Updates from November, 2023 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts

  • Kate 23:17 on 2023-11-23 Permalink | Reply  

    The ARTM (Autorité régionale de transport métropolitain) has just managed to propose a budget for 2024 that won’t require cuts in transit services.

     
    • Kate 23:15 on 2023-11-23 Permalink | Reply  

      Philippe Pichet, once the city’s police chief, has announced his retirement. He’s still suing the city and the SPVM for psychological harassment, and he wants $2.9 million.

       
      • Kate 23:09 on 2023-11-23 Permalink | Reply  

        The SPVM and the STM have come up with plans for metro security this winter, including bringing in more mental health specialists, but also calling police from the closest station if anything drastic happens.

         
        • Kate 10:02 on 2023-11-23 Permalink | Reply  

          A national funeral for Karl Tremblay is set for November 28 at the Bell Centre.

          …Aaaand it’s already sold out.

           
          • Daniel 11:00 on 2023-11-24 Permalink

            with Ticketmaster surely getting a nice cut, and tickets being resold on the market for 500$+. FuneralFest.

          • Kate 11:02 on 2023-11-24 Permalink

            I was wondering – have we seen a funeral with ticket sales before?

          • Ian 16:39 on 2023-11-24 Permalink

            Scalping funeral tickets? Mom would be so proud.

          • Orr 13:00 on 2023-11-25 Permalink

            Exactly the kind of profit-maximized free-market capitalism that Karl and Les Cowboys sang against.

        • Kate 10:01 on 2023-11-23 Permalink | Reply  

          The only consortium in the running for extending the blue line is threatening to pull out unless the contract is rewritten to its advantage. Mobilité Bleu Horizon is a Pomerleau joint.

           
          • Ephraim 10:57 on 2023-11-23 Permalink

            If no one from Quebec wants to do it, open it up to companies outside of Quebec. It will likely save quite a lot of money

          • qatzelok 12:31 on 2023-11-23 Permalink

            Saving money by sending money outside Quebec… is shooting oneself in the foot. Better to find a way to keep internal costs down but still keep all the money here since Quebec has a mass-transit industry.

            The Dollarama Dialectic is self-harming in the long term, and governments are supposed to be thinking in the long-term.

          • Ephraim 13:56 on 2023-11-23 Permalink

            Buy Quebec, buy Canada and Buy USA clauses don’t work. For one thing, they don’t fly in a work crew, they hire local contractors. But also, it brings in different expertise and equipment that might be able to do the job for less. And in the end, the GDP isn’t the construction, it’s the usage. It also creates more barriers with Buy Ontario, Buy USA, etc. which creates more barriers and raises prices everywhere.

          • Kevin 16:09 on 2023-11-23 Permalink

            Preventing competition has allowed corruption to thrive and drive up costs, while providing shoddy quality.

            That only one company in Quebec has bothered to submit a bid for building a tunnel is a giant red flag that collusion is rampant.

          • Nicholas 16:59 on 2023-11-23 Permalink

            The Blue Line has one of the highest tunneling and transit costs per kilometre in the world, and the highest in Canada. If we could build more cheaply, we could build more lines, so have more work, most of which is done by people in Quebec regardless of where the head office is. The more projects we build, the more expertise we can locate here (companies will set up offices and divisions here, experts will move here). Maybe we could even have local teams competitive enough that they bid on projects elsewhere. But right now, we don’t have that, our costs are stratospheric, no one is hiring a Quebec company in this field unless they’re required to by law. I’d rather focus on hiring project managers into the public sector with expertise who can manage the next generation of projects being put out to bid at a competitive price so we can get the great benefits from better transit than focus on one or two projects every decade.

          • DisgruntledGoat 19:15 on 2023-11-23 Permalink

            “The Blue Line has one of the highest tunneling and transit costs per kilometre in the world, and the highest in Canada. If we could build more cheaply, we could build more lines”

            Hear me out here… just spitballing.

            If only there was some affordable, grade-separated, automated solution that could be built without tunnelling on the medians of existing avenues and other large traffic corridors.

            Something that had already been proven to be extremely cost effective compared to underground tunnelling and that is already a template ready to replicate.

            Some kind of Express Metropolitan Network. Oh well, a guy can dream, right!

          • Kate 13:30 on 2023-11-24 Permalink

            Kevin writes: That only one company in Quebec has bothered to submit a bid for building a tunnel is a giant red flag that collusion is rampant.

            Is it? How many companies, or consortiums of companies, in Quebec, are capable of tackling a job on a scale like this?

          • thomas 15:35 on 2023-11-24 Permalink

            Would the troubled history of the Blue Line extension be a factor? I could imagine a serious company deciding to not waste their time bidding on this project given the high probability that it will get delayed or restudied or postponed or cancelled etc.

          • Kate 15:55 on 2023-11-24 Permalink

            A permanent drop in ridership and a provincial government that’s not enthusiastic about funding public transit might be enough to cool their jets.

          • Kevin 16:06 on 2023-11-24 Permalink

            Kate
            Conpanies always create consortiums to do this kind of work. Pomerleau is working with two other firms on the Lafontaine tunnel.

            The REM is being built by SNC-Lavalin, Dragados Canada Inc., Groupe Aecon Québec Ltée, Pomerleau Inc., EBC Inc.
            with help from Aecom Consultants Inc: Lemay, Bisson Fortin, Perkins + Will, Provencher Roy.

        • Kate 09:47 on 2023-11-23 Permalink | Reply  

          It’s taking so long to open the REM station in Griffintown that residents are begging for a bus to Brossard.

           
          • Faiz Imam 20:58 on 2023-11-24 Permalink

            A lot of people work in old montreal, and the commute of those workers has gotten quite a bit longer.

            its at least an extra 10-15 mins for most people, which is understandably annoying.

            Though the biggest issue is the complete lack of timeline for the opening of the new station.

        • Kate 09:42 on 2023-11-23 Permalink | Reply  

          Strike actions in Quebec intensify Thursday as the FAE (Fédération autonome de l’enseignement) adds its unlimited strike to the other public sector unions striking today.

           
          • Ian 16:20 on 2023-11-23 Permalink

            I finished my Front Commun march and on my way home joined the FAE march. Lot of walking today, but great weather for it and good spirits with lots of solidarity.

          • Uatu 18:50 on 2023-11-23 Permalink

            It was a pretty amazing sight today outside the Glen. The Front Commun, APTS, FIQ all along Decarie. I’ve never seen that many people so motivated to tell off the caq. Hopefully they’ll get the message. Thanks for your support, honking motorists!

          • Ian 20:25 on 2023-11-23 Permalink

            Pretty amazing coordination given how many different marches there were and how many unions were involved. I hope to get to see footage snd photos of them all but given the news coverage so far i have my doubts even if 70% of Quebec supports the strikers.

        • Kate 00:04 on 2023-11-23 Permalink | Reply  

          After a lot of complaints in the summer about traffic congestion near the airport, there are plans to unjam access with new drop-off and pick-up zones.

           
          • Kate 00:02 on 2023-11-23 Permalink | Reply  

            The CAQ has plans for a new law to strictly limit access to English‑language vocational training.

             
            • Meezly 10:52 on 2023-11-23 Permalink

              According to the CTV site: On Tuesday, the Parti Québécois (PQ) tabled a motion to make vocational training and adult education centres subject to the Charter of the French Language provisions. The CAQ had refused to debate it…
              “We’re still waiting for their plan for French,” said Bérubé. “I don’t know if you have a date between now and Christmas. We don’t, but French doesn’t wait, and then it keeps going backwards.”

              So all this went down on Tuesday, the first day of one of the biggest public sector strikes in decades… Apparently 500,000 workers can also wait while our politicians get their panties in a knot over this horrifying Bill 101 loophole.

            • Ephraim 10:59 on 2023-11-23 Permalink

              So instead of getting people into jobs, we are going to make it even harder for them to get retrained. And incidentally, they must pass a vocation French language course to graduate from these Voc. Ed. programs. A course which teaches them the jargon they will need in French.

            • Bert 11:58 on 2023-11-23 Permalink

              Why do I have déjà vu? Ah, yes, the fabulous Elvis Gratton Gets Inspected by the OQLF. Méo, passe moi le cliquet, Le Cliquet, LE CLIQUET!

            • Dominic 14:48 on 2023-11-23 Permalink

              I think a lot of the “theory” part of these courses will switch to online-only

            • Ian 20:35 on 2023-11-23 Permalink

              The truly worrisome part is that the CAQ is losing popularity over everything EXCEPT ethnonationalism.

              If the PQ gets in they are going to double down on suppressing English and “dealing” with the néo-Québecois “problem” – all to preserve and support the French language, of course.

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