Metro reports Alan DeSousa quits Union Montreal. Except he didn't.

Congratulations to Metro, which had the scoop this morning (UPDATE: link now dead) that Saint Laurent borough mayor Alan DeSousa has quit Mayor Gérald Tremblay's Union Montreal party to join the opposition Projet Montréal.

This news is a bombshell, coming halfway into the mayor's third term. De Sousa is a high-profile figure in Tremblay's party. And yet only Metro is reporting the news so far.

That's because it never happened. DeSousa didn't quit Tremblay's party, and says he has no plans to.

Turns out it was another borough mayor, from another party, that defected today. Rosemont's François Croteau left Vision Montreal, saying Louise Harel's party has no political vision (I'm not sure if that was intended as a pun). You can read his full statement here.

Correction fail

Metro's story reporting about Croteau adds a "précision" that the story about DeSousa was incorrect. I'm no expert on the French language, but the definition of "précision" doesn't seem to fit "we got the story all wrong and made it all up".

More importantly, though, the original story reporting DeSousa defecting was still online, with no correction, four 12 hours (and perhaps as many as 26) after the truth was known and the "précision" appended to the Croteau story. The writer says (see below) that this was a technical problem.

What's interesting about that story, by reporter Mathias Marchal, is that it doesn't cite a single source for its information, not even anonymous ones. No "Metro has learned" or any of the other euphemisms that journalists use to say they have a scoop. It's written as if it's already public knowledge and its status as a fact is unquestioned.

Except, of course, that it's all made up.

Was it just a guess?

I'm curious how this story came to be written (see update below). It wasn't in this morning's print edition, and the timestamp shows it was first posted at 9:43am, with the press conference set for 11.

The press conference part was known. A press release announcing it was sent at 7:54am. It said a borough mayor would defect to Projet Montréal, but didn't say which one (or from which party). My instinct (and hey, it could be wrong) is that this was a guess. There are 18 boroughs in Montreal whose mayor isn't Gérald Tremblay. It obviously wasn't Plateau mayor Luc Ferrandez, who's already part of Projet Montréal. And it probably wouldn't have been Ahuntsic-Cartierville mayor Pierre Gagnier, who quit Projet Montréal. But that still leaves 16 people. A rumour might have been enough to sway an inexperienced journalist into running with the story.

What's ridiculous is how little gain there is from something like this. At best, other media will cite you for the hour between the time your report is published and the time the press conference confirms it. At worst, you look like a laughingstock because you got it all wrong, and the subject of your article has to issue a press release pointing out how you disappointed him.

This kind of thing always annoys me. I've seen so many times where a newspaper will get the details of an announcement leaked to them the day before and come out with an "exclusive" detailing them mere hours before the press conference. At least Metro didn't label it as an exclusive, though the damage is the same.

Let this be a lesson to other journalists: An official statement that partially confirms a rumour doesn't mean that rumour is correct.

And always, especially when you think you're leaking information the public doesn't already know (or when you're taking information from another journalist who appears to be leaking it), cite your sources.

UPDATE (Nov. 2): From Marchal, on Twitter:

À l'origine du problème: un quiproquo au départ lors d'une discussion avec Projet Montréal. (A)ussi bête qu'un mélange entre bld St-Laurent et arrondissement St-Laurent.

Mon erreur, et je me suis excusé à Alan DeSousa, qui n'aurait pas dû être mêlé à ça. La nouvelle fut supprimée après 10 min, mais un problème tech. a fait qu'elle est restée accessible par certains URL.

And to answer the question in your blog, no it wasn’t a guess to gain anything! ;)

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The City of Montreal has jumped on the open data bandwagon, setting up a website with raw data available for download.

There isn't that much there right now (a full list is available in their press release), but the fact that the city even acknowledges the use of this is a huge step forward, and means we should expect much more in the months to come.

The idea behind open data is that information be made publicly available in its purest form. Instead of charts or long reports, the actual spreadsheet tables or map files are posted online so that application developers can find new and interesting ways of presenting information for public consumption.

For an example, here's a Google map of the city's major construction projects currently under way.

Now, this map doesn't include highway projects that are done by the Ministère de Transport du Québec, or bridge projects under federal jurisdiction. But if those organizations had similar raw data available, a mashup of them together would be trivial. That information could then be used by GPS devices or trip planners to plan around construction sites. Or they could be used by radio station traffic reporters, or by investigative journalists, or by FTQ union thugs.

The best part is that the best use of this data might be something the people who put it online never even considered. The limits are not technological in nature, but merely the limits of the imaginations of thousands of computer geeks.

Another example: This XLS file of bike path counters. A few seconds in the spreadsheet and I find the busiest day for cyclists so far this year was Tuesday, June 21. And the top 25 days are all between May 30 and July 10. Without the raw data, I would have needed to wait for some bureaucrat to create an annual report, if they even bothered at all.

The STM should follow this example

One organization that I think could substantially benefit from an open data policy is the Société de transport de Montréal. Somewhere, it has a huge database of thousands of bus stops and schedules. It uses that data to feed its website, to give to Google Maps, and to create its printed schedules. But the data isn't available directly to developers. So independent apps that help people know when the bus stops have to scrape the STM's website for the information.

Giving the data away could help significantly in making these applications better, and in finding new ways of getting information to people that would encourage them to take public transit.

I look forward to seeing what data gets released through this website, and particularly how developers can take that data and do interesting and useful things with it.

If this kind of thing interests you, by the way, Montréal Ouvert is holding a hackathon on Nov. 19. Hopefully the city can put some more stuff online by then that can be played with there.

UPDATE: A congratulatory post from Montréal Ouvert, and more coverage from:

• The Gazette (and a blog post from data expert Roberto Rocha)
• Metro's Mathias Marchal
• 24 Heures's Mélanie Colleu
• La Presse's Marie-Eve Morasse

And here's Projet Montréal shitting all over it because it's not transparent enough for their liking.

UPDATE (Nov. 1): The city is launching the portal on Nov. 15. And a new iPhone app, NaviCone, is already making use of the city's construction site mapping data.

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Fairmount Ave., hardly devoid of history

With the 10th anniversary of Mordecai Richler's death approaching (and the resurgence of interest in his work), city councillors Marvin Rotrand and Michael Applebaum are doing some political organizing of their own. They're trying to get people to sign an online petition that demands the city "make an appropriate gesture to commemorate the contribution of Mordecai Richler in naming a street, a public place or building in his honour."

The petition doesn't make any suggestions, doesn't necessarily suggest renaming anything, and doesn't even demand that it be a street. But the discussion has begun, and it has 683 signatures so far.

The Gazette's Bill Brownstein made the first concrete suggestion: Fairmount Ave. in Mile End, where Wilensky's is located. "That shouldn't upset too many people, other than surviving members of the Bagg family," he writes.

Well, there's Fairmount Bagel, and Garderie Fairmount, and Fairmount Hardware. (Okay, maybe not that last one, it's boarded up and closed now.)

And there's the Société St. Jean Baptiste and other language/sovereignist hardliners, who just hate Richler. They denounce him for being divisive and demonizing politicians, as if they are themselves above both those things. They say he's an anti-Quebec racist, which is an odd thing to say since he himself was a Quebecer.

It's not that I agree with or think we should honour some of the meanspirited things that Richler has said. But if we can fawn over Pierre Falardeau despite all the crazy shit he's said, certainly we can do the same for Richler.

More sane nationalists like Jean-François Lisée agree it is time we name something after Richler. According to the Commission de toponymie, the name Richler currently isn't attached to anything in this province.

Rue Saint-Urbain and Avenue Mordecai-Richler?

Renaming is tricky

Rotrand has learned the value of public consultation in situations like this. The city administration had the best of intentions when it announced it was going to rename the generically-named Park Ave. in honour of Robert Bourassa. But residents and business owners mounted a huge campaign against it, arguing that not only would it cause practical problems like replacing dozens of street signs and forcing businesses to change their business cards, but that it would take away from the city's history rather than adding to it.

It's a no-win scenario. Rename something big and central like Park or St. Urbain, and you start poking holes in the city's history. Rename something small like a side street and you diminish the importance of the person you're trying to honour (Ruelle Nick-Auf-der-Maur, anyone?). Name a new street in a suburban development, and you might as well be naming something in another city.

Fairmount is an attempt at a compromise. It's not as important as St. Urbain or St. Laurent, but it's not some tiny side street either, and it's right at the heart of Richler's neighbourhood.

But Fairmount also has history, probably best known as the street that houses one of Montreal's two most important bagel makers. Renaming the street might make sense in that context, or it might not.

So we have a vague campaign that leaves the biggest detail up to a city bureaucrat. And the pundits throw out their ideas too.

I think, like with Park, this process isn't starting the right way. If this is to be truly a grass-roots campaign, it should start with the people who live and work on the street that would be renamed. If Fairmount Bagel and its neighbours want to mount a campaign to honour Richler, then the city should consider it. If some other street's residents want to do the same, they should consider that as well.

The problem with this scenario is that it isn't top-down, and the councillors are powerless to force it through. It depends on regular people spontaneously starting a major campaign with their neighbours to get something changed.

But that's the only way I can see this happening to everyone's satisfaction.

Of course, if it wasn't a street we were renaming, the risks would diminish along with the rewards. Other naming suggestions have also come forward, from a small park to a sandwich or drink. Rotrand tells Radio-Canada that people have suggested a cultural prize or library would make more sense.

But nothing carries the same punch as a street named after you.

UPDATE (Nov. 14): Chantal Guy explores the subject and agrees with the idea, even if Richler wasn't exactly a saint.

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I'm not necessarily in favour of spending millions of taxpayer dollars on massive air conditioning systems for the three or four weeks a year they'll be useful, but I have to admit this Projet Montréal video is damn funny.

(The original, for those who haven't seen it)

You can find the party's dossier on the subject on its website. It includes those pictures of people holding up giant thermometers on the metro.

If only all public policy discussions involved dancers (and am I the only one who thinks it's a missed opportunity that we don't see Richard Bergeron, Luc Ferrandez and Peter McQueen prancing around a fake metro car?)

(via Projet Montréal on Twitter)

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As you can imagine with these ads, there's a lot of missing context. The project has been under fire recently because of Sergakis's use of a "loophole" in the law that allows him to bypass a register (that could force a referendum on the subject if it gets enough signatures) by having more than half the people affected sign a petition.

The ad itself isn't what surprises me, though. What's interesting is that the ad turns onto a different page. Like newspapers that (used to, at least) start major articles on the front page and continue them inside, this one ends a colour ad on Page A3 with "advertisement continued on Page A8".

Peter Sergakis ad for Station des Sports (Page A3 of Thursday's Gazette)

Part 2 of the same ad, from Page A8

Not something you see often in advertisements. Most likely this was done because A3 has colour and exposure but limits the space given to advertisers to ensure most of it is editorial copy.

Why is this a loophole?

Anyway, back to that loophole. In this city, if you don't like a by-law change that affects the area immediately around where you live, you can sign a register to demand a referendum on the subject. If you get the required number of signatures, the city/borough must either hold a referendum or withdraw the project.

The "loophole" is a little-used way to get around this, by having more than half the people who would be able to sign that register and vote in that referendum sign a petition supporting the project. So if the area around a new development had 1,000 people, you'd need to get 501 to sign a petition and then there wouldn't be a register or referendum.

The reasoning makes sense to me. If those 501 support the project, why bother having a referendum where they would, presumably, all vote no? How is this a "loophole"? Isn't it just democracy at work.

I asked around, and the answers I got pointed to how ancient and unused this law is, and how it wasn't designed to be used in this way (even the city admits that). I see that, but it hardly makes it undemocratic.

The other answers mentioned how unfair it is compared to the trouble one has to go through to force a referendum. The petition can be passed around over months, while registers are open only for a day. The petition can be brought to people's homes, while registers can only be signed at borough offices.

On the other hand, though, far fewer people are required to sign a register to force a referendum than sign a petition to quash one. And again, if more than half the affected residents support the project, isn't that still the will of the people? Or should the minority overpower the majority?

What's left unsaid in calling this a "loophole" is the implication that those who sign petitions supporting projects don't really support them. That they're being fooled by people hired by developers to bribe people into signing petitions they don't fully understand. That when exposed to the issues in a referendum, they would change their minds and vote against.

That's not a far-fetched idea or a conspiracy theory. It's a legitimate concern. And the process should probably be changed, both to ensure that people have better access to registers and to ensure that those signing petitions in support of a project understand the implications of doing so.

But don't call direct democracy a "loophole" just because you disagree with a decision that you think is uninformed.

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Video: Alex Norris won't wear a tie (18:22)

Alex Norris is on a mission. The former journalist, elected as a member of Projet Montréal in the last election as a city councillor representing the Plateau, is fighting what he considers an archaic unwritten rule of Montreal's city council that sets minimum standards for "decorum" including the fact that all male councillors must wear a tie.

At the council meeting last week, Norris rose to debate a point about the city's democratic process (namely the fact that people need to be registered to vote well in advance of voting day, something he considers undemocratic), when immediately councillors from the governing Union Montreal party rose up to object that he wasn't following the rules.

This wasn't the first time that Norris showed up without a tie, and council chair Claude Dauphin had made it clear at the April meeting that the rules would be enforced - meaning Norris would be expelled until he put a tie on.

It might have ended as simply as that, except Dauphin wasn't chairing the meeting when Norris stood up. Caroline Bourgeois, of Vision Montreal, was filling in for him as he had other business to attend to. She refused to eject Norris, preferring to leave the decision to Dauphin when he returned. So instead, she pleaded with Norris to put a tie on so the council could continue its business, while councillors from Union Montreal objected with strong language (Marvin Rotrand called the move "infantile" and described Norris as a "juvenile delinquent"), and Vision's house leader Anie Samson rose to object about the ways other people were objecting.

Fifteen minutes later, after Richard Deschamps spent a full minute complaining about the 12 minutes that had been wasted so far, Norris finally put on a tie and was allowed to complete his point.

It reminds me of my old days at Concordia Student Union council meetings in terms of the level of absurdity.

"There is in fact no dress code at City Hall," Norris explained to me via email. "The speaker has traditionally imposed an unwritten rule requiring male councillors to wear ties but there is no basis for this rule in any bylaw or formal written code of any kind. There is a long tradition of progressive councillors objecting to this rule -- and then giving in and forgetting about it, which is why we still have an archaic dress code whereas other big cities like Toronto and Vancouver have long gotten rid of theirs."

Amazingly enough, there's a body to deal with these kinds of things. It's called the Commission de la présidence du conseil. But instead of taking a hard line either way, this body appears to have decided to leave it up to the chair of council to enforce "decorum".

"Bourgeois, a young (and quite progressive) Vision councillor, had told me that she found the tie rule utterly archaic and ridiculous," Norris wrote. "I surmised that in these new circumstances the tie convention would no longer be enforced. When I rose to speak, however, a number of Tremblay backbenchers went ballistic. I held my ground -- briefly -- to highlight the absurdity of the rule, then relented and put on the tie.

"So yes, this is a small protest -- one to which I have devoted very little time or energy but one on which I have made my views known and will continue to do so, periodically."

Norris stresses that this is his campaign and not that of his party. Luc Ferrandez and Richard Bergeron wear ties to city council meetings without complaint.

So why make this an issue?

"I think imposing any kind of dress code on a democratically elected body is anti-democratic and sends the wrong message about who we are and what we represent," Norris wrote. "We are not meant to be a class apart from the people we represent; we are meant to be 'of the people.' Also, dress codes inevitably carry cultural and class biases. Is city council meant to be reserved only for business people and white collar workers? If so, how should we regulate women's clothing? How low can a neckline go? How high a hemline should be permitted? And what about hijabs, kippas, turbans or any other type of attire for that matter? Where does it all end?

"Inevitably, a dress code carries biases of the sort that I think should be avoided in a democratic body representing a culturally diverse, cosmopolitan city such as ours. Ultimately, I think the final judges on this and on all other matters are the voters who elected us -- and that neither Claude Dauphin nor any Tremblay backbencher should have any right to tell me or any other councillor how we must dress in order to be able to advocate on behalf of our constituents -- just as I would not presume to tell them or anyone else how to dress at City Hall."

Norris added that he didn't see any ties on (male) candidates running against him during the campaign. "If we were good enough to win the votes of Mile End voters without ties, I figure we should be good enough for the council chambers without ties."

As for wasting council's time, Norris correctly points out that he wasn't the one talking during those 15 minutes. He simply stood his ground on a rights issue he believed in and watched as others went crazy over the most minor of issues.

Will Norris resume his campaign during the next council meeting? We'll see. He doesn't want to distract the council's business with such a simple issue, but he doesn't want to surrender either.

UPDATE: I should point out this post on Coolopolis, in which a barber tells Norris to "get a tie!"

UPDATE (Aug. 25): This week's council meeting (the first since the one in the above video) sparked a bit of media coverage about wearing ties, including a blog post by La Presse's Ariane Krol and a column by Patrick Lagacé, who doesn't own a tie (he has reaction on his blog).

UPDATE (May 19): Another incident at city hall, also ending with Norris putting on a tie.

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My beloved green recycling bin: zero cost, zero waste

I hadn't paid attention to the matter until recently, but apparently the city of Montreal has a problem with its recycling bins.

Actually, a few problems.

The first is that after prolonged use they tended to crack and break. That's okay though, the recycling bins themselves are recyclable, and there are new, stronger bins like the one above (after three years of use, it's dirty, but completely intact).

The second is that they're difficult to carry outside, requiring the use of both hands. More of an annoyance to everyone else really, requiring them to put the bin down as they open and close doors (or awkwardly wedge the bin against something to free up the other hand). But for people with limited mobility, it's a more serious problem.

Finally, the most pressing issue, it seemed, was that papers and light containers would fly out of the recycling bins and litter the surrounding streets. Though I'm pretty good about packing my bin and haven't seen any of my recyclables tumbling down the street, my job at the coop I live in requires me to clean up the front yard on a nearly daily basis, and it's obvious that garbage is piling up there from somewhere, most likely other green bins.

To solve all three of these problems, the city of Montreal has looked at three different solutions, which are being implemented in various boroughs. The city is studying each carefully to see which is more successful.

The bac-sac

The first solution is this contraption, a redesign of the recycling bin that allows it to carry more stuff but also be carried with one hand, and be easily emptied by collection crews. It seemed perfect, and the city was really excited about it, so they started a pilot project in three boroughs.

Blue-collar workers quickly predicted that the redesigned bins wouldn't last through the winter. Flexibility doesn't mean much when you're encased in ice, and the meshy sides of the container are just an invitation for a freeze-thaw cycle to permanently bond it to a snowbank.

Sure enough, in January, residents using the "bac-sac" (the city didn't want people to call it that) complained that it was too high, too difficult to carry and would break easily. In fact, most of the ones on the street were already broken in some way, as this Canoe.tv video shows. Residents wanted their old bins back.

It's a failure, but not one I feel too badly about. As predictable as it was, this is a pilot project, and you have to expect failures when you're testing something new.

Hopefully the city will learn from this and design a new container that is more sturdy and easier to transport.

Going big

Thinking, I suppose, that bigger is better, the Saint-Laurent borough is testing a large recycling container on wheels that has a lid and can be easily (even automatically) picked up and emptied into recycling trucks. The fact that the bins are in some cases larger than their owners is a bit of an issue though. You can't take them down a flight of stairs, so they have to stay outside at all times. That's okay if you live in a single-family house, but in an apartment building in a high-density area, it's a solution that doesn't work.

The sac-sac

The final solution to the garbage problem was to get rid of the idea of bins altogether and just have people put their recyclables in clear plastic bags. The Ville-Marie borough started this in 2007, and now the Plateau borough is climbing on board, with green guys Projet Montréal (who control the borough council) thinking it's the best option as they announced their environment plans this week. The big containers won't work in the dense borough, the bac-sac isn't strong enough, and the garbage problem caused by the old bins can't be left to continue.

An initial supply of bags will be handed out by June. After that, residents will need to buy their own bags, at a cost of between 10 and 50 cents a bag. Considering how people complained about the five cents a bag it costs for groceries, you can imagine how they'd feel about this. Some might decide they don't want to pay for the bags and just hide their recyclables in garbage. Or a household might run out of the bags and decide to throw a few recyclables in the trash because they won't be able to make a trip to the store for another day or two.

What's more, the bags themselves aren't recyclable. It's just plain wasteful.

And, to top it all off, there are problems with this system that are just as predictable as the problems with the bac-sac. Crews can be confused between the recycling bags and the garbage bags. Poor people scavenging for refundable containers can rip open the bags to get at that soda can or two-litre bottle, leaving a big mess. Or the bags can get stuck in the ice.

Still, Luc Ferrandez and the Projet Montréal people are smart, and I respect their opinions on matters such as these. It's very possible that this is an imperfect solution that is the lesser of many evils, and will only need to last a few years until a better one comes along. And statistics show that the boroughs using the bags (Ville-Marie and Verdun) show increased recycling by 10 to 15 per cent so far, which is pretty encouraging.

The short-term fix: more collection

Fortunately or unfortunately none of these have come to my borough yet, so we're still using the little green bins that could, and I'm still picking up garbage every day from the front lawn.

I certainly am not crazy about this idea of plastic bags, and I think the bac-sacs still need a redesign. A large bin on wheels might work for the small apartment building I'm in, something I can empty recyclables into and wheel to the curb once a week.

But one solution to the problem of overflowing recycling bins would seem to me to be to just collect them more often. Instead of two garbage pickups and one recycling pickup a week, have two recycling pickups and one garbage pickup. I already have more recycling waste than pure garbage, and once a composting option becomes available to me that will become even more so.

Then again, it takes two minutes to clean up the front yard, and my recycling bin works just fine. So I'm not exactly losing sleep over it.

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What is this the shape of?

And, for you smarty pants who already know, a tougher follow-up: why is it shaped like this?

UPDATE: This is, of course, a map of the town of Côte Saint-Luc. Those things on the right are exclaves, little pockets of Côte Saint-Luc land sandwiched between Hampstead and Montreal. They're tiny, but their history is one of controversy, bad blood, political power struggles and, of course, money.

As the 19th Century turned to the 20th, Montreal didn't extend nearly as far as it does now. Most of the island (especially its centre areas far from the shorelines) was uninhabited and undeveloped. A good chunk of that to the northwest of the city formed the town of Côte Saint-Luc in 1903.

A decade later, some urban planners fashioned their idea of an idyllic suburban community, a "garden city" called Hampstead. That town was carved out of Côte Saint-Luc, comprising most of the town east of Randall Ave. with the exception of a few parts: two small undeveloped areas near what is now the Hippodrome, and a strip that comprised Dufferin St. and one side of MacDonald Ave., between Dupuis and Aumont. The former, according to an article in the Montreal Daily Mail of 1914, belonged to the Montreal Jockey Club. The latter had already been developed and had owners who apparently weren't keen on joining the new town. Still, all these exclaves were to "eventually" form part of Hampstead.

The strip on the southeast side of Hampstead was eventually cut to just the west side of MacDonald Ave.

A map of Hampstead and Côte Saint-Luc's exclaves in 1945. Note the planned Hampstead neighbourhood on the other side of the railroad tracks, which never materialized - the land is now part of Montreal

Over the following decades, there were various attempts to solve this apparent geographical problem. In the early 1950s, Montreal proposed annexing the MacDonald Ave. portion. They brought it up again in the 60s. Each time there was fierce opposition both by Côte Saint-Luc (which wanted to keep the land and its tax revenue) and Hampstead (which wanted to annex the land for itself).

The issue isn't just aesthetics - there are practical problems with having tiny exclaves bordering two other cities. Whose responsibility is it to provide water to these areas? Who handles snow clearing?

The political quirk was even blamed for delaying response to a fire on MacDonald Ave. in 1961. Fire trucks were sent from Côte Saint-Luc, but a law prevented neighbouring municipalities from responding to fires unless asked. Côte Saint-Luc did ask for Montreal's help, according to the article in the Gazette, but residents still raised the issue. (It's a moot point today, as fire protection is coordinated on an island-wide basis.)

It also provided an interesting benefit for Côte Saint-Luc: the areas could be zoned for high-density residential construction - high-rise apartment buildings and condominiums - without affecting the views or traffic of the rest of the city. Nick Auf der Maur was among the ones to notice this.

High-density residential zoning on MacDonald Ave.

It was in the early 1980s that a three-way battle for land created a serious rift between Côte Saint-Luc, Hampstead and Montreal. Development had begun on a condominium project on the land north of Hampstead (at Côte Saint-Luc city hall, this area is literally referred to as "north of Hampstead"), comprising what is now David Lewis and Tommy Douglas Sts., as well as Decarie Square. Hampstead complained that the development would increase traffic in their "garden city." Montreal, meanwhile, complained that the development would tax the city's water system (a high-density development attached to a water network designed for a low-density area). It even went so far as to refuse to supply water.

In November 1981, Hampstead Mayor Irving Adessky proposed that his city annex the land. The proposal came at the demand of the developers, who apparently thought it would be easier to join neighbouring Hampstead (and get access to its water supply) than remain part of far-away Côte Saint-Luc. But Montreal had already proposed annexing this area of land, as well as the strip of MacDonald Ave. They took their respective cases to the Quebec government.

High-rise condos in Côte Saint-Luc near Tommy Douglas and Clanranald.

What followed was a harsh war of words, particularly between Côte Saint-Luc and Hampstead, that many in both towns still remember.

Eventually, an agreement was reached between Côte Saint-Luc and Montreal concerning the Blue Bonnets part: Montreal would build a road connecting Jean-Talon St. (at Decarie Blvd.) and Kildare Rd. through that area. In return, Montreal would give Côte Saint-Luc $10 million. The deal was approved by the National Assembly in 1982, with construction to begin in 1986.

But the construction never happened, because it would have been too expensive ($25 million, by Montreal's estimate). In 1992, Côte Saint-Luc mayor Bernard Lang went to a Montreal city council meeting and demanded mayor Jean Doré respect the contract. Côte Saint-Luc took Montreal to court to force the issue.

In 1994, another deal: Montreal would hand the land back to Côte Saint-Luc (though it would keep a small part east of Decarie Blvd., as well as the part above the tracks). The deal went through and marked the borders as they are now (not counting that whole merger thing).

New homes on Tommy Douglas St.

Development on the northern exclave, which began in the late 1980s, continued, with homes being built on David Lewis St. and Bernard Mergler Crescent starting in 1998. That part is now fully developed, with high-rise condos on the eastern tip and expensive-looking single-family homes filling most of the rest. Roads connecting it to Hampstead are limited - one is only one-way, the other goes by the town dump.

Battles with Montreal and Quebec have since made friends of Hampstead and Côte Saint-Luc. And, until some politician comes up with a new crazy scheme to mix it all up again, Côte Saint-Luc's exclaves are here to stay.

Note: This particular quiz has been in the can for months now - the pictures were taken when I visited the town to pick up a sign in October. While I was there I asked staff at city hall about the exclaves, and while they were aware of the '80s battle with Hampstead, they couldn't say why they existed in the first place. It's only with the recent opening of the Gazette's newspaper archive on Google that I've been able to piece together a clearer picture of the history of these two bits of land.

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The outburst was enough for an Agence QMI story to be written about Ferrandez's reaction (the QMI story quotes 24H, apparently unable to read Ferrandez's blog for itself).

UPDATE (Jan. 10): Ferrandez has cut out the media-critical part of that post, explaining in another that it was un-mayor-like. To me, the best part about Ferrandez is that he's un-mayor-like. But maybe it rubbed a few people the wrong way.

It's funny (and unusual) for us regular folk to see a politician air these annoyances publicly like this. Normally they just call the reporter directly, or call the reporter's manager, or complain to friends. If the case is serious enough, they might write a letter to the editor.

But what strikes me about Ferrandez's post is that this is part of his education process as a rookie borough mayor. He's not used to the idea of the media getting a story wrong and that error propagating more quickly than it can be stopped.

As much as I'd like to defend journalists and the media here, to say that he's got it all wrong, instead I can only offer that he should get used to this. This isn't the last time he'll be misquoted, not the last time someone will get the story wrong because they went for the sensationalism over caution, were lazy or just confused.

Journalists are human. They make mistakes. And with all the cutbacks in the news business these days, those mistakes are going to get worse.

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From February 2008: Will all weekends be like this?

The snow hit the fan Tuesday morning, with La Presse reporting that Projet Montréal plans to change its snow removal policy for the Plateau and Ahuntsic-Cartierville (the two boroughs it holds the mayor's seat for).

Instead of paying expensive overtime and equipment charges, the borough would increase the minimum amount of snowfall before they bring in the dump trucks from 8 to 15 centimetres. They would also no longer truck away snow on weekends, instead leaving it until Monday, to save money.

Note that this applies to snow removal, not snow clearing. The plows will still push snow to the side of the street and clear the way for traffic. What this will affect is parking, which tends to get creative when there are snowbanks.

Note also that this won't apply to major thoroughfares, which are the central city's responsibility, and so probably won't apply to most places travelled by city buses.

But small residential streets that get significant snowfall on weekends might have to live with it for a day or two more.

Despite the reported non-trivial savings this move would create ($500,000 to $1 million, by Projet's estimate), the reaction has been negative (or, at least, skeptical). Tristan Péloquin did a video streeter for Cyberpresse and only found one person who thought it was a good idea. Catherine Handfield found merchants whining about how a lack of parking would affect their businesses. Even Patrick Lagacé picks up the flag of the Pro Car Party (albeit reluctantly, and with a tiny car), saying snow clearing is expensive but needs to be done.

Give it a shot

Even though I'm perhaps a little biased because I don't have a car, I'm willing to give Projet Montréal the benefit of the doubt and let them try this plan. I'm just as skeptical as the rest, in fact I have an added concern: If the idea is to save money by trucking away snow only during business hours, wouldn't that cause incredible traffic chaos? Plus, why can't truck drivers be regularly scheduled to work on weekends?

This is the first major policy initiative that Projet Montréal has come up with since the election, and unlike many of its promises during the campaign, it's a logical, conservative, money-saving idea rather than a bold vision for massive spending. If we're going to use their control of the Plateau borough as a testing ground for their eventual control of the city, we need to let them try stuff. If it fails, they can always switch it back with relatively little work.

They're talking and listening

Part of this plan that intrigues me is also how Projet is going about it. While the Tremblay regime would just declare it a fait accompli and present it to city council, backing down only under overwhelming public protest like they did the Park Ave. name change, Projet is setting up a public consultation, Dec. 16 at 7 p.m. at the police brotherhood office on Gilford St.

Luc Ferrandez, the Plateau mayor, has also taken to his blog to get his message out directly to the citizens, bypassing the media filter. While I don't think La Presse or other media got anything wrong here, hearing directly from a politician on his own terms can help people understand a bit more of the context and reasoning behind Projet's plan. This is a clear example of why Ferrandez was right not to shut down his blog after the election.

Even if this project fails, doing so with democratic principles and by deferring to common sense would go a long way toward showing responsible leadership on behalf of Projet Montréal.

For the sake of municipal budgets, let's hope this idea is a lot smarter than everyone thinks it is.

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But then, journalists started to discover things about him.

The timing wasn't a coincidence. According to anonymous sources that came forward, Labonté's constant criticism of Mayor Gérald Tremblay and his Union Montreal party as being corrupt was a hypocrisy too outrageous not to be challenged.

When reports by Rue Frontenac's Fabrice de Pierrebourg (confirmed by Radio-Canada but ignored by TVA) and TVA's Paul Laroque came out that Labonté asked for and received large cash contributions from city contractors (including the water-meter-infamous Tony Accurso) while he was running for the leadership of Vision Montreal in 2008, Labonté's first reaction was from the standard politician playbook: deny, deny, deny.

It's a no-brainer. Either he's telling the truth that this is a smear campaign against him, or he's lying. But if he's lying, then the crime will destroy his political career and nobody will care about the coverup.

When Labonté said he would step down, supposedly to prevent being a distraction to his party, it was pretty obvious to everyone he was guilty. Innocent people don't resign during an election campaign because of false charges.

But the media had to play along. Without absolute proof of his guilt, they couldn't report what they were all thinking privately.

When Louise Harel accused Rue Frontenac and others of outright lying, as if these news organizations would all risk their reputations on such a serious accusation without conclusive evidence, nobody could say that was bullshit. When she blamed Union Montreal for making up a story, the media had to assume that was a possibility. (Of course, Union Montreal could very well have had a hand in this story, but they certainly didn't make it up.)

And so everyone had to act surprised when, a day later, Harel announced she asked Labonté to resign as a candidate for Vision Montreal. (Because the nomination period has ended, Harel could not replace Labonté on the ballot. So the Ste. Marie district of Ville-Marie will have no Vision Montreal city councillor to vote for.)

No apologies

During her press conference, Harel made it a point to "saluer" the work of investigative journalists, supposedly the same ones she had called liars the day before. She offered no apology for attacking their reputations the day before.

Neither did Labonté, who went tell-all in an interview with Radio-Canada television four days later.

I'm sure Rue Frontenac, TVA and Radio-Canada won't lose any sleep over it. But Harel and Labonté called them liars. They threatened to sue. They attacked the integrity of these organizations. Even though Labonté still denies taking money, it's clear he attacked them to save his own skin. Don't they deserve an apology?

They didn't get one that I could see, even though Labonté did his interview ostensibly to save his reputation.

Only a politician would think he could save his reputation while at the same time admitting he outright lied to people about his integrity.

And yet, journalists are treating his two-hour interview (which Radio-Canada has decided to show excerpts of but not air or put online in its entirety yet) as if he's come clean and can be trusted. Even though this interview contains such hard-to-believe statements as he lied to protect his party. So all the accusations he's levelled against Gérald Tremblay suddenly have a new air of trustworthiness to them.

I certainly wouldn't take Labonté's accusations against Tremblay at face value, even now that he really has nothing to lose by finally being honest with us. Nor do I take the statements of disgruntled former Vision Montrealers that they warned Harel about Labonté with anything other than a giant grain of salt. But Labonté's statement (supposedly quoting Tremblay) that this kind of corruption is what municipal politics is all about, that makes a lot of sense.

A poster plastered on the Champ de Mars metro window

What now?

So now that we know the problem, what do we do? Gérald Tremblay thinks he can clean up city hall, an absurd statement if I've ever heard one. Louise Harel still thinks she can sweep up the corruption, even though she was clueless about her right-hand man.

And Richard Bergeron, whose party hasn't been touched by a corruption scandal yet (notably because he's the only member of that party who's ever been elected) sees his numbers slowly climb in the polls.

I don't think Gérald Tremblay is corrupt. Nor Louise Harel. Nor Richard Bergeron. But if the past few weeks and months have shown us anything, it's that leaders can't always account for the actions of members of their parties.

Both Tremblay and Harel were let down by high-ranking politicians. If they can't trust them, how can they trust all 102 people running as city and borough councillors? Can any of the three parties really vouch for the integrity of that many people?

In Quebec City, the grandstanding is just as theatrical. Pauline Marois is calling for a public inquiry with a kind of urgency that suggests it can't wait until after the elections. Jean Charest wants to wait for police investigations to end first, and hasn't committed to anything.

The Everything Inquiry

We need a public inquiry. But it needs to be about more than municipal corruption, and it needs to be about more than Montreal. We need an inquiry into the whole system of municipal politics.

It's clear from the actions of politicians of late that they simply can't be trusted. We need to, from now on, work under a system that simply assumes that they are corrupt. Rather than punish people when the truth eventually comes out (because in many cases it doesn't), we need a system that has roadblocks in place to stop every step of this.

I was under the impression such a system was already in place. There's a reason that donations to politicians can't be made by giving that politician money. Instead, all funds must go through the "agent officiel", who keeps track of it. If such a system isn't in place for leadership campaigns, or for parties in general outside of election periods, then it needs to be.

According to Vision Montreal's website, the party has raised $300,000 from 1,180 donors. Union Montreal has raised about $105,000 from 297 donors (though that list hasn't been updated in two weeks). I don't know if that's enough to run an election in a city this size (even if you're not putting up posters). It's $1,000-$3,000 per candidate.

Not only do I not know if I can trust that this represents all the money going into party coffers, I can't trust that all this money really originates from the people named in those lists. And I don't know who those people are. I don't have time to call 1,000 people and ask if they have any connections with the construction industry.

This inquiry also needs to look to the other side of the equation. If politicians are getting money off the books, how can they spend this money without arising suspicion? Is the money being laundered somehow? Are they buying things outside the official party structure? If so, measures need to be in place to stop it.

We also need to take a step back and ask ourselves if the party system in general makes sense in municipal politics. We need to ask if political parties should be able to accept donations or if they should be entirely funded by the government (presumably based on how many votes they got the last time). We need to look at the way construction contracts are assigned. We need to ask if the contracting of construction work (rather than doing things in-house) makes sense.

In short, we need to look at everything.

Nine days before the election, it's too late to start now. But starting Nov. 2, the file needs to be opened. The problem is too systemic for whoever is elected mayor to fix it from the inside, no matter their honourable intentions. And you can bet it's in a lot more places than Montreal.

Of course, there's no need to take my word for it. The Gazette's City Eye blog is developing a top 10 list of things to do to combat corruption, taking suggestions from the audience and talking to experts. #1 on the list is the public inquiry, but other items are worthy of note.

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The idea isn't new. The city first approached the volunteer group Ile Sans Fil more than two years ago to talk about setting up such a system. Ile Sans Fil provides free wireless Internet through more than 150 access points in the city, most through places like coffee shops who pay ISF a small fee.

The city has even conducted studies and hearings on the subject, and a presentation given in November 2007 resulted in only one comment, in support of the project. In a report, filed at the beginning of 2008 (PDF), the city's commission on economic development recommended setting up a network with Ile Sans Fil.

For various reasons internal to the city's operation, this issue has been sitting on a shelf since then. ISF even appealed to the public in August 2008, (perhaps prematurely), though specifying that the group wasn't in danger if the deal fell through. ISF were expecting a call for tenders earlier this year on a free wifi project, which it would then bid on and be a clear favourite for, but it never came.

Both Tremblay and Harel should be somewhat embarrassed to have this on their platforms. Tremblay because the city hasn't acted on this yet despite the preliminary work being done, and Harel because it was an idea of the Tremblay administration that her party has now stolen.

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Apparently Mr. Peterson finds this blog interesting and informative about local issues (joke's on him, I'm just some moron on the Internet), so he asked me a few questions about the big city council meeting tonight and the city's new ethics hotline. (My uneducated take in brief: it sounds cool, but experiences in other cities show such hotlines aren't worth the cost.)

I started off the interview pointing out that even if people were interested, they couldn't watch this meeting live. No electronic media - TV, radio or online - are broadcasting this meeting. Not even VOX, LCN, RDI, Info 690 or CJAD. There was plenty of live coverage of tonight's preseason Canadiens game (two television networks and three radio stations, by my count), however. Gives you an idea about priorities.

Even the city's own website doesn't provide live streaming. The best you get are video clips posted online after the fact.

So if you want to watch the meeting, you have to be in the building. That's kind of sad. Not that most people would sit down and watch a council meeting from start to finish (especially when there's the season premiere of House), but you'd think we could find some space in the 500-channel universe to what news people pretend to be the biggest news story of the week.

The media is, of course, at the meeting and will report on it. The Gazette is quasi-live-blogging it. Radio and TV are providing updates as part of regular news reports.

But all of them are providing a filter on this news, instead of letting us see it for ourselves.

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Union Montreal's "English" website

I got an email Friday morning, just as the municipal election campaign officially began, informing me that Union Montreal has redesigned its website.

So, of course, I checked it out with my usual critical eye. I was pleasantly surprised by what I found. The design was clean and simple, the page looked fine even with the style sheet turned off. They've got the usual Facebook and Twitter and YouTube and Flickr accounts. They're even releasing their content under a Creative Commons license.

Great, I thought. So where's the English version?

After a bit of searching, I could find some pages that had a link at the bottom that said "English". That would bring me to an English version of those pages. But then I'd click somewhere and it would bring me back to the French website. Or it would be the English page and all the navigational text would be in French.

I asked the guy who emailed me, Marc Snyder, what's up with all that. He said they're working on it:

We're progressing in the right direction: I think this is what a work-in-progress is all about ;-)

Building a website that's bilingual isn't easy. Most cool content management systems don't think of building in support for bilingual websites. So many do so through third-party plugins. In this case, the website is WordPress based and they're using the Qtranslate plugin.

But to launch a website so publicly without even basic information in English (at first, there wasn't even an English bio for the mayor) seems a fairly major gaffe. Even now, most of its content isn't accessible in English. Instead, you get a short apology with a link to the French version.

Remember, this is supposed to be the anglo party, embracing both languages of this diverse metropolis. Vision Montreal, with ex-PQer Louise Harel who speaks little English, and Projet Montréal, which doesn't even translate its name into our language, both have better English versions of their websites.

Maybe next time someone from Union Montreal criticizes Louise Harel for alienating anglophones, she can point out the fact that people don't need to look up what "Arrondissement de militantisme" is before they can donate to her party.

Oh wait, she can't. Neither can Michel Richard Bergeron. Because both Vision Montreal's donation form and Projet Montréal's donation form have random untranslated bits of French on them.

I realize this is small-time politics and we're not dealing with real big budgets here, but these are forms people fill out to give you money. If you're so careless about translation, I can only imagine what kind of controls you have on the $100 I'd be putting in your campaign fund.

Colour me pas impressionné.

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Brenda Paris

Mayor Gérald Tremblay got yet more bad news when he found out that the president of his party, Brenda Paris, has defected to rival Vision Montreal to run as a borough mayor.

In addition to her various roles with government and non-profit organizations in the city, Paris is a member of the Société de Transport de Montréal's board of directors. There, she serves as the "transit users' representative", which means she represents regular people like us who take the bus and metro to work every day.

It's one of two seats on the board set aside for this purpose. The other is for a paratransit users' representative, and is currently held by Marie Turcotte. Both Paris and Turcotte have served since 2001, making for quite a long tenure.

All the other seats on the STM's board are held by municipal politicians. Borough mayors, city councillors, or representatives of on-island suburbs. Now, having declared herself as a candidate, Paris has become one of them. (One might argue she was already one of them being president of a political party.)

I'm pretty sure that when the "transit users' representative" was added to the STM's board, this wasn't what they had in mind for it. There are already far too many politicians on the board, and far too few people from the community.

I don't know Brenda Paris, and I have no reason to believe that she's anything other than an outstanding person. But after eight years on the STM's board, I think it's clear that she has more connections to municipal politicians and civil servants than she does regular transit users. It's not a personal fault, it's just the natural progression after eight years and being so involved in politics.

The STM has done a lot for transparency, and is continuing to improve (putting documentation online, for example, and releasing annual reports with useful statistics), but there are serious deficiencies, starting with the board of directors itself. While the agendas for meetings are published in advance, the items are vaguely described, and there is no supporting documentation available. Reference could be made to a new bus route in the agenda, but a description, map or schedule of that route isn't available before or at the meeting to interested users.

At the meetings themselves, time is set aside for questions from the public (which usually comes in the form of complaints about individual cases of inconvenience from people who clearly have nothing better to do with their time), but when it gets down to business, there is never any discussion of the millions of dollars of projects approved unanimously. The actual meeting, with a dozen items on the agenda, lasts for less than 10 minutes, with the secretary noting only who was present and who moved and seconded various motions.

It's time for a new transit users' representative on the STM's board. Perhaps even one selected by the transit users themselves instead of by political appointment. (I focus on Paris and not Turcotte here, though if a paratransit user was willing to serve on the STM's board I would suggest change there as well.) And I think some consideration should be given to term limits for these positions.

I don't know if Mayor Tremblay has the power to remove Paris from the STM's board because she defected from his party (or whether he'd be so petty as to remove her strictly for that reason), but even if that doesn't happen, I think she should recognize it's inappropriate for her to continue serving on this board in this capacity.

I'm sure Brenda Paris is an asset to the STM, and would even suggest that she be appointed to one of the political seats on the board in the event she wins in November's election. But she's taking up a seat that needs to be filled by someone with new ideas and a better perspective on the issues that transit users face every day, someone whose votes won't be clouded by the worry of how they might be seen on the campaign trail.

For that reason, I respectfully suggest that she resign.

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The move comes a couple of days after Boulos posted an item on his blog about how destructive party politics can be, based on a column from The Gazette's Henry Aubin he read. Though he asked for comments, the post only got one, from me, asking if this means he'll be sitting as an independent. I didn't actually thin he'd just make the jump right there.

As important in his decision is that Boulos represents the Peter-McGill district (PDF), which includes all of the Ville-Marie borough west of University (in other words, both anglo universities, though not the McGill ghetto). With the splitting of the borough into a third electoral district, his turf becomes even more anglo than it was (it used to extend to St. Denis). And having a sovereignist former PQ minister leading your party isn't sitting well with those constituents on Pine and Dr. Penfield.

His move also comes just over a week after he defended Vision leader Louise Harel on his blog, saying he's still a federalist Liberal but they can work together on municipal matters.

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He promises to highlight electoral platforms "as soon as the parties render them public".

I'm waiting too.

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Better pull these ads quick. There's a minor update to them.

Well, it's official. Benoît Labonté is stepping aside as leader of Vision Montreal so that former PQ minister Louise Harel can run in his place for mayor of Montreal.

I must say I'm surprised by this move. Not only does Labonté have a lot of ambition, but he's made his campaign for mayor all about him. The Vision Montreal website still links to his blog, which has his face plastered all over it and is now useless as a campaign website (which makes his assertion that his cause "isn't personal" absurd to the point of late-night comedy). They'll replace it by one from Louise Harel (who will hopefully hire Labonté's web designers instead of sticking with her current blog).

I could criticize Harel on many points. She was the person who gave us the whole megacity disaster (fortunately for her, residents of Hampstead and Beaconsfield don't vote for Montreal's mayor), and she wants us to just forget all that, saying "there's no question of rekindling the debate." She's an evil sovereignist who spent most of her political career in Quebec City and can barely string three words together in English. And she shares Labonté's habit of using lots of words that say nothing, not to mention his lack of humility.

But what gets me most is how matter-of-fact this all is. Five months before an election that Labonté has been preparing for more than a year, they have a meeting and just replace the leader.

The ease by which this happened reflects something I wrote about with Labonté in April: He and his party have no platform.

You can see it in Harel's press release, just like in Vision Montreal's "Manifesto". There's lots of talk of "true political and administrative leadership and attention to priorities," but no discussion of what those priorities actually are. The only thing that ties Labonté, Harel and Vision Montreal together seems to be the only point of the platform so far: A dislike of Gérald Tremblay.

Actually, to be fair, there's one other platform point hidden among the empty calories of text about "visionary leadership" and "bold vision": a desire for a radical change to the borough system and more centralized power at City Hall. It's something Labonté has supported and something Harel instituted with municipal mergers (though her bill created the mess in the first place).

But that still leaves a lot of blank that can be filled in by almost anything (provided it can be sold as bold and audacious) before November. They could fill it with Projet Montréal's trams and greenery if they go through with a merger, as Harel hinted at. But I'd like to think that Richard Bergeron is smart enough not to tie his reputation to this sinking ship.

In the end, this probably says more about Vision Montreal and our city's politics than it does any individual player. The parties can't be pigeonholed like they can on the provincial and federal levels (Conservatives/ADQ xenophobic conservatives who want to dismantle the government piece by piece, NDP/Québec solidaire crazy leftists who want to pour even more tax money into inefficient black holes, BQ/PQ left-wing separatists who talk radical to get elected and then soften up when they get into power, Greens the environment nuts, and the Liberals the centre-left lesser of many evils who have the experience to run government and the experience to exploit their offices). We don't really know what separates Union Montreal and Vision Montreal other than who's leading them.

Like with Labonté, I'm willing to give Harel the benefit of the doubt, and look forward to reading her platform if eventually it comes out.

But right now it's hard not to see the party of Pierre Bourque as a blank cheque to be cashed in by naive, ambitious politicians who want to parachute in and carpetbag their way into power based solely on their personal, vastly overestimated popularity combined with a lot of empty words from rejected Obama speechwriters.

UPDATE: Le Devoir agrees with me, asking why the left-wing Harel is uniting with the pro-business Labonté.

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De Maisonneuve Blvd. W. at Decarie Blvd.

You'd think that Côte des Neiges and Notre Dame de Grâce, being so young, urban, working-class and eco-friendly, would have lots of bike paths spread across its huge territory. And yet, when you look at a map, you see only one, along de Maisonneuve Blvd. next to the tracks.

So I'm sure plenty of people got excited when they heard last Friday that the borough is working to vastly improve its bike path network, adding a new east-west corridor on the north side, about where the 51 bus travels. It would start from the western end of the de Maisonneuve path, go up West Broadway, east along Fielding and Isabella, then along Lacombe and Édouard-Montpetit until it reaches the Outremont town limit, where it will link up with the new path along Côte-Sainte-Catherine Rd.

Well, almost.

You see, looking at the map (French-only PDF), you see this strange grey zone with a grey bike path in the middle. That's the town of Hampstead, and the grey bar in the middle seems to indicate that there will be a bike path of some sort on Ellerdale Rd. Except Hampstead hasn't announced any such path. (A city representative had no idea of such a thing being approved.)

View New bike paths in CDN/NDG in a larger map

The new network isn't perfect (notably lacking in north-south routes), but it's a start.

The only thing is, none of these are bike paths. They're, at best, bike lanes, meaning painted lines on the asphalt. In the Google map above:

• Red lines indicate shared roads, meaning there's no actual path, just some bike icons painted on the road. Cars and bikes are expected to share the road, just as they do on every other road in the city.
• Orange lines indicate bike lanes between traffic and parked cars. These are both annoying and dangerous, creating the perfect conditions for cyclists getting hit in the face by the driver-side door of a parked car.
• Yellow lines indicate bike lanes next to the sidewalk, where parking has either been removed or wasn't there to begin with. These are much more tolerable than the other two, but still aren't as safe as isolated paths.

These contrast with the path on Côte Sainte-Catherine, which is isolated from traffic with a median.

De Maisonneuve missing link is a death trap

Meanwhile, in case you missed it, the borough finally took a step a while back toward solving the missing link on de Maisonneuve Blvd. Before, the path would mysteriously end in a U-turn just before Decarie Blvd., only to reappear when it enters Westmount. Cyclists wanting to take both paths would have to navigate around busy intersections and lots of moving buses, all because nobody thought to connect the two.

The ideal solution would have been to continue running the path along the tracks, where it wouldn't have to deal with traffic. Unfortunately, that would require expanding the overpasses over Upper Lachine and Decarie, and finding a way to squeeze it in next to the Vendôme train station. (UPDATE: Fortunately, as James points out in the comments below, this is exactly the plan when the new superhospital is built sometime in the year 3577.)

So instead, the borough just painted a bunch of lines on the ground. Allow me to explain with pictures, starting from the West.

Existing de Maisonneuve bike path in NDG

The bike path between the tracks and de Maisonneuve Blvd. isn't fantastic. At best you'll have some poles keeping the traffic away. But on the plus side, there's no crossing traffic so your trip is uninterrupted.

Sharp turn is more than 90 degrees

Heading east, the first thing that happens is this extremely abrupt left turn, which I estimate at somewhere between 100 and 110 degrees. More importantly, the turning radius is tiny, especially on the westbound side. This is a recipe for bikes colliding with each other.

How many people do you think could make this turn at speed?

Assuming you make it out of that alive, you now have to cross de Maisonneuve Blvd. (you'll have to cross back a block later).

Clear as mud. Remember to go on the left side.

This crossing is confusing, partly because of the patchwork of asphalt, partly because of the faded paint, and partly because instead of going on the right side of the median, cyclists are supposed to go on the left (with traffic). This means that cyclists actually cross each other here, even if they're not exactly made aware of that.

Cyclists ignore their sharp turns and take a softer diagonal approach to the bike lane

These things might be contributing to the fact that I didn't see any cyclists actually making those two sharp turns. Instead, most went diagonally and crossed when there was a break in traffic.

Contrary to what you'd expect, here you have to drive on the left.

Looking east, other than the strangeness of driving on the left, everything seems routine here.

Looking west from Decarie

The uphill climb heading west is certainly straightforward.

Where's the bike path?

But heading east, the bike path disappears as the road becomes two ways. They don't have much of a choice here, there's simply not enough room for two lanes of traffic and a bike lane, so they have to share.

There's no sign saying so, but you're supposed to turn right here.

Then it becomes confusing. Not only is there no path, but there's no indication anywhere at the route you're supposed to take.

Once, there were lines indicating a bike lane here

Archeologists studying this area might eventually conclude that there was once a short bike lane here, but it has long faded away.

A cyclist cuts across traffic to make a left onto de Maisonneuve from Decarie

Again, it's not clear, but you're supposed to make a left turn from this lane back onto de Maisonneuve Blvd., returning to its southern side. There's no light for this, of course, so cyclists just kind of do what they want. For some, they'll cross one way and then cross the other. Some might follow the green light like other traffic (even though they'd be turning left from the right lane), and some jut wait until a break in traffic and cut across diagonally.

Careful here, or you and your bike will both end up busted

Right away, you're met with pothole hell if you're not paying attention.

Looking east from Northcliffe, you see a lane of car doors waiting to open

If you survive that, you face the gauntlet, sandwiched between speeding drivers on the left and parked cars or waiting taxis on the right, with the occasional jaywalking pedestrian thrown in randomly.

The bike lane disappears at the bus stop

When you reach the bus stops at Vendôme, the lane disappears. From the odd dotted line here, I guess it means this lane is some sort of bus stop/bike lane combo. It's not clear what that means if a bus is parked in the lane. Do you go on the left, trying to squeeze in between a bus and car traffic, do you wait until the bus pulls away, or do you hop on the sidewalk?

This car is in the bike lane. I think. It's not clear if there's a bike lane here, actually.

Finally, once you get to Claremont, you're placed in the warm, comforting hands of a separated bike path, and you thank your lucky stars you've entered Westmount.

From now on, you think, I'm in a place that actually cares about cyclists and their safety, and doesn't use awkward shortcuts to get around problems.

NDG's paths are a step in the right direction, but the borough still has a long way to go before it can call itself bike-friendly.

UPDATE (June 10): The Suburban's cover story this week is about NIMBY OUTRAGE that (some) street parking is being sacrificed in order to construct this bike path. They simultaneously argue that their businesses are doomed and that these streets are too dangerous for cyclists anyway. The borough passes the buck like a hot potato to Montreal city hall, and there's talk of possibly rerouting the path from Isabella to a neighbouring street.

Related Posts

• Metro screws up, but it’s just the wrong name
• Montreal, where data is becoming free
• The useless bike rack
• AMT allows bicycles on more trains
• Mordecai’s dilemma

The website for (long-shot) mayoralty candidate Louise O'Sullivan belongs in the latter camp:

partimontrealvillemarie.ca

Let us count the ways:

• <title>Test2</title>
• Candidate's photo in 256-colour GIF
• Photo of the city stolen from Google Image Search
• Drop shadows on everything
• Scrolling marquee
• Coloured boxes inside other coloured boxes inside even more coloured boxes
• Text is all in bold
• Date written via JavaScript
• No links in main text

I'm sure you can add more in the comments. Feel free.

Sadder still, there are other atrocities where this came from, people who presumably spent hundreds of dollars for these sites. Perhaps the "© 1999" at the bottom might have something to do with it.

Related Posts

• Metro screws up, but it’s just the wrong name
• Montreal, where data is becoming free
• Mordecai’s dilemma
• Tout l’monde transpire jusqu’aux orteils
• Sergakis’s ad turn and the development “loophole”