Updates from November, 2025 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts

  • Kate 15:59 on 2025-11-30 Permalink | Reply  

    I’ve been looking back through posts and comments over the last year as I create the 2026 blog calendar, and find some loose ends I want to ask about. I’ll add a few as I continue.

    November 2024, access to the Falaise St‑Jacques was closed because the city said it wasn’t safe. Did it ever reopen?

    There was a piece the same month about people praying openly at the airport, TVA clearly telegraphing that this was unacceptable. I checked, and there’s still something described as a multi-faith area for prayer and reflection there. Is that even allowed now?

    The MUHC has rooms set aside for this kind of thing, too.

     

    • MarcG 16:23 on 2025-11-30 Permalink

      The Sauvons la falaise group has been pretty active in 2025.

    • Andrew Aitken 10:41 on 2025-12-01 Permalink

      Officially yes, but some paths were open this summer and some were fenced off with obvious signs of people just going around. There are still plans to make it an official park with more access from St-Jacques, a new bridge over the highway and greenify the abandoned space between the highway and Notre-Dame.

      https://montreal.ca/en/articles/parc-nature-de-lecoterritoire-de-la-falaise-new-park-works-93527

    • Kate 10:47 on 2025-12-01 Permalink

      Thank you, Andrew.

      Is that the bridge that was initially promised when the Turcot rebuild was being planned?

    • Andrew Aitken 11:43 on 2025-12-01 Permalink

      Unclear. The original concept for the “dalle park” was a wide elevated park over the highway so it’s a continuous green space. The city plan just shows an arrow connecting from NDG to Ville Emard, it might just be a simple bike/pedestrian bridge. It seems like a long term plan so the question is probably who’s got the budget when we get to that step.

    • Ian 12:35 on 2025-12-01 Permalink

      Tangentially related, does anyone here know what’s going on with the de l’Épée rail crossing between the new Outremont Campus & Parc Ex?

    • AMF 21:09 on 2025-12-01 Permalink

      I’m not sure the bridge is going to happen. People have campaigned for it for a long time, but all that’s promised for now is a “conceptual study” (I’m not sure what that means).

      There’s a hidden Junko in the Falaise which is fun to see, past the little skate park. I wonder how much of the community art will survive the official park.

    • patatrio 15:50 on 2025-12-04 Permalink

      Ian it looks like it is for all intents and purposes completed, but it is still barricaded for now. Perhaps they are waiting for sign-off, contractor needs to resolve a fault or waiting for an official ceremony. I haven’t seen it from the Outremont side, but I reckon it is probably a sign off from all boroughs that is imminent that will lead to its opening soon. It was due to finish end of autumn.

  • Kate 10:06 on 2025-11-30 Permalink | Reply  

    Le Devoir’s Caroline Montpetit talks with a woman who drives an STM bus about what the work is like.

     

    • Kate 09:58 on 2025-11-30 Permalink | Reply  

      looking at editorial cartoonsThe Vincent Marissal theme started the week with a bang, and continues on with no end in sight.

      Godin pondered government largesse but Côté only saw Éric Girard as a grim‑looking Christmas elf.

      Once again the theme of the sinking of the CAQ crops up, although Ygreck thinks the CAQ, the PQ and lonely little Éric Duhaime must be celebrating the scandals tearing up both the PLQ and Québec solidaire.

      The environment never quite leaves the stage as a theme for editorial cartooning. Both Godin and Côté put Steven Guilbeault into a pipeline. Chapleau found him a new job – or an old one.

       

      • Kate 19:45 on 2025-11-29 Permalink | Reply  

        Reports on the labour protest Saturday are vague about the numbers, TVA simply saying thousands and La Presse tens of thousands.

        Magali Picard, president of the FTQ, said the protesters want the government to abandon its changes to how doctors are paid, its attempt to alter union laws, and its plan for a Quebec constitution.

        Bill 3, the new labour law, comes into effect Sunday.

        I’d feel better about all this if we had a plausible alternative to the CAQ.

         

        • Ian 20:19 on 2025-11-29 Permalink

          The La Presse artcle quotes the 50k figure ifrom the CSN, as did the Gazette. It’s curious that TVA chose to downplay attendance.

        • jeather 21:13 on 2025-11-29 Permalink

          But not, notably, the new anti-anything-but-Christianity laws.

          Solidarity but not for everyone.

        • Ian 22:05 on 2025-11-29 Permalink

          WHY DO YOU HATE WAFFLES

        • Ian 11:30 on 2025-11-30 Permalink

          FWIW, jeather, there were a lot of people out for a lot of reasons, and lots of signs and buttons and banners against the secularity laws.

          “Plusieurs manifestants, comme Ève Boilard, ont aussi amené leurs enfants pour leur apprendre que «le privilège qu’ils ont est attaquable, et que c’est le droit du peuple en démocratie de s’affirmer et de se rassembler».

          Pour ses enfants, dit-elle, l’enjeu le plus important est celui de la loi 21 sur la laïcité de l’État, puisqu’«un tiers de leurs enseignantes, qu’ils adorent, sont voilées». Selon elle, une telle loi prive ces femmes leur indépendance financière. Même son de cloche chez Zahraa Sayed et sa cousine, qui rêvent toutes les deux d’être professeure. Elle déplore également l’usage de la clause dérogatoire et de l’adoption de plusieurs lois sous bâillon.”

          https://www.journaldemontreal.com/2025/11/29/plus-de-50-000-personnes-dans-la-rue-une-maree-humaine-anti-caq

        • jeather 13:16 on 2025-11-30 Permalink

          Oh, that’s great. I was actually nearby, and I saw a lot of people out there, but I only saw general union signs, and was basing it on the quote Kate mentioned and when I skimmed the articles I didn’t notice mention of bill 21 either.

        • Kate 16:24 on 2025-11-30 Permalink

          I didn’t think it was supposed to be a general protest against the policies of the CAQ government, but I’m not surprised that some people were protesting that law.

        • Ian 17:47 on 2025-11-30 Permalink

          It was organized by the unions but as a protest of the general right wing slide of the CAQ there were lots iof others groups out too, from Equiterre to pro-Palestine groups.There were even anarchists, communists, and international socialists (oh my)

        • jeather 19:42 on 2025-11-30 Permalink

          Given a lot of what is in it, I think bill 21 counts as a work related bill, and just as reasonable for unions to protest as doctor pay.

        • Ian 10:38 on 2025-12-01 Permalink

          The teachers’ unions held mass protests when it was introduced, I suspect that’s where most of us got our buttons from. In all fairness though, Bill 9 is even worse, as a development on Bill 21 and Bill 84.

      • Kate 11:41 on 2025-11-29 Permalink | Reply  

        Apropos discussion below on Steven Guilbeault, the CBC’s Isaac Olson examines how activists can have trouble when they find themselves in government.

         

        • Su 13:44 on 2025-11-29 Permalink

          People are often called “activists” when:

          their views challenge the status quo

          their background is in social/environmental movements

          their goals are seen as moral rather than technical

          So someone like Steven Guilbeault gets labeled an activist because his prior work was in environmental advocacy — a field that challenges existing economic structures.

          But people who support the status quo economic paradigm are rarely framed as activists, even though that paradigm is just as ideological.

        • Su 13:55 on 2025-11-29 Permalink

          Just to add; Steve Guillbault was acting based on factual, measurable, scientific evidence, not just an ideology. Ecology is a science. Sounds like Olson is using postmodernist rhetoric to deligitimize Guillbault’s actions. We are seeing this technique alot these days ( ie “activist judge” accusations) coming from various powerful players .

        • Chris 13:57 on 2025-11-29 Permalink

          Is “activist” supposed to be a slur now? He was one. No shame in that.

        • Kate 14:56 on 2025-11-29 Permalink

          Psychologically, if you spend years in an adversarial position vs the government, it must come as a shock to find yourself in government, and having to make the kinds of compromises that activists generally pride themselves on not making.

          Scientific facts are facts. Facts are of limited usefulness in politics. That’s got to be hard to accept.

        • thomas 19:19 on 2025-11-29 Permalink

          Actions like Steven Guilbeault’s occupation of the Alberta premier Ralph Klein’s home ensured that he would never be taken seriously by subsequent Alberta governments.

      • Kate 11:18 on 2025-11-29 Permalink | Reply  

        Le Devoir’s Caroline Montpetit writes a semi‑impressionistic piece about the people taking the metro at 5:30 am. It should come as no surprise that everyone she speaks to is an immigrant, making the whole piece a statement.

        Reminds me of the Gérald Godin poem “Tango de Montréal” that’s inscribed on the wall behind Mont‑Royal metro:

        Sept heures et demi du matin métro de Montréal
        c’est plein d’immigrants
        ça se lève de bonne heure
        ce monde-là

        le vieux cœur de la ville
        battrait-il donc encore
        grâce à eux

         

        • Blork 15:25 on 2025-11-29 Permalink

          Wow, that one guy who lives in Villeray and works in St-Bruno. It takes him an hour and a half each way. I thought it would be longer (although that’s long enough!)

          I worked for three years up by the Orange Julep, and that took me about an hour and fifteen minutes each way. It sounds worse that it actually was, since only a smallish bit at the home end was by bus. (It’s the bus-to-bus or Metro-to-bus transfers that kill.) I got a lot of reading done during those years!

        • Ian 18:12 on 2025-11-29 Permalink

          Mile End to Ste Anne is an hour and a half, at best – but up to 3 hours each way when they were rebuilding the VME.

        • Uatu 16:27 on 2025-11-30 Permalink

          I commute at this time and it’s pretty accurate. Lots of foreigners and working class Quebecois. Health care staff, construction, security guards, etc. dressed in uniforms, utility clothes and most wearing safety shoes. Very different from later rush hour where people are dressed to impress with leather shoes and fancy portfolios. The writer missed the foreigners talking on overseas calls (I guess because who else is awake at 5:45am to yak?). There’s one Russian and a guy speaking Farsi on my commute and it’s annoying as hell because they insist on using speaker phone and I’m trying to nap lol. Of note there’s a lot less people on the Orange line heading west after the opening of the new REM stations. The commute of that guy to Bruno really highlights that we need transit that doesn’t mainly serve downtown at rush hours. The working world has moved on from that limited model.

      • Kate 10:06 on 2025-11-29 Permalink | Reply  

        A big multi-union demonstration will be taking place Saturday afternoon downtown, but this piece only says it will start at 1:30 pm.

         

      • Kate 09:58 on 2025-11-29 Permalink | Reply  

        The Grande Bibliothèque hosts a service called Consultez un aîné pour 25 cents in which seniors can be asked advice about life.

         

        • Mozai 15:43 on 2025-11-29 Permalink

          En français, seulement?

        • Kate 15:54 on 2025-11-29 Permalink

          I doubt they’d allow any other language to be spoken in that context.

        • Ian 18:14 on 2025-11-29 Permalink

          Maybe if you give them a quarter you can ask them if they think learning other languages than French is worthwhile

      • Kate 21:25 on 2025-11-28 Permalink | Reply  

        At least 32 homeless people have died around Cabot Square over the last 18 months. Twenty‑six were Indigenous. A ceremony was held in their memory Friday; we can hope nobody said any prayers outdoors.

         

        • Frankie 23:26 on 2025-11-28 Permalink

          Just thoughts, no prayers.

        • Chris 11:06 on 2025-11-29 Permalink

          Indeed prayers will do nothing, so don’t bother. More useful to give 25 cents to charity.

        • Ian 18:16 on 2025-11-29 Permalink

          A quarter isn’t goingto do anyhting either. Maybe you could bring yourself to give a bit more than that, at least enough for a coffee.

        • MarcG 10:50 on 2025-11-30 Permalink

          I think he used a small amount to illustrate just how useless prayer is. e.g. “Not worth a dime”

      • Kate 17:48 on 2025-11-28 Permalink | Reply  

        May not be true all over town, but here in Villeray it’s treacherous underfoot Friday evening – not full‑on ice, but that greasy slippery feeling distributed unevenly over the sidewalk. Penguin stride is advised.

         

        • MarcG 18:14 on 2025-11-28 Permalink

          Yeah super dangerous in some spots in Verdun too – a very unique texture!

        • Nicholas 22:11 on 2025-11-28 Permalink

          It reminds me of a curling rink: slick with pebbles, and just enough thickness that you can’t touch the concrete in most places, so looking at it you think you’ll get friction and you don’t.

        • jeather 10:22 on 2025-11-29 Permalink

          True in St Henri and ville Marie too.

        • Ian 11:43 on 2025-11-29 Permalink

          Same in Outremont adjacent Mile End. All the local Hassidic men walking to synagogue for shabbos in their dress loafers were doing some fancy footwork. Suddenly the Skver wearing jackboots makes a lot of sense.

        • Kate 12:57 on 2025-11-29 Permalink

          I was wondering about that, but the Wikipedia article on the Skver says “Today, married men also wear fur hats, called shtreimels, and knee-high leather boots known as shtievl.”

        • Ian 16:56 on 2025-11-29 Permalink

          They’re mostly Belzers in my area but there are some Skverers

      • Kate 15:14 on 2025-11-28 Permalink | Reply  

        Félix Tremblay, a young man without a criminal history who agreed to bump off 14 gang enemies for a fee, was sentenced to more than 18 years this week in the deaths of Justice Owusu Tajudeen, Christopher‑Shawn Jean Vilsaint and Noël Garcia Frias.

        The last named was killed not because of any gang affiliation but because he was driving the same model of car as one of Tremblay’s targets. More on the complicated plot last month in La Presse.

        – – –

        A man who had sexually abused his four stepchildren for years was sentenced to seven years this week, decades later.

        – – –

        The driver who killed seven-year-old Mariia Legenkovska near her school three years ago has been partially exonerated by a coroner’s report this week, saying he had been confused by a GPS detour due to the closure of the Lafontaine tunnel, and semi‑blinded by the low December sun. Juan Manuel Becerra Garcia was sentenced to a year’s house arrest, back in spring 2024.

         

        • Nicholas 15:27 on 2025-11-28 Permalink

          Lots of interesting details in the story on the coroner’s report. It suggests governments could better coordinate with mapping apps to push people away from residential areas when there are detours. But apps send you through residential areas even without detours; why would they listen? If you instead make those areas dead-end loops for driving then no one will drive there except locals.

        • bob 09:24 on 2025-11-29 Permalink

          Life has become cheap in Canada.

      • Kate 14:57 on 2025-11-28 Permalink | Reply  

        The new catholaïcité law ordains that no further ceremonies can be held at McGill’s Birks chapel, “où se déroule surtout le culte protestant,” which has sometimes been used for weddings and baptisms, but a Catholic chapel at Quebec City’s Laval University can go on holding masses on the technicality that it’s part of a student residence and not the university proper.

         

        • Nicholas 15:36 on 2025-11-28 Permalink

          Looking forward to McGill putting one student in residence in the chapel, and also prayer rooms all over their residences. Then we’ll get some law that chapels are allowed only if constructed in 1961 and placed between 46.77 and 46.78 degrees north and

        • bob 13:16 on 2025-11-29 Permalink

          I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again, no longer Christian, but oh so very Catholic.

      • Kate 10:40 on 2025-11-28 Permalink | Reply  

        Steven Guilbeault, who came out of a background of environmental jobs like running the Quebec Greenpeace chapter, has resigned from the federal cabinet over Mark Carney’s pipeline promise to Alberta premier Danielle Smith. He also drops his role as Quebec lieutenant. Guilbeault is staying in the Liberal caucus as MP for Laurier—Sainte-Marie.

         

        • Ian 10:56 on 2025-11-28 Permalink

          Pretty wild play by Carney considering BC is flat out refusing to go along, as well they should. Guilbeault did the right thing, but I’d love to see him take it a step further and cross the floor to the NDP or Greens.

        • Joey 11:43 on 2025-11-28 Permalink

          I read one analysis that basically said this is all highly performative pipeline love from Carney, who knows that the thing will never get built (lack of enthusiastic private sector partner, resistance from BC but more importantly from First Nations that cannot be as easily dismissed) – he gets a little love-in from Danielle Smith and Alberta who, in exchange, will be increasing the province’s industrial carbon price (see here: https://www.nationalobserver.com/2025/11/27/opinion/method-mark-carney-madness). I’m not sure I’m convinced – this sounds like five-dimensional chess – but I am similarly unconvinced the pipeline will get built.

        • Meezly 12:06 on 2025-11-28 Permalink

          I really want to believe that optimistic perspective, that Carney’s deal is more a strategic move to win over Alberta than realistically getting the pipeline built, and the act of making the deal may still help boost the economy. But wouldn’t Guilbeault have been in on it then? Unless he’s looking for an excuse to leave the cabinet, or the deal won’t look legit unless Guilbeault makes some kind of statement?

        • Ian 12:16 on 2025-11-28 Permalink

          Occam’s razor says nah

        • CE 16:47 on 2025-11-28 Permalink

          I’m not sure about the Greens but the NDP doesn’t allow an MP to cross the floor to them without a byelection. Although now that NDP MPs are almost a rounding error in the HoC, they might be willing to overlook the rule at the moment (especially for someone like Guilbeault who I always thought was more ideologically aligned to the NDP and ran in a riding where the NDP came in a close second).

        • bob 09:26 on 2025-11-29 Permalink

          He quit because he was sidelined, and can’t do anything. If he can’t do anything as heritage minister, he can do less as an NDP backbencher. He’s going to go to a not-for-profit, or some other organization where he can do things rather than yell into the wind.

        • Ian 10:39 on 2025-11-29 Permalink

          That’s not at all true, bob – every vote counts right now, as we saw in the last budget. Even the Greens were being courted by Carney for support. This is an opportunity to negotiate for NDP and or Green issues, much like Singh attemptd in the last Parliament. That the NDP are a “rounding error” has nothing to do with the value of their vote in tipping the very close minority., especially as the gloss comes off Carney’s vision and the real neoliberal corporatist technocrat agenda is revealed.

        • bob 13:33 on 2025-11-29 Permalink

          If he can’t advocate for green issues within his own party, what can he do in opposition? If Carney needs a vote or two to pass a bill that removes environmental regulations altogether he has 143 eager Conservative votes to make up his majority (viz. C-5). The CPC is not against that neoliberal agenda in general. The budget passed because no one wants an election so soon. The NDP got nothing out of it.

        • CE 11:56 on 2025-11-30 Permalink

          I wasn’t a huge fan of Singh as leader of the NDP but I really would have liked to seen him in the House in the lead-up to the budget. He has a lot of experience negotiating with the Liberals and getting some concessions out of them. He and Carney also seemed to have a good rapport. You could see a lot of respect between them during the debates, even when they were disagreeing.

      • Kate 10:26 on 2025-11-28 Permalink | Reply  

        weekend notesWeekend notes from Le Devoir, Montréal Secret, CityCrunch, CTV, CultMTL.

        The Louis-H-LF tunnel will be closed all weekend and so will the Île‑aux‑Tourtes bridge. General driving issues.

        La Presse already has Christmas notes and both La Presse and Radio‑Canada have New Year notes out.

         

        • Kate 00:42 on 2025-11-28 Permalink | Reply  

          The STM’s maintenance workers are planning a month‑long overtime strike to start December 9. CBC emphasizes that, if not settled, the strike could continue through the holidays.

           

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