Updates from July, 2026 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts

  • Kate 17:25 on 2026-07-29 Permalink | Reply  

    There’s a link in the right sidebar (on the desktop version of the blog) to my Patreon account. Some of you are kind enough to chip in a little every month. The take has been hovering around $80 USD a month for awhile now, which covers web hosting and domain charges, and allows me to pass along support to a few other folks doing local news coverage and commentary.

    Patreon is going to force us to change how it works before November. I will have to bill people who’ve been contributing, not something I ever planned or hoped to do. Who wants to get another bill? Also, Patreon’s really pushing people to establish tiers of membership and produce extra content to lure people into higher‑paying tiers. I don’t think this blog lends itself to that.

    I’m not sure exactly when I will switch to this system, but if you get a little invoice asking for your habitual $5 or whatever, that’s why. I apologize, but they’re not leaving members any choice.

    Also: I’m considering switching to ko-fi.com. So if anyone has opinions, please comment and let me know.

     

    • MarcG 18:49 on 2026-07-29 Permalink

      I’m not really versed in this realm but just did a little reading and it seems to me like you’re already using the subscription billing model, so nothing big will change for you or your patrons. At worst, the cycle of automatic payments and payouts will change a ltitle bit. I could be wrong but that’s what I understand from reading this.

    • jeather 10:02 on 2026-07-30 Permalink

      FWIW I have in the past subscribed to an author who had tiers: free self pubbed ebooks / free self pubbed ebooks + gratitude / free self pubbed ebooks + gratitude + guilt (I stopped once she went wholly trad pub), so you can make tiers with intangible rewards.

    • Kate 13:22 on 2026-07-30 Permalink

      Oh I know, but I’d have to generate intangible content just as much as any tangibles. I would find it far easier to come up with Montreal City Weblog merch – hats, tote bags, t‑shirts – than to generate a constant feed of extra text or visual content for my special readers.

      Anyway, I don’t know how journalists face the paywall. You’re writing, you want to be paid – of course – but you also want your writing to be read. A paywall blocks most potential readers from seeing your work. Long term that isn’t good for journalism or for your career, surely?

      I don’t see doing it, in other words. Unless I can think about it a different way.

    • Blork 17:55 on 2026-07-30 Permalink

      I would wear the shit out of one of those t-shirts.

  • Kate 16:51 on 2026-07-29 Permalink | Reply  

    A ruling by Quebec’s administrative tribunal has allowed two private colleges, both called Collège Supérieur, to reopen for the time being so students can complete their programs.

    It’s never been made clear why Quebec withdrew the permits, so the background to this story remains a mystery.

     

    • H. John 22:13 on 2026-07-29 Permalink

      Kate wrote “so students can complete their programs.” That’s a possibility; but not a given.

      The TAQ did not permanently overturn the Ministry’s decision. It merely suspended its effects, using an interlocutory order, to protect nearly 900 international students from losing their academic and immigration status while the case is prepared.

      The decision allows the Collège Supérieur de Montréal and the Collège Supérieur de Sherbrooke to resume teaching immediately while the formal dispute over the Ministry of Education’s permit non-renewal plays out.

      I say it’s not a given because the Tribunal could very well rule in the government’s favour as soon as they hear the case (say in September). Whether or not the students have finished their courses, the schools will be closed.

      It really does go part way to explaining the “mystery”. The Ministry of Education stated it would not comment explicitly on the matter specifically because the legal proceedings are active and ongoing.

      The fact that as Kate wrote “the background to this story remains a mystery” is just another example of really poor reporting. None of the articles I read (before Tuesday’s La Presse) mentioned that the government was being sued. And since there’s already been an interlocutory hearing and decision , the lawsuit wasn’t filed this week.

      If the government loses the final, definitive hearing at the TAQ and the tribunal permanently forces the Ministry to renew the college permits, the government is highly likely to seek judicial review in the Superior Court of Quebec.

    • Kate 10:01 on 2026-07-30 Permalink

      Thank you, H. John.

      Previous stories had emphasized how some of the students were very close to completing their courses, so I assumed the surcease was to enable them to do so. I jumped to conclusions on that – thanks for correcting me.

    • jeather 10:19 on 2026-07-30 Permalink

      It really depends what argument the judge makes — they have in the past not gone to the Superior Court to fight to close schools after a loss. But 90 days does give students who are close to graduating time to finish their programs and ones who aren’t time to transfer everything.

      Even if they win in the final hearing and are allowed to reopen this will be difficult to recover from.

    • H. John 13:23 on 2026-07-30 Permalink

      @jeather You wrote “they have in the past not gone to the Superior Court to fight to close schools after a loss.” Could you give an example?

    • jeather 14:19 on 2026-07-30 Permalink

      Not in public, sorry. If Kate is willing I can send an article to her to send do you.

    • Kate 14:38 on 2026-07-30 Permalink

      Certainly. You have my email.

  • Kate 13:44 on 2026-07-29 Permalink | Reply  

    The Quebec health ministry is urging us to buy local produce because of cyclosporiasis, but this Gazette piece soft‑pedals any accusations toward the U.S., saying our cases don’t come from the U.S., and it then tries to spread blame to Mexico.

    We’re all at it. Carney is ending the so-called Netflix tax that forced American entertainment media to devote a portion of their takings in Canada to Canadian content. The Journal says Charles Milliard is supporting appeasement of Trump’s tariffs. It’s like we’re in the lion’s jaws and hoping that an offer of kitty treats will make it let us go.

     

    • jeather 14:51 on 2026-07-29 Permalink

      Well, that’s a way to differentiate himself from the other possible premiers, in this, the most anti-Trump province.

  • Kate 13:32 on 2026-07-29 Permalink | Reply  

    The federal government is putting in 2 billion for a new Montreal plant to build 45 new locomotives for Via Rail.

     

    • Nicholas 15:13 on 2026-07-29 Permalink

      Stadler makes some great trains. Too bad those aren’t the ones we’re buying.

    • Kate 17:12 on 2026-07-29 Permalink

      Wrong model?

    • Nicholas 18:54 on 2026-07-29 Permalink

      First off, diesel battery hybrids are the worst of both worlds: you need a diesel engine and a big heavy battery. And you have to find somewhere to charge it (though since these trains often sit around for hours doing nothing, not a best practice, it might not be too burdensome). The more common dual mode, diesel and catenary (wires), allows you to run on electricity under the wire and switch to diesel for the unwired segments. They’re also not good. AMT/ARTM/Exo bought some of those right before we scrapped the only wired mainline in Canada, and no one wants them so they’re scrapped. The third type is wire and battery, which is convenient when most of your route is wired, and you can recharge the battery there and then use it for the short other segments, such as a few km at the end or where there’s an old bridge with too low clearance for wires.

      The second part is that we should be getting multiple units not locomotives. Multiple units are like the old Two Mountains line electric trains, or the metro, such that each (or each other) car is powered with an engine below the floor or above the ceiling, while a locomotive is a big vehicle at the front that pulls unpowered cars. The MUs are much more efficient and better at accelerating, whether they are diesel powered or electric. Acceleration is really important on curvy, slow, badly maintained routes like the ones Via travels on. Basically the only advantage of locomotives are sometimes at the highest of high speeds (these trains are not for the new high speed rail, so that doesn’t apply) or for being able to use different coaches the same day (or if you already bought coaches recently, which we absolutely haven’t; some of these coaches are so old it’s laughable they haven’t been replaced, so given there are already bids out for them to be replaced they should just buy MUs). The main reason to use locomotives would be if you had a bunch of sleeper trains converging together from a few places and then splitting up to a few places, and you wanted to shuffle the coaches around every night without people having to switch trains. But for the Jonquière Senneterre split it’s just a single split and it’s easier with an MU as you don’t need a second locomotive in the middle; it’s like the Blue Line metro, you’d have the front three cars go one place and the back three to another and they can detach in under 5 minutes and be off.

      Given that we absolutely aren’t going to get wires on any of the long distance routes outside the Corridor in our lifetimes, we should be buying diesel multiple units (DMU). The batteries are just green washing. I don’t know for sure but I would bet that the increased efficiency of a DMU will mean fewer emissions than these diesel electric battery hybrid trains even though part of their trip there are no emissions. And since a DMU would do the trips in less time more people would take the train, which would also reduce driving; it wouldn’t surprise me that this heavier battery diesel hybrid runs more slowly than the trains today.

      The key thing to look for in these announcements is what are people talking about. The press releases and articles mostly focus on how final assembly (but not most of the work) will be done in Canada (it’ll mostly be in Spain), and that it will produce 1,200 jobs, and trains will be made in Canada for the first time in 25 years. They also add it will reduce fuel consumption and emissions, and increase performance and reliability. Note that nowhere does it say that this purchase will allow Via to run more service on current lines or add service on new lines or make service quicker. Nowhere are the specs for even which type of train will be bought, let alone the speed and acceleration and weight or proposed travel times. Just like when it was announced the STM will buy electric buses, no one talked about running better service, because that wasn’t the goal (and since we still don’t have a place to safely charge them in our brand new leaking garage, they in fact offer worse service). At least with digital health records or SAAQClic people can do things more efficiently, and the REM at least claimed to offer more frequent service than the line it replaced (even if it practice it fails to offer any service somewhat regularly). The benefits here are jobs, nationalism/protectionism and (arguably) the environment; rail service is not talked about because no one involved in the decision making cares about it, and so this purchase won’t improve it. Maybe when these locomotives reach their end of life in the 2050s we can buy the right stuff in the 2060s for delivery in the 2070s.

  • Kate 13:29 on 2026-07-29 Permalink | Reply  

    Elderly tenants were evicted from a Park Ex building four years ago, told the building needed repairs. Now it’s slated for demolition.

     

    • Kate 09:51 on 2026-07-29 Permalink | Reply  

      A plan is afoot to raze the row of buildings on Peel below Ste‑Catherine and put up a highrise that exceeds the zoning limit of 19 floors and will throw a shadow over Dorchester Square.

      Bye-bye McLean’s and Peel Pub.

       

      • DeWolf 10:21 on 2026-07-29 Permalink

        I think it’s a bit more nuanced than that. The current “de plein droit” zoning allows for a 19-storey slab that would cast even more shade over the square.

        A project here has been a long time coming which is why McLean’s already opened a new location further north on Peel a couple of years ago.

        And it doesn’t seem like it will happen anytime soon…

        // Giovanni Tartaglino tempère les attentes quant à la possibilité de voir le gratte-ciel lever de terre sous peu. « C’est un petit peu au point mort », dit-il en expliquant la situation par le ralentissement du marché du condo à Montréal. //

      • Nicholas 19:00 on 2026-07-29 Permalink

        Oh no, where will we ever find an Irish bar and a La Belle Province and an overpriced dep in downtown Montreal? Are some things not sacred anymore?

      • Kate 10:07 on 2026-07-30 Permalink

        It’s not those entities specifically. A lot of smaller places are disappearing before the pickaxe of the condo juggernaut. My visual memory of the city is constantly being deleted and I don’t like that. I’ve never so much as set foot inside McLean’s or the Peel Pub.

      • MarcG 12:09 on 2026-07-30 Permalink

        Vanishing Montreal does a good job of documenting changes like this

    • Kate 09:14 on 2026-07-29 Permalink | Reply  

      Metaphor in action: the airport has had to shut down U.S. customs operations because of a bad smell in the area. People planning to fly there today are advised to check the status of their flights.

      As of Wednesday afternoon, operations have resumed.

       

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