A vehicle was driven into the front door of the Montreal headquarters of the RCMP, on Dorchester in Westmount, on Saturday morning. The driver’s motives are not known; he was arrested; nobody got hurt.
Updates from August, 2025 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts
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Kate
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Kate
The drop in visitors from the U.S. has affected Old Montreal this summer, although they’re seeing more visitors from elsewhere in Canada – not as free‑spending as Americans, by implication. Sales overall are estimated as down 30% from last year.
Why are Americans boycotting Canada? Or is it that some of them worry about being let back into the U.S. once they’ve left?
Blork
I think there are multiple reasons why some U.S.ers are not coming to Canada this year, including:
Depending on what sources they get their information from, some people from the U.S. think that Canadians are hating on them because of Trump’s trade war, so they might think it’s dangerous or at least unwise to come here right now.
Some might have the feeling that since there’s a trade war, Canada must be “the bad guy” so it’s best to boycott us.
Some probably think they are better serving their fearless leader by avoiding anything that’s not 110% “American.”
Some might even be stupid enough to think that Canada is some kind of crazed fentanyl war zone with French-speaking Trudeau clones stuffing everyone’s suitcases with the drug just before crossing the border. Also, the same people think we are overrun by warring drug cartels everywhere.
Any U.S.ers who are not 110% white and 110% passport-certified as 110% AMERICAN CITIZENS are likely (and correctly) worried that they might have trouble getting back into the U.S.
(All that said, I did an Old Montreal walkabout with a friend last week on one of the not-too-hot days, and I was pleasantly surprised that, while the area was busy, it didn’t have the “crush of humanity” feeling that it often has in summer. So I personally do not miss those people.)
walkerp
Might simply be the economy.
DeWolf
I passed through Old Montreal today and Blork’s “crush of humanity” assessment is pretty much spot on. There’s no shortage of people, but I guess they just don’t spend as much as Americans.
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Kate
The restaurant Le Violon, already doing nicely after being judged the 11th best resto in Canada by Canada’s 100 Best, is booming after the Justin Trudeau and Katy Perry story, TVA even showing us the table where they dined.
Meezly
They’ve been doing better than nicely. My friend and I must’ve lucked out last summer when I got us a table (a 5pm on a weekday), as she claims she hasn’t been able to get another reservation since. I imagine it’d be even harder now that the whole world knows that Justin and Katy had dined there!
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Kate
One consortium has grabbed all the tunnel excavation contracts for the blue line extension. But is this shady, or is it simply because only the group led by Pomerleau has the equipment and expertise necessary for such a massive job?
Ephraim
Buy Quebec clause limits who can bid. Which is why the REM was built by the CDPQ
Nicholas
Not exactly, Ephraim. Couillard mandated the creation of CDPQ Infra specifically to create a transit project on the Champlain and in the West Island. It’s not that Quebec companies were the only ones who could bid; it was the government gave this government arm the sole mandate to conceive of this project. It’s like Montreal giving the parking bureau the mandate to create a bike share. No one else, Quebec or not, could bid.
And the engineering and construction were not done by CDPQ, they put that out to bid. The winner was SNC-Lavalin, joint with companies from Spain, ROC and the US (plus Pomerleau) and the only other qualified bidder was an American company, joint with a Montreal company (that’s mostly British and American, just a reverse merger to save on taxes). Ops were a mix of bids, but there was always a Canadian company involved.
I agree that our contracting here is not best practices, though, and we need some major changes to get costs under control.
Nicholas 16:16 on 2025-08-02 Permalink
This seems to have been intentional (potentially spurred by mental health issues), but most aren’t. A fun piece of trivia: how often does someone in the US drive their motor vehicle, intentionally or not, into a building, something that is by definition immovable? Go ahead, guess.
You’re wrong. It’s every 15 minutes.
MarcG 17:18 on 2025-08-02 Permalink
Let’s do mass shootings next: 214 days into the year and they’ve already had 256.
Kate 21:27 on 2025-08-02 Permalink
But guns! Cars! Freedom!