séguin in classical music, and links us to a 60 Minutes interview with some scenes in Montreal.
-
Kate
Electric scooters will be back this summer in a second attempt, but only over in Parc Jean‑Drapeau. Laval is also going to give them a try. Another La Presse writer recounts how Paris just voted to banish them.
Ephraim
Remember this photo? https://i.redd.it/0j16mcdzs4r31.jpg
MarcG
I was hoping that would be the pic of the huge pile of e-scooters set for the garbage. Can’t seem to find it now… anyone?
marco
@MarcG
Here is what happened to the Jump bikes.
https://www.24heures.ca/2020/05/28/des-centaines-de-velos-jump-a-la-ferrailleMarcG
Thanks marco, that’s the one I was thinking of.
Chris
That pile of junk scooters is nothing compared to the number of cars we junk. The energy and materials of one vs the other is orders of magnitude more. It’s a shame so many have such a hate-on for these scooters. The main problem with them is one of space allocation. We don’t want them on sidewalks of course. The solution is easy: take space away from cars and reallocate it to scooters. But of course that’s impossible. Pity.
Uatu
Last time we had scooters they did use some street parking spots as pick up and drop off points but riders just left them all over the place anyway. Including in the middle of sidewalks
Kate
Chris, most cars get driven a number of years before they’re scrapped. I’m not saying that’s a good thing, but I think the shock value of those Jump bikes being scrapped was that they were relatively new and could have seen a lot more use, even if they had to be shipped somewhere else.
Tim S.
The scooters weren’t replacing cars. They were replacing walking, and possibly bike/public transit/taxis.
Mr.Chinaski
With the new pricing method that have geolocalisation and will make you pay extra $$$$ if you don’t put it back in a designated spot, I can give them a second chance.
They are essential in a city for the first&last mile.
Reply