The city has several plans for dealing with flooding as rainstorms get heavier with climate change. It’s not just about abandoning homeowners in flood zones, either.
Updates from May, 2024 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts
-
Kate
-
Kate
City hall, renovated over five years of work costing more than $200 million, is set to reopen on June 7.
-
Kate
TVA visits rue Berger, which runs south of Ste‑Catherine from near Foufounes, and investigates what’s known as l’allée du crack. This is where Cactus is located.
Robert H
In the absence of adequate resources, political will and funding necessary to make a real dent in the chronic problems that have plagued this location for so long (with no change), the city seems to be following a policy of containment. This policy is a cynical sacrifice of the well being and goodwill of the residents of Rue Berger and the neighboring streets.
I realize Cactus provides a public service with supervised safe injection, counseling and aid to people in the grip of mental illness and addiction. Its location is a part of its commitment to being where the need is most intense. But if law enforcement, the courts and civic or provincial officials won’t do their parts, then does Cactus become part of the misery it’s trying to reduce?
The residents of the street have been left to their own devices, and they are understandably fed up. But would the crowds of walking wounded dwindle if it moved? And where would they go next?
Joey
+1 to what Robert H said. Compounding all of this is the addition of Fentanyl into the mix in there last few years. Add on a housing shortage and it’s a perfect storm…
Ian
Fent isn’t even the worst anymore, now there’s xylazine (tranq), isotonitazene (ISO), and the nitazene family. Protonitazene is already a problem in Quebec, and 25 times stronger than fentanyl, which is already 50 times stronger than heroin.
Kate
This must be getting into the zone of being fatal if you so much as look at it.
-
Kate
The city is planning 44 road construction sites this summer. Radio‑Canada includes some maps. TVA prepares drivers with the announcement un autre été chaotique à prévoir – who do they think the roads are being fixed for?
Chris
Drivers know the roads are being fix *for* them, their beef is that it’s not being done faster. They want even more car subsidy, they want more tax dollars spent to hire more people and equipment to do the work faster, so they can get back to unencumbered driving.
jeather
I mean, it’s not just speed. It’s that they tear up the same street multiple summers in a row, they don’t coordinate locations so there are multiple big construction zones in the same area, they don’t give clear notice, they have “end dates” that are invariably postponed by weeks to months.
Chris
jeather, oh, for sure, I’m not saying it couldn’t all be done better. I was merely addressing Kate’s seeming surprise that motorists complain about work done *for* them.
jeather
A lot of the work isn’t being done “for” motorists, specifically. When they’re fixing, eg, water mains or hydro, they need to block the streets, and of course everyone needs the utilities fixed, but it isn’t for drivers. Bike lanes, too, though I think a separated bike lane is good for everyone, it isn’t really “for” drivers.
Kate
jeather, I take your points, the dig is not always for motorists’ benefit.
However, I’ve seen several reports and studies that have found that bike paths make roads safer for everyone.
jeather
I’m pro separated bike lanes! I said they are good for everyone, and I stand by that. But it’s not really for motorists, and it reduces parking, which is of course the cardinal sin for most drivers.
Kate
I’ve met people for whom the element in their lives that evoked the strongest passions is parking.
Joey
Even the projects that are not designed principally to maintain the state of our roads often provide a tangible, direct benefit to drivers. For example, the creation of the Pie-IX SRB or the work around the Edouard-Montpetit REM station (ostensibly transit projects) or the St Denis REV (a cycling infrastructure project) help drivers by making alternatives to driving viable. Drivers tend to have an extremely short-sighted perspective that rarely extends beyond the front end of their car – but the development of infrastructure that supports transit options that enable more people to more more frequently throughout the city reduces the perceived need to get around by car. In fact, these kinds of projects are pretty much the only thing cities can do to make driving more fluid, short of reducing the number of cars in the city.
Meezly
My street has been dug up multiple times over the course of 6 years.
From what i can recall, in 2018, the city had to replace the drainage pipes for a 3 or 4 block stretch.
There was relative peace until around 2023 when they had to dig it all up again to replace the pipes connecting from the main to all the residences. This seemed to go on for many months.Then in Feb 2024, they had to do some repair work on our block. I know this as I made an FB post complaining about how much I love the sound of jackhammers as I’m home sick.
Last month (April), they had to do another repair on our block and had turned the water off without any warning whatsoever. A neighbouring resident was so incensed that she ran out and spat in the face of one of the workers, who then shoved her to the ground.
At this moment, they’re getting read again to dig up the 4-block stretch to apparently replace the main pipe. FUN!
So this makes me wonder the percentage of our city’s road construction is due to:
subpar work that resulted in having to subsequently return and dig up the street again to make repairs
piecemeal work (instead of doing all the work in one shot, perhaps due to budget, management, resources, they can only do it piecemeal, which results in digging up the same streets over and over again)In any case, we our expected to have our water cut off during the day for god knows how many days. It’s really rather tiring, and I don’t even own a car.
Kate
I grant you, the city ought to coordinate better – this has been a sore point for years. It turns up over and over that it’s no one’s job to track what exactly is going on under our streets, so there are always surprises when there’s a dig.
There should be a city hall department whose ONLY job is to make and keep records of this stuff, and there should be a law that any private construction must submit detailed plans to the city of any underground construction and excavation, and ditto for Hydro‑Quebec, cable companies and anyone else putting things underground.
And then there should be a department which coordinates digs to minimize the amount of excavation and inconvenience.
Some bits and pieces of this idea have been promised, but obviously not yet delivered.
dhomas
I have an opposing story to Meezly’s. Last year, they needed to redo the water pipes in my neighbourhood. In preparation, they came to each household to test for lead in our water. If there was lead in our pipes, we could coordinate with the city to redo our “entrée d’eau” while it was exposed from the city’s end (luckily, I had no lead in my system). After this, there were folks from: Hydro-Quebec (not sure why or if it was coincidence, since all our wiring is on poles overhead); Gaz Métro; Bell; Videotron. I work from home, so I got to see most of them. Every single utility company was in our neighourhood putting little flags in the ground and painting the pavement (the Bell techs got some paint on my paving stones). I was actually quite impressed and hopeful that this would become normal SOP. I guess we’re not there yet.
bumper carz
@Kate: “I’ve met people for whom the element in their lives that evoked the strongest passions is parking.”
And yet if you don’t like our parking situation in Montreal, there are lots of dead American cities with acres of parking to enjoy. Akron, Dayton, Toledo, Detroit, Indianapolis, Rochester, Syracuse, …
All are parking paradises. And urban failures.
Ian
I’ve met people for whom the element that evoked the strongest passions is bacon.
Your point?
Kate
You going to eat that?
Ian
Happy to share 😉
Meezly
It turns out this latest repair work is not as invasive as they made it seem. They’re using a camera cable under the street to see where the repair work is needed and then only opening up that section to work on it.
It seemed like it was going to be a bigger affair when they sent out notices that the water would be turned off from 7AM to 5PM, but I think that was in case they found something big they needed to repair, because the water stayed on all day. Major work probably wasn’t needed because of the repairs done earlier in April and Feb!!! They finished with our street yesterday and have moved onto the next block.
But our street is still blocked to traffic and no one is allowed to park on the 4-block stretch. Our street is currently wonderfully peaceful with no car traffic!
-
Kate
Don’t forget the test of the emergency signals and industrial sirens Wednesday afternoon.
Ian
Following links from that article I actually got to hear the siren… it’ surprisingly non-alarming.
I wonder, though, what the Saputo factory would be releasing as a toxic substance in an emergency?https://montreal.ca/en/articles/release-toxic-substances-what-to-do-if-you-hear-warning-siren-5117
Kate
Fake poutine cheese?
I got the phone thing. Not sure whether I was hearing an industrial siren or just more of the same from Crémazie.
Nicholas
Ian, if you click through, it lists the different substances, and most, including the Saputo factories, are ammonia. Ammonia can be used in refrigeration systems (such as cooling the ice at a rink, and probably also the Labatt brewery), and also can be used as an antiseptic (e.g. to kill E. coli. in beef, so maybe beef products?), so I would guess that’s their use in these factories, but I don’t know for sure.
CE
My phone was set to silent mode so didn’t make any sound when the test went through. That makes it kind of useless during an actual emergency (although, I would hate for it to override the settings for amber alerts which often come through in the middle of the night and, unlike a tornado or flood of ammonia from a cheese factory, isn’t really an emergency that needs my immediate attention).
Ian
Thanks Nicholas, I missed that.
I did hear the alarm on my phone but thankfully I’m not within the killing zone for the cheese factories.
Kate
CE, my phone was on “do not disturb” and I knew the alert was coming, and it still managed to startle me.
But I suppose silent mode and DND are not the same thing.
-
Kate
A Quebec City production outfit is planning a Montreal comedy festival this summer, from July 18 to 28, the dates that had been pencilled in by Juste pour rire before its collapse. No programming has been announced yet.
MarcG
I’m surprised that Evenko hasn’t swooped in to pick up the pieces.
CE
It looks like ZooFest/OffJFL is still happening this year.
-
Kate
The federal government is putting up a ten‑storey courthouse in Old Montreal, but there’s been no revelation to the public of what it’s going to look like.
Nicholas
Were any of the people worried about historic character saying anything over the sixty-four (64) years that this site was a surface parking lot?
Ian
That doesn’t mean that the unique opportunity to build something appropriate to the quartier shoudl be ignored.
bumper carz
Like Nicholas, I am extremely happy that this parking lot will soon disappear like so many other have in the last 20 years. Every parking lot is an atrocity.
DeWolf
“Ottawa n’a pas à respecter la législation provinciale ou la réglementation municipale dans ses projets de construction.”
There was a discussion about this on Agora when this project broke ground. I think a lot of people are surprised to learn the federal government can simply bypass the local planning process, and especially surprised that they haven’t revealed even so much as a rendering.
I doubt anyone thinks it’s a bad idea to build a 10-storey courthouse at this location. It’s a very appropriate function for this particular space. But it’s also a prime spot next to a number of significant buildings, in an architecturally sensitive part of town. What if the feds throw up a vinyl-sided monstrosity? I wouldn’t put it past them to build something that looks like it belongs in suburban Ottawa, and then we’ll be stuck with an absolute eyesore in one of the best-looking parts of town.
Say what you will about the modernist buildings around there, but 500 Place d’Armes and the Palais de Justice were designed with care, and they have a lot to recommend them, even if some people find them distasteful simply because they’re modernist. But the risk here isn’t a modern intrusion, it’s a cheap pile of garbage built by penny-pinching bureaucrats.
Blork
10 stories isn’t a problem for this site, as the existing buildings east and west of the site are all 10-11 stories. But yes, it would be nice to know what they expect it to look like.
DeWolf mentions 500 Place d’Armes, which is indeed a beautiful building, well designed and a fine example of the International style. By today’s standards it is out of place in its environment, but when it was being designed in the early- mid-sixties the thinking was more future-facing than past-facing. There wasn’t much emphasis on historical preservation at the time; it was all about progress and moving towards a modern future.
Was that a mistake? I sure seems like it now (and when the building was completed there was an outcry from some sectors, but how serious or widespread those objections were I cannot say).
That said, I think it it highly unlikely that the new Federal Court will be some modern or post-modern monolith. The bigger danger is that it will be designed to fit into the surroundings, but badly. As in, tacky and with cheesy flourishes.
My opinion is in favour of a simple design that fits in terms of scale and materials with a few nods to the neighbouring buildings. In other words, it would be nice if it were designed to blend in instead of stand out. Especially since this is a federal building in the middle of Quebec’s largest city.
DeWolf
I think the bigger problem here is that it’s all being done in secret. That’s what makes people nervous. If they were building something worthwhile, wouldn’t they want to share the renderings?
Nicholas
I wasn’t saying we shouldn’t consider aesthetics, but the time for that is probably passed. The RFP went out four years ago, and surely planning started earlier. The time to be lobbying for this was half a decade ago. And if the Montreal community wasn’t able to get the ear of this government, which had a PM, Justice Minister, Heritage Minister and many other ministers from the island (as well as the current minister in charge of procurement being from Old Quebec), that is much more worrying than anything they might put up on this one lot. Dinu, get out your rolodex!
As well, it’s common for higher levels of governments to be unconstrained by lower levels. You don’t want projects of regional or national importance to be stopped by a local zoning board.
qatzelok
@DeWolf: “What if the feds throw up a vinyl-sided monstrosity?”
We would then all vote “YES” in the next referendum – for heritage protection.
CE
Considering the ugly and relatively out of place building the city approved at Notre-Dame and St-Jean, I doubt having municipal approval would make much of a difference for the aesthetics of this building. Who knows, maybe having a building pushed through without city oversight will result in a nice building for once!
Em
They can’t possibly build something uglier or more out of character to the neighbourhood than the Palais de Justice.
-
Kate
A building in Villeray that was the target of an arson attempt a year ago was firebombed again Wednesday morning. Windows were broken but the device was ineffective.
-
Kate
Residents of the CHSLD near Chinatown have been openly selling and smoking crack. This isn’t a seniors’ residence, but a place for adults of all ages with physical disabilities.
Reply