The Gazette’s Leora Schertzer digs into the story of the large mosaics at Édouard‑Montpetit REM.
Updates from December, 2025 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts
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Kate
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Kate
I don’t know whether this tendency can be blamed on AI, or just lazy writers.
TimeOut ran a piece about what it calls a virtual Opus card, the upcoming new STM fare system. The piece is brief and appears to be mostly a recap of the STM’s own PR handout, but it doesn’t ask any interesting questions, like whether people paying the student fare, or older people riding for free, will be able to use it.
And then Saturday, TVA has a hand-wavy piece about alternatives to the REM, which won’t be running this weekend. Little actual information is given, hints like “L’ARTM recommande aux usagers de planifier leurs déplacements à l’avance” not getting us anywhere. Then there’s a link to the REM page.
If journalists (is this journalism, or simple content provider work?) are going to write articles, they need to make an effort to add some value to the bare bones of the PR handout they’re working from.
(Although, to be fair, this isn’t a great time of year to get a response to a querying email or phone call.)
Blork
You basically answer your own question; this demonstrates one of the main the differences between “content creation” and journalism.
We could dig a little deeper and ask what is the motivation behind the piece. If it’s “content” the primary motivation is to fill the space and capture attention for a minute (ultimately to land a few ads). If it’s journalism the primary motivation is to inform.
You could argue that the “journalism” is also just there to land ads, but I would counter that landing ads is not the journalist’s motivation; it’s the publication’s motivation. Less so with “content creators” because their income and/or credibility is directly linked to how well they capture attention and land those ads.
Mozai
I often use the name “news-like entertainment product,” but the bland beige “content” seems more appropriate because copy-pasting their peers seems more like sawdust than sugar.
Blork
Regarding the virtual Opus card, it will be fantastic for people who use Opus with a monthly pass. I don’t know what the ratio of monthly:per-use is, but I suspect that most users go monthly. But questions remain about pay-per-use users.
I suspect it will work for per-use users with simple use cases, such as those who always stay within Zone A. But for other users, like me, I doubt it will work well at all. Admittedly I’m probably an edge case, but I currently need THREE separate Opus cards. OK, I could get by with two, but I need three to get the best value.
In my case I’m 65+ (side note: age is not just a number) and I “operate” in both Zone A and Zone B, primarily moving from one to the other. In theory, a single A+B card would cover all my needs, but (a) that would not give me the free Longueuil transit I get from my 65+ Zone B/Longueuil/RTL card, and (b) it would mean paying the premium A+B price when I’m only using the card within Zone A (such as going from McGill to Mont-Royal by Metro).
Also, the A+B card is supposed to get me from my local RTL bus to the Longueuil Metro, on to the Metro all on one ticket. (Ditto going the other way.) But several times it has taken an extra fare when I’ve done that. So I now use my “free” RTL Opus card to get me to the Metro in Longueuil, then use my A+B card from there (and ditto going the other way). If I’m in the city and want to do a Zone A only ride, I use my Zone A card. (I use a Sharpie to write on the cards so I can tell them apart easily.)
The gist of it is simply that in a non-standard use case the system doesn’t know what my intentions are since it is tap-in only, not tap-in/tap-out.
But whatever. I’ve got my system figured out and it works for me. The big advance for me was being able to add tickets via the Chrono app. That was a total game changer.
steph
Three cards is very edge case, but two cards is VERY common for everyone I know on the south shore. They need their AB card, and keep an A card for Montreal only trips. Two is still one too many.
Tee Owe
@Blork London, Oyster – copy – how can this be so complicated?
Kate
London has tap out, though. We’ve never had that, so our fare system is not collecting as much data.
You can go to Laval or Longueuil on a card with Zone A tickets only, but you can never go home again. It’s very sad.
MarcG
I typed up some comments about the ludicrosity of our fare system when other cities have had superior tech for decades but realized I’d said it all before.
@Kate, there are literally villages of displaced persons growing around the Montmorency and Longueuil metros. We need to get these people home ASAP.
dhomas
The virtual OPUS card allows for multiple OPUS cards on the same phone via the Chrono app. You need to “activate” the OPUS you want to use, but once that is done, it works even when your screen is off. You only need to access the app again when you need to change OPUS card / fare.
Source: I beta tested the app and this was one of the things they asked a lot of questions on to make sure it was functioning correctly.
Kate
MarcG, I agree. Something must be done!
steph
@Kate. physically you can, but you can get caught and fined. They can (and do) check fares getting off the Longueuil/Laval Metro, and if you don’t have the appropriate fare validated – that’s a fine! The metro always plays back a “Last stop for Zone A, please have the appropriate fare to continue” message
Tee Owe
@Kate – ‘London has tap out, though. We’ve never had that’ – you make it seem inevitable – why can’t that be implemented? Also, London doesn’t have tap-out on shorter bus journeys, they just apply a standard fare. I confess i don’t know all the details of their system, except that it’s superbly user-friendly. Worth copying IMO.
Blork
dhomas, activation switching sounds like an engineering workaround more than a practical application of the tool. How many clicks and swipes does it take to switch? Can you tell at a glance (without clicking and swiping) which card it is set to as you approach the turnstile?
I doubt it. Frankly, I’d rather just pick between physical cards, which takes two seconds, than open phone, swipe, swipe, click, click, swipe, click, click, click ever time I want to use it.
Kate
Tee Owe, new devices for every turnstile in every station? Cost a pretty penny.
Yes, I’m sure ours could be improved. Not saying it couldn’t. But, $$$
MarcG
I went into a metro station for the first time in almost 6 years a few weeks ago and it looked to me like the turnstiles had been replaced in the interval – am I wrong?
CE
They replaced the turnstiles with readers a few years ago. It seems like they’ve been there for a long time but I guess six years is a long time. I think the new readers are supposed to be able to read the next generation or cards. One big improvement is that they read the cards immediately. It took a little while to get used to not doing the little pause between tapping the card and going through the turnstile. On the bus it made a noticeable difference for boarding times.
CE
I truly hope they don’t eventually phase out cards and make it so you have to use a phone to pay for transit. I often leave the house without my phone and would hate to be forced to carry it around at all times to be able to travel.
dhomas
@Blork I just checked. Here is a quick rundown:
Open Chrono app
Click “Virtual Fares” button
Swipe to “secondary” virtual OPUS
Click “Activate”Still quite a few steps. For me, it’s acceptable as I rarely travel off-island. For someone who needs to switch often, it might be better to keep a virtual card plus a physical one, to avoid switching in-app.
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Kate
Snow removal is to begin Saturday night. The warning for possible freezing rain on Monday (“possibly accompanied by ice pellets”) is still up on the government weather site.
Ian
Of relevance to those without the 311 app, curious whether their street is scheduled to be cleared:
https://services.montreal.ca/deneigement/carteTim S.
Thanks Ian. Matches what I see out my window, so hopefully it’s accuracy can be counted on.
Ian
Weirdly the city app did not display that my street was getting cleared at all, both sides got done over the last 2 days. The crews did put up signs though, so everythign proceeded as usual…
But at least from my perspective there is no longer a relaible free app. Oh well, nice while it lasted.
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Kate
The last of the Dionne quintuplets has died. Annette was 91. Her sister Cécile had predeceased her in July, and the other three died in 1954, 1970 and 2001. Wikipedia.
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Kate
We’re in for a cold weekend followed by freezing rain on Monday. You’ve got time to make sure your devices are charged up and you know where the candles are.
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Kate
The entire REM is to be down all weekend so tests can be run on the Anse‑à‑l’Orme branch.
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Kate
The Rover has looked into an incident of possible journalistic skulduggery in which Le Devoir may have buried its own investigation at the behest of big bucks. Although the Rover’s writers attempted to query some of the paper’s journalists, in each case they were referred to their union, which responded with an empty formality and no information. The implication that enough money can buy retraction and silence hangs there, unaccounted for.
Ian
Deep pockets can buy all kinds of compliance, especially if there are threats of lawsuits. Look at how Shiller-Lavy got away with ruining Mile End.
steph
Popularity and overexposure ruined the Mile-End (and that was through good intentioned publicity)
Ian
Speculation and commercialization ruined Mile End, and the refusal by the city to engage meaningfully with commercial interests was one of the main underlying factors.
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Kate
The weekend between Christmas and New Year is always atypical, but Radio‑Canada has a list of suggestions for families and CultMTL posted a winter art calendar last month. CTV notes some holiday installations that are still going on.Some are already listing New Year suggestions, like La Presse and CityCrunch. The Old Port will have a show and the REM will run overnight. Le Devoir previews a show planned on Place Jacques‑Cartier.
An open and closed.
Arctic weather expected into the new year.
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Kate
Daniel Renaud does a dive into 2025’s homicides, looking at them from various angles. Like the recent TVA piece, he notes the drop in gang‑related killings, and the involvement of homeless people in eight incidents.
Renaud also notes that, of the 31 homicides so far in 2025, 25 have been solved, along with eight from previous years.
A second piece looks at the solution of five old gang murders this year.
Renaud is doing a podcast called Les Archives criminelles which I planned to listen to, since he’s a mine of information on the local crime scene. But it’s so boosted with music cues, probably intended to build apprehension and suspense, that I find it unlistenable. I suppose this is the prevailing style of true crime podcasts – the music relied on to create emotional tension in the place of visuals – but it ends up making the podcast feel like an aural equivalent to Allô Police.
Or maybe that’s the intention?
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Kate
The Journal has a brief history of the evolution of Christmas in Montreal from the mid‑19th‑century sober Catholic observance celebrated with nothing more than a slightly fancier dinner, to the essentially nonreligious commercial extravaganza of our times.
The Adrien Hébert painting at the top of the story, Magasinage de Noël, has been poorly reproduced. Here’s a better view. And an even better view found by regular reader MarcG.
Radio-Canada tracks down the earliest Christmas tree in Canada. Interestingly, it didn’t come from the British via Prince Albert, but earlier and more directly from the wife of a German baron working here for the British Army.
The item mentions traces of the largely forgotten German presence here, but doesn’t raise the interesting point that François Legault has German ancestry via the Schetagnes.
PatrickC
After looking at the Adrien Hébert painting, I started to wonder what it was like to use horses for sidewalk snow clearance. Must have been tough on the worker, though maybe easier on the pavement and any parked bicycles.
Ian
Horses were never used for sidewalk snow clearance…
PatrickC
@Ian, so the horse pulling a snow scoop in the painting is just the artist’s invention? Or maybe a downtown commercial gimmick?
MarcG
Here’s the full-size image for anyone wanting to zoom in. Kinda looks to me like the horse is shoveling the gutter.
Kate
Thanks, MarcG. It’s a pleasure to see that painting in more detail.
Ian
@MarcG exactly, you can see that the family at the corner has stepped off the curb.
JP
Is this a painting of a specific intersection?
Ian
Sainte Catherine and McGill College looking looking SE from just north of the NW corner, I believe. You coul probably see almost the exact view from the southenmost windows of the Indigo bookstore facing McGill College..
MarcG
Looks to me like a composite since the bank window kinda matches but the entrance with the clock is excluded, and the brick/stone colour on the SE corner is different…
Ian
I’d want to see a photo from the era to compare, becasue even in my memory the old bank building has been at least 5 different businesses with massive interior and exterior renovation and cosmetic work. That intersection as a whole has also been under some kind of street construction on and off with various projects for about 15 years now. A lot has happened downtown since 1938 – 1945, the dates given to that painting.
MarcG
I found this pic from 1936 before commenting, should have included it. http://www2.ville.montreal.qc.ca/archives/seriez/pages/z68.htm
Ian
The link’s not working, but I’ll take your word for it – it could very well have been a pastiche.
Kate
I think Hébert must have taken some liberties. If this is McGill College, I can’t imagine where that foreground streetcar is going to go.
I was thinking Peel Street but that bank window top left is not on that corner.
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Kate
American producers of booze are mightily miffed that Canadians aren’t buying their products any more. In fact, they want to bully Canada into line, making us abandon protection for our own enterprises and favour American products again.
Why is it OK for them to blare “America first!” but try to block Canada from putting Canada first? Because for the U.S., “America first!” doesn’t mean just having Americans buy local – fair enough – but that the rest of the world has to put America first too.
Let’s hope we get the last laugh.
Joey
Now *this* is stenography.
dhomas
Fuck ’em. You play stupid, you win stupid prizes. Nobody wins in a trade war. Sure, we lose here in Canada but so do you, American distillers. Too bad, so sad. If you’re not happy, take it up with YOUR government, not ours. Or, move your operations here, like this company is doing:
https://www.lapresse.ca/affaires/entreprises/2025-11-12/la-boisson-sour-puss-demenage-au-quebec.php
Uatu
Putting it back on the shelf doesn’t mean we’ll buy it.
Kevin
They can complain all they want, Canadian provinces have made their decision.
They FA and now they are in the Finding Out phase.dhomas
@Kevin I think their hope is to get the provinces to come back on their decisions. Like Alberta and Saskatchewan did.
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Kate
I don’t usually blog brief stories about crimes, but I’m doing this one about a non‑fatal stabbing because 1. there’s no news on Christmas morning and 2. the location described, the corner of St‑Denis and de Blainville, does not exist.
They may have meant de Bienville, because de Blainville is a short street in St‑Léonard.
(Checked later in the day, it’s been corrected! I’ll send in my bill, TVA.)
Also, posting this allows me to delay shovelling the steps for another two minutes.
The incident map continues to accumulate incidents. 2025’s suspicious fires layer is smokin’.
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Kate
It’s time for a redistribution of Quebec’s provincial ridings, a fundamental principle updating riding boundaries to adjust to demographic shifts over time. But Quebec’s going to the Supreme Court to try to stop it, because two ridings are set to disappear.
The news item isn’t specific but the Elections Quebec site has a section on redistribution, with a map in which you can see that the eastern tip of Montreal island, currently divided into LaFontaine and Pointe‑aux‑Trembles, is meant to be rolled into one riding called Pointe‑aux‑Trembles.
It’s probably not a coincidence that the CAQ is ruffled because, while Pointe‑aux‑Trembles is represented by the CAQ, LaFontaine is currently represented by the PLQ’s interim leader, Marc Tanguay. Combining the two might give the advantage to the PLQ, depending how things develop throughout 2026.
Details in this Le Soleil piece about the other Quebec riding set to disappear, in the Gaspé.
We had some discussion about this here a few weeks ago.
Nicholas
The CAQ actually doesn’t benefit politically from this appeal. Each of the two areas to lose seats (Gaspésie, East End Montreal) are mixed (partially CAQ, PLQ, PQ), while the areas to gain seats (Couronne) are CAQ heartland. But all parties need to show they’ll defend “traditional Quebec” (Gaspésie, not Montreal) so they all supported this antidemocratic bill, regardless of the political outcomes.
Kate
It’s interesting that all parties backed the attempt to block the changes, yet the appeals court ruled it would be unconstitutional. I don’t see how the Supreme Court can do otherwise.
Nicholas, do you know whether the proposed Quebec constitution has anything in it meant to change Canada’s rules about riding populations?
jeather
You can give MNAs in large areas more staff and a bigger travel budget, more money for satellite offices, etc instead of making them population imbalanced.
Nicholas
Kate, I don’t, but Canada’s rules are already so undemocratic you wouldn’t have to change anything. The Court of Appeals said Quebec could have made the Gaspé seat a special situation, like they do with other seats like the Magdalen Islands and Ungava. Quebec just didn’t, instead they delayed redistricting for the whole province, which was unconstitutional. And they already allow deviations of ±25%, which means if the average is 40,000 you could have 32,000 and 50,000. Canada’s Supreme Court has already rejected One Person, One Vote, so no reason Quebec would have to do any heavy lifting to reject it too.
H. John
CAQ just can’t get its act together.
Bill 39 was introduced in September 2019 with the goal of reforming Quebec’s electoral system from first-past-the-post to a mixed member proportional representation system.
That Bill’s implementation was contingent on approval in a referendum that was supposed to be held concurrently with the October 3, 2022 general election. But in April 2021, the Quebec government withdrew planning for that referendum, citing disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic and inability to meet the necessary timeline. Without committing to a new referendum schedule, the reform stalled. It stalled because the government failed to meet legislative timelines, backed away from holding the required referendum (largely due to the pandemic), and dropped electoral reform as a priority, leaving the bill in limbo.
Legault justified this change by saying that electoral reform “was not a priority for Quebecers” and that other issues, especially pandemic-related concerns, were more pressing. He also said that most Quebecers weren’t interested in the reform. In a debate, Legault stated that the electoral reform “doesn’t interest the population, except for a few intellectuals,…”
The new map, currently under consideration, was first published for consideration in 2023. CAQ and the other parties said they needed extra time to deal with a problem that has been evident since before 2010 when the PLQ under Charest failed to get a Bill passed to add three seats to the Assembly to help with the balance.
It’s worth remembering that this case was brought by the ridings who think they’re under-represented. As the judge in the original case wrote:
“Le groupe des demandeurs est formé de citoyens, électeurs, maire, élus, d’un
regroupement d’élus ainsi que d’une municipalité se trouvant dans l’une des sept
circonscriptions électorales en situation d’écart positif du fait que leur nombre d’électeurs
dépasse le seuil de 25 % par rapport à la moyenne québécoise.
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Kate
Taylor C. Noakes looks back on the municipal election: “I felt like I was watching an election campaign for president of a geriatric South Florida condo board association, not Canada’s most interesting city.”
Why should this be so? Montreal’s strength is in its diversity and the life that comes from the variety of cultures within it – the one thing Quebec has been at pains to repress and bleach into uniformity. I wonder how we’d be doing if the government in Quebec City was gung‑ho about helping the city thrive, rather than trying to turn it into Joliette. As things stand, it would be unwise for any mayor, or candidate for the mayoralty, to speak too loudly about pride in the city’s multicultural life.
Speaking of people on the wrong track, La Presse interviews Yves‑François Blanchet, under the stinger headline “Le Québec devrait craindre le Canada plutôt que les États-Unis.” Blanchet must have had his flacks busy, because he’s also interviewed in Le Devoir, where he tries hard to sustain a claim that we’re all disillusioned with Mark Carney.
(I don’t know anyone who’s a wholehearted cheerleader for Carney, but likewise I don’t know anyone who doesn’t feel that he’s infinitely preferable to the alternative, especially under their current leader. On the other hand, as I’ve said before, I prefer the Tories to be led by an idiot rather than by a smart barracuda like Mulroney or Harper.)
DavidH
Thinking whatever is going on in the rest of Canada should be scarier than ICE, the end of due process, and Trumpists’ supremacist mentality is white privilege on steroids.
dhomas
I like the line about “a referendum on whether or not Valérie Plante built too many bike lanes”. My favourite rebuttal to this was that more bike paths were built, per mandate, during Denis Coderre’s single mandate as mayor than during either of Plante’s two tenures. Under Coderre, we saw ~220KM of new bike paths. Under Plante, we saw ~350km over two mandates, or 175km per mandate.
Ian
Ah yes but as many here have pointed out, unless a bike path is physically separated from cars it is worse than useless, etc.
dhomas
I see painted bike paths as something like “desire paths” for bikes. Cost is a factor in creating good bike infrastructure, so what a responsible municipal government would do is replace those painted bike paths during the next roadworks project with more durable, protected bike paths. Example: a street needs to be dug up to replace the sewage system or water pipes, then those painted bike paths become protected bike paths when the road is repaved.
Ian
Funny how bike advocates are doing so much heavy lifting for Coderre, lol.
dhomas
I’m not sure if that comment was directed at me, @Ian. But there was no lifting on my part. It was more to illustrate how people just bought into the whole “bikes ruin everything!” campaign, when really there weren’t really more KMs of bike paths added during PM’s time running the city. They seemed to be using a similar playbook as elsewhere in the political world: find a divisive topic and focus on nothing but that topic to get to victory.
Ian
All I’m saying is that a lot of people here was complaining that Coderre-era bike paths were insufficient (some even said worse than nothing) but now that it can be used to defend Projet there are lots of voices suddenly declaring Coderre’s bike paths as equivalent to Plante’s. Accusations of cherry picking go both ways.
@dhomas My 2 cents is that on a residential street, painted paths should suffice especially as residential street paths often have to be adjusted (Jeanne Mance between Fairmount and Bernard is a a good example), but on a mixed or commercial street, divided lanes are necessary if at the very least you don’t want your bike path full of parked delivery vehicles & to protect bikes from turning cars at intersections (a green box does not suffice).
Kate
I saw a post to Bluesky that fits in here:
Painted cycle lanes are the non-smoking sections of today’s urban landscape.Both recognize a problem and the harms it causes, but are designed without the will or imagination required to implement a real solution.
Ian
I disagree – not every bike lane can be a fully divided fietspad. A divided bike path works on a wide street like Clarke (having to tear it out and re-do it because of poor planning aside), but wouldn’t on a narrow street like Esplanade.
For that matter the painted lanes on Jeanne Mance were problematic in that the first version with a southbound path on the west side and a nothbound path on the east side didn’t work out for safety reasons – southbound lane should have been on the right hand side of the street for visibility from parked cars OR bike lanes should have been along the curbs. The new version has a full lane width bike path going northbound only on the east side. Of course since people are used to JM being a 2-way bike path, they still bike south on the west side even though there is no longer a bike path there, and since there is only one lane for carrs, they are riding directly against straffic… so I imagine in another couple of years someone will try another variation of the 2-way bike path. Of course one of the big issues on streets like JM is the regular flow of school buses at different times deoending on the school anbd the age of the children, 6 days a week, all year long – as we saw from the old bike path configuration where a southbound bixi rider plowed into a little kid skipping into the street to catch her school bus. Schoolbuses should also only be allowed to do pickups on residential streets at intersections – but that’s another argument altogether.
Regardless, pedestrians, especially children, should always be considered top priority. It’s worth noting there is a big synagogue right at the stop sign every bicyclist blazes thorugh at Groll, and you can’t drive to synagogue on Shabbos so the streets are full of people of all ages (including a lot in wheelchairs) Friday and Saturday, all times of year. There’s another synagogue just north of Saint Viateur on JM, and another at the corner of Bernard, Honestly I’m beginning to think that Bernard to Fairmount and Jeanne-Mance to Waverly should be entirely limited to local traffic, public vehicles and deliveries only, and every street made one way in the opposite direction at every major intersection, enforced for all motorized AND non-motorized vehicles – the flocks of kids riding their scooters and bikes excepted.
Oh and capital punishment for parking your vehicle in crosswalks even “for just a second” or riding your bike on the sidewalk if you are over 12
…
OK just kidding about that last partIan
addendum:
I guess part of my assumption is that all streets should be reconfigured to be safer for bicycles, but there is certainly a school of thought that bike paths should only be on streets of a certain width and/ or where bicyclists are actively in danger.I do think that residential streets shoul be designed primarily to accomodate residents, not commercial traffic or commuters of any type from outside the neighbourhood – but I know I’m in the minority, and catch hell from both bike advocates and car advocates.
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Kate
24Hres has a political recap of 2025 and Toula Drimonis has another good one.
The Gazette has a selection of its photographers’ best shots of 2025.
The Journal with the ten most expensive houses sold in Quebec this year.
CultMTL on the year’s most heinous scandals.
Le Devoir has a news quiz of the year.
CTV Montreal’s ten most‑read stories of 2025.
Le Devoir with five works of public art that appeared in 2025.
Dense critique of new laws passed in 2025 that often obfuscate attacks on personal liberty and democracy.
The Gazette looks at prominent Quebecers who died in 2025.
Ian
CultMTL’s list is weird as only noise complaints and the SPVM budget are specificically Montreal, but I do appreciate the use of “heinous”
tee hee
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