Updates from July, 2024 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts

  • Kate 22:58 on 2024-07-17 Permalink | Reply  

    Quebec has sacked Patrick Savard, who’s headed the ARTM (Autorité régionale de transport métropolitain) since 2022. According to La Presse, it’s largely because he insisted on holding two jobs – he was heading the transit authority and the Quebec order of engineers, each job paying at least $200K. His argument? Running the ARTM wasn’t a full‑time job.

    A haute fonctionnaire called Ginette Sylvain will be top cat at the ARTM now.

     
    • Nicholas 23:22 on 2024-07-17 Permalink

      If it wasn’t a full time job, he didn’t need a full time salary. I’m sure $20,000 a year would have been fine.

    • Uatu 10:20 on 2024-07-18 Permalink

      This just confirms that artm was run half assed.

  • Kate 22:38 on 2024-07-17 Permalink | Reply  

    The city’s mobility squad is focusing on reducing the number of traffic cones before the construction holiday begins after Friday; it runs till August 3.

     
    • Ephraim 10:06 on 2024-07-18 Permalink

      How are we going to grow more cones, if we don’t plant them before construction season? Isn’t that how you get baby traffic cones?

    • Ian 18:34 on 2024-07-18 Permalink

      Maybe we could start by not blocking off entire project sites, just active portions, and have a central registry of cones and placards. You know, like most other cities.

  • Kate 22:26 on 2024-07-17 Permalink | Reply  

    The Centre des mémoires montréalaises unveiled its permanent exhibit this week on Montréalité.

     
    • Kate 13:49 on 2024-07-17 Permalink | Reply  

      A camp was evicted from CP land on Wednesday in Rosemont. La Presse talked to people who lost their homes.

       
      • CE 16:04 on 2024-07-17 Permalink

        I biked by this morning during the eviction. They had a garbage truck and city workers were throwing everything in. There was a bit of media and about 20 cops.

      • Joey 16:08 on 2024-07-17 Permalink

        Saw on social media that the small encampment at the southwest end of Jeanne-Mance Park was also being removed today. Guess the city decided it’s eviction day for the unhoused.

      • Chris 21:37 on 2024-07-17 Permalink

        3 years was pretty patient for CP really. Them staying there forever wasn’t really an option.

        I passed it often. It started very clean and tidy, but in recent weeks I saw 2 fights and it had been getting messier over the last months too.

        Sucks stuff was tossed in the garbage, but they were given opportunity to move their stuff.

      • Kate 22:24 on 2024-07-17 Permalink

        Where to?

      • Chris 07:55 on 2024-07-18 Permalink

        Elsewhere.

        I don’t have a magic solution for you.

      • Ian 18:03 on 2024-07-18 Permalink

        How about 30 feet up the tracks? If there’s nowhere to go, anywhere is just fine.

        As the saying goes, put up or shut up. You can’t just tell people with nowhere to go to just be “elsewhere”.
        This is also relevant re: refugees. I’m not surprised you are unsympathetic.

    • Kate 12:45 on 2024-07-17 Permalink | Reply  

      Dangerous mold has been found in the Mount Royal tunnel, under a long refit to make it fit for the REM.

       
      • P 14:29 on 2024-07-17 Permalink

        Have there been any reasonable explanations as to why a new tunnel was not a viable option for this project.

        At this point, a monorail OVER the mountain would have been faster and cheaper, I bet.

      • Kate 18:43 on 2024-07-17 Permalink

        My guess is that they were too nonchalant about the state of the tunnel, and jumped in because it seemed to be a handy “free” shortcut.

      • Major Annoyance 01:43 on 2024-07-18 Permalink

        They’ve been working on that tunnel since, what, 2019? And they finally discovered the mould… last week?

        Tell us another one, cher grand-père.

      • Ian 18:03 on 2024-07-18 Permalink

        As in so many other things, trying to cheap out is often more expensive.

    • Kate 09:17 on 2024-07-17 Permalink | Reply  

      I’m not sure this is even news: a business in Brossard has been denied a sign permit over the English word “party” in its business name. Isn’t that exactly what the language law ordains? Why should anyone be surprised?

      Wednesday evening, CTV reports that the OQLF has approved the sign. Presumably the municipality was being overly keen.

       
      • MarcG 09:41 on 2024-07-17 Permalink

        A friend of mine registered a business 15 or so years ago and there was a long conversation about whether the name was French or not. I guess this person got a nicer agent and it’s biting her in the ass now?

      • Uatu 10:27 on 2024-07-17 Permalink

        Reminds me of when they filed against Old River which was a clothing store from France. Keep up the good fight you conscientious bureaucrats. Kafka needs some more justification lol

      • Blork 10:38 on 2024-07-17 Permalink

        What’s potentially interesting here is that it’s not the OQLF that is refusing the sign, it’s the city of Brossard (who are doing so due to Bill 96). If I’m reading correctly, the retailer even has a permit from the OQLF but Brossard isn’t having it.

      • Kate 10:44 on 2024-07-17 Permalink

        How would we translate “Party Expert” anyway? I’ve often seen “party” used in French. Expert de la fête?

      • Blork 10:59 on 2024-07-17 Permalink

        Maybe slightly off topic, but decades ago I was a member of a professional organization with chapters around the world (but mostly in the US). The name was in English, but they were mostly known by their three-letter acronym. Let’s pretend the organization was “People Who Eat” and they were known internationally as “PWE.”

        So the people in charge of “PWE-Montreal” had to register the organization at whatever office is involved in that, and the person at the office asked what “PWE” meant. When they hear it meant “People Who Eat” they refused to let us register the name, insisting it must be in French — even through we were trying to register “PWE-Montreal” not “People Who Eat – Montreal.”

        I don’t think that bureaucrat had the authority to refuse us the name, but what can you do? Unfortunately I was not there while this was transpiring, because I would NOT have told them PWE stands for “People Who Eat,” I would have said it stands for “Pierre, William, et Eric,” the three founders of the organization.

        But no. Unfortunately the PWE-Montreal people folded before the bureaucrat and agreed to register it as “Les gens qui mangent – Montreal.” So around the world there were local chapters of PWE (PWE-New York, PWE-London, PWE-Paris, PWE-Budapest) and here we had “GQM-Montreal.” Essentially the PFK of professional organizations.

        In practice, absolutely zero people used GQM-Montreal; everyone called it “PWE-Montreal.” Our web site said “PWE-Montreal” and our communications said “PWE-Montreal.” Most members did not even know that our “official” name was “GQM-Montreal.”

        I hated that for multiple reasons, the main one being the way we folded in the face of bureaucracy and then kept a sham name that nobody used but we were constantly under threat of some bureaucrat noticing and busting us. It was amusing in an Orwellian way (there’s that again) but ultimately it was frustrating and annoying, especially for someone like me who is allergic to bullshit.

        (Reminder: “PWE” and “GQM” are not the real acronyms. Fake names are used to protect those who are workaround-challenged.)

      • Ian 13:06 on 2024-07-17 Permalink

        That Kentucky Fried Chicken branded as Poulet Frit Kentucky in Québec long before language laws required it seems almost prescient. Anyone remember Villa du Poulet?
        https://greynotgrey.com/blog/2012/10/16/kfc-pfk-kfcj-how-kentucky-fried-chicken-does-internationalisation-right/

      • Uatu 17:24 on 2024-07-17 Permalink

        I remember eating at the Villa du Poulet dining hall / restaurant on taschereau back in the 70s and 80s! So many birthday parties and family celebrations spent there.

      • Ephraim 12:23 on 2024-07-18 Permalink

        @Ian – The La Villa du Poulet was actually Scott La Villa du Poulet and it was Scott’s Chicken Villa Colonel Saunders Recipe Kentucky Fried Chicken. The Franchise in Canada was owned by Scott’s Restaurants Limited. Related to an older company called Bowles (Bowles Lunch) which had lunch restaurants that catered to men. Yes…. business men. They had a seperate franchise agreement for the recipes and name. The signs were a bit convoluted. See https://www.flickr.com/photos/57156785@N02/6244158296 where you can see they clearly said Col. Saunder’s Recipe in small… it was part of the legal name in Canada. Then there was SR Acquisition corp, which bought out Scotts (SR…. Scott’s Restaurants) by Bitove in 1999, yes, the same guy from the Raptors. This was then formed into a company called Prismz which went bankrupt in 2011, I think. And I think they sold a lot of the restaurants off to a company called Soul Foods Group. Oddly enough, they changed the name voluntarily, if I remember correctly, because corporations have an international protected right to use their copyrighted name. So they could have gone with Les Restaurants KFC if they wanted.

      • Ian 14:43 on 2024-07-18 Permalink

        Sure, they could have. It’s further complicated by the fact that Colonel Sander sold his share of Kentucky Fried Chicken in the US (but agreed to stay on as the figurehead) for tax reasons and opened up in Canada. The reason he partenered up with Scotyt’s Chicken Villa aka Maison du Poulet is that they already had great market presence throughout canada. The Colonel lived out most of the rest of his life in Mississauga and only returned to the US for medical treatment when he was terminally ill. He’s buried in Louisville. All the weirdness with the KFC/ PFK rebranding happened after the franchise got bought out by Yum Brands in the 90s.

      • Ian 14:44 on 2024-07-18 Permalink

        n.b. “Sanders” not Sander. Or Saunders, for that matter.

        also Scott’s not Scotyt’s. Yeesh. Time for a nap.

    • Kate 09:10 on 2024-07-17 Permalink | Reply  

      La Presse followed a duo who keep up the planted decor around the Village all summer.

       
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