La Presse has a possibly useful list of summer festivals.
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Kate
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Kate
The West Island branch of the REM opens for a free preview Saturday and Sunday till 6 pm.
Agitation for a branch to the east end of the island is only bound to grow now.
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Kate
Linda Gyulai has a long, well considered piece about the decline of Milton Park. As she reports, “the entire neighbourhood makes up just six per cent of the area of the Plateau and a tenth of its population [but] accounts for 24 per cent of all crimes reported in the borough.”
DeWolf
“But at some point in the last year or two — no one can seem to peg exactly when — the individual dealers that prey on unhoused people in the area turned into conspicuous groups of criminals that roam the neighbourhood.”
That’s the big difference. You feel it even if you’re just passing through. The crowd at Milton/Park was always relatively chill and it was usually the same people you’d see day in, day out. Then at some point there was an influx of dealers — really nasty-looking types — followed by a lot of strung-out people from outside the neighbourhood.
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Kate
La Presse investigated what it’s like for city workers to clean up after the crowd that watches a playoff match outside the Bell Centre. The strange part is how many workers choose to do the job. It’s a very optimistic story.
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Kate
Two brothers were found guilty of murder in the second degree on Friday, in the stabbing of another young man two years ago. Details of their sentencing will be announced later.
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Kate
Pleas were made this week for a safer Park Avenue for pedestrians and cyclists, eleven of whom have been killed on the street since 2013.
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Kate
TVA talks to one of the women shot in the École Privé nightclub last weekend. She was competing at a high level in soccer and studying nursing; her leg injury will interfere with both. There have not yet been any arrests.
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Kate
The city will see 52 road construction sites this summer. (What was SMF saying about eliminating cones?)
TVA has a list and map.
Nicholas
All (or nearly all?) of these are provincial/regional roads or projects. Mostly highways and some transit. So not the city, which has its own projects (how I know, as one is nearby and already started but not on here).
Kate
That was one of the reasons SMF’s cone promise was so pointless. Ensemble used to slam Projet for cones too, perfectly well aware most of them were not placed by city hall but it gave them leverage with their motorist supporters.
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Kate
Fagstein has compiled a line-by-line guide to changes in the STM bus routes that will take effect on Monday.
(Augh! They took away the 15 not long ago, and now they’re abolishing the 30?!)
Nicholas
Steve’s point regarding public consultation is very well taken. The initial consultations were very vague, asking about values. And then they just put the routes online and that was it. I actually went through them making comments, and then tried to find a place to send them and there was nothing. I don’t think they need to deal with every concern, but there are some things they did that they could have done better that I was going to suggest (and which would inconvenience me, personally, but I still support them!), but they didn’t care. (Also, Steve, if you’re reading this, you forgot the 485.)
Kate, while the 30 is going away, there’s more than enough service with other buses. The 31 will run on St Denis. The 56 will run on St Hubert (and Chateaubriand southbound in the Plaza). The 13 will run on Christophe-Colomb. And all this is right on top of the Orange Line. That’s one of the comments I had: the buses are too split across too many streets. The proposed service is each route runs about every 30 minutes (couldn’t make it exactly 30, could they….). Instead if they combined all the buses onto one street, they could run that route every 10 minutes. So people walk a little farther but get 3x the frequency.
I don’t really care which route they pick (though it should probably be Christophe-Colomb, farthest from the metro and least commercial slow traffic), but instead everyone gets infrequent service that sometimes comes at the same time: for example, northbound at Rosemont metro weekdays the 56 comes at 10:35 am, the 31 at 10:42 and the 13 at 10:45. Three buses in 10 minutes, then a 20 minute break until the next bus. The least they could do is time these to perfectly alternate so you always have some bus every 10 minutes, you just have to figure out which main street to walk to.
DeWolf
When I was in Chicago a couple of years ago (twice in a few months), the L was a disaster but the buses were surprisingly good. And it’s because they run their system exactly like Nicholas is suggesting: buses run every 10 minutes on big arterials. Each of the big arteries tends to be a 10 minute walk from each other, so you have more of a distance between bus lines than we have in Montreal, but the service is more frequent and reliable.
Nicholas
Yah, ten minute max was the way to go, and this is something you can see around the city. The distance between D’Iberville and Papineau is about the same as the one between D’Iberville and Saint Michel, but the former pair also has a bus on de Lorimier. NDG has east-west buses on almost every street [omissions]: St Jacques, [de Maisonneuve], Sherbrooke, Cote St Antoine/NDG Rd, Monkland, [Terrebonne], Somerled, Fielding, CSL Rd (yes it’s diagonal). You could also consolidate some east-west routes in the Plateau/Rosemont; especially for longer distances going to the Green or Blue extension is often faster than say the bus on Bélanger or Rachel.
We could also use some stop consolidation especially on the east-west routes, which really slow buses down. I look forward to seeing the results with the 18 Beaubien and 161 Van Horne.
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Kate
A REM train with passengers aboard, South Shore bound, instead was diverted into the train wash and held there some minutes.
There are train buffs who would’ve been thrilled by this view of a backstage feature, but apparently not everyone was.
Major Annoyance
Count me among the “thrilled to get the opportunity to see some of the back of house stuff” crowd.
Speaking of train washers, has anyone else noticed that the STM doesn’t wash the roofs of their MPM-10s, like, ever? They’re downright grimy on top. What’s with that?
Chris
Thank god they’re not wasting any of the cleaning budget on that when so many entrances stink of piss.
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Kate
The REM has seen record numbers of passengers because of the hockey playoffs, and the opening of the West Island REM this weekend is also bound to be crowded.
EmilyG
I live in the West Island and if this were pre-pandemic times, I’d like to check out the weekend’s festivities, but I suppose the pandemic has made me a bit nervous about spending a lot of time in large crowds. Will definitely check out the new REM stations a bit later on, though.
And most of the local buses will have their routes changed, and there will be some new bus routes.
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Kate
A driver somehow crashed into a terrasse on Sherbrooke Street in NDG, early Friday. He’s in critical condition.
MarcG
It looks like a pretty minor crashed from the photo (he’s lucky he didn’t hit that light post), and whatever has put him in critical condition is the cause of the accident and not a result of it – heart attack or stroke?
Kate
Or fell asleep at the wheel.
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Kate
Weekend notes from Le Devoir, CityCrunch, Journal de Montréal, the Gazette, CultMTL.Nice weather in the forecast.
Mozai
I’m going to the Bandes-Dessinees / Comic-Book fest on rue St-Denis. whole street is like a con’s artists’s alley from Sherbrooke to Mt-Royal
Kate
Why do you say con artist? I walked down there Saturday afternoon myself, and while not everything is to my taste, the sellers don’t seem like con artists.
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Kate
Notes on what’s open and closed over the variously named long weekend.
DeWolf
Variously Named Long Weekend should be the official name!
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Kate
With the Grand Prix now taking place in May, there’s a possibility the event may conflict with a Canadiens playoff game. Grand Prix is the weekend of May 22‑24, not the impending long weekend.
Strippers at Montreal clubs are planning a walkout for Grand Prix weekend, in an attempt to establish their right to be paid.
SMD
All sex workers are encouraged to strike: “On May 23 the Sex Work Autonomous Committee is inviting sex workers and allies to participate in activities and a protest — and encourage sex workers to deprive the city of their services. Their demands? Abolishing the bar fee in strip clubs. Gaining worker status with Quebec’s labour board, the CNESST, to get protections like sick leave, disability, Employment Insurance, and a way to report unjust or unsafe labour practices. Fully decriminalizing sex work. And eventually, even a wage.” From some deep reporting by The Rover.
Kate
Thank you, SMD.
PatrickC
Maybe the strippers should join up with the blue collar workers who, as you reported, intend to “make themselves visible” during the Grand Prix days.
dwgs
How about we do a Freaky Friday thing? The cols bleu will be exceptionally visible on strip bar stages while the strippers will be invisible as they hang out in the lunch rooms of city works facilities. Win win.
Kate
Kind of a Full Monty approach?
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