After a year of planning and months of construction, CFCF’s newscasts officially moved into their new Studio 12 home today. The noon newscast was the first to inaugurate the studio. CTV Montreal has been doing its newscasts from a temporary set in their newsroom since early July.
The new studio was designed from scratch, is larger (or at least it feels that way) and has plenty of new features. The most striking change besides the design is the fact that it has windows. This studio was designed as a storefront, allowing cameras to see out and potential viewers to see in. (Management there isn’t sure how this will work out – they don’t expect any Today Show-style sign carrying, but you never know.)
The studio is also “HD-ready”, which means cabling is HD-compatible and great attention has been made to detail that wouldn’t have mattered in standard-definition days. But the word is that getting high-definition cameras and editing equipment is still a year or two away.
I got a chance last week to tour the new studio as final preparations were being made to launch it, under the condition that I wait until now to show you photos.
But the biggest change to come out of this won’t take effect on Sept. 6. Instead, the STM is giving advance notice that 26 of its routes will be changing numbers in January, when the winter schedule takes effect.
The change, according to an internal publication that was posted to the metrodemontreal.com forum, is to make things easier for users to understand, by having the number indicate the type of bus route. Express and reserved-lane buses will be numbered 4XX, where XX matches the last two digits of the associated all-day route on the same axis. The 221, for example, is being renumbered 411, so people will see it as the express version of the 211. The 182, an express bus to Pointe aux Trembles, becomes the 486, or the express version of the 186.
The changes will also carve out a spot for seniors’ shuttles, which have awkwardly been given numbers mixed in with West Island routes. (The 261 is a West Island route, but the 260 and 262 are both seniors’ shuttles.)
Roughly speaking, here’s how the numbering system works now:
1-9: Reserved for metro lines
10-199: Regular bus routes
200-299: West Island bus routes (and seniors’ shuttles)
300-349: Unused
350-399: Night bus routes
400-499: Express (limited-stop) routes
500-599: Reserved-lane routes (545 is used for special shuttles)
600-699: Unused
700-799: Special routes (so far only 747 is used, for the airport shuttle)
800-899: Unused
900-999: Unused
In January, the system will be reworked so it becomes more like this:
1-9: Reserved for metro lines
10-199: Regular bus routes
200-249: West Island bus routes
250-299: Seniors’ shuttles
300-349: Unused
350-399: Night bus routes
400-499: Express, Metrobus, Trainbus and reserved-lane service
500-599: Unused
600-699: Unused
700-799: Special routes (particularly those marketed to tourists)
800-899: Unused
900-999: Unused
Bus routes being reassigned into the 400 range:
Current route
New number
Matching route*
77 Cégep Marie-Victorin
444
44 Armand Bombardier
120 Lachine/LaSalle
495
195 Sherbrooke/Notre-Dame
143 Métrobus Charleroi
440
140 Fleury
148 Métrobus Maurice-Duplessis
448
48 Perras
159 Métrobus Henri-Bourassa
469
69 Gouin
173 Métrobus Victoria
496
196 Parc Industriel Lachine
182 Métrobus Sherbrooke
486
186 Sherbrooke Est
184 Métrobus Bout-de-l’Île
487
187 René-Lévesque
190 Métrobus Lachine
491
191 Broadway/Provost
194 Métrobus Rivière-des-Prairies
449
???
199 Métrobus Lacordaire
432
32 Lacordaire
210 John Abbott
419
219 Chemin Sainte-Marie
214 Des Sources
409
209 Des Sources
221 Métrobus Lionel-Groulx
411
211 Bord-du-Lac
261 Trainbus Saint-Charles
401
201 Saint-Jean/Saint-Charles
265 Trainbus Île Bizard
407
207 Jacques-Bizard
268 Trainbus Pierrefonds
468
68 Pierrefonds
505 R-Bus Pie-IX
439
139 Pie-IX
506 R-Bus Newman
406
106 Newman
535 R-Bus Du Parc/Côte des Neiges
435
None
* Some of these are best guesses. There is no official list.
There are a few other changes as well. Three buses are being added to the 7xx range:
167 Casino becomes 777 Casino (get it? Triple-sevens?) (No word on its alternate routes toward the Casino and beach)
169 Île Ronde becomes 767 La Ronde (supposedly in reference to Expo 67)
515 Vieux-Port/Vieux-Montréal becomes 715
As well, some routes are changing numbers so they fit in better with this scheme:
132 Viau becomes 136 Viau, so there can be an express bus at 436 (the 432 is being used for the Lacordaire express, matching 32). a rapid bus transit system is being conceived along Viau.
251 Sainte-Anne becomes 212 Sainte-Anne so the 250+ block can be reserved for seniors’ shuttles. The 251 is a special minibus that carries regular passengers through the narrow streets of Sainte-Anne-de-Bellevue. The number it takes used to belong to the 212 Lakeshore, which was a rush-hour double of the 211 that took Lakeshore Rd. all the way to Dorval Ave.
480 Pointe-Nord/Île des Soeurs becomes 178, presumably because they will no longer consider this route an express bus
As the 132 case shows, this new system of numbering has a simple flaw: There are more than 100 regular bus routes, which means there isn’t enough space in the 4xx range to accommodate them all. We’re adding 20 to the eight existing routes, which means a quarter of the numbers are already taken.
Plus, a lot of these 400-series express routes aren’t exact matches to the regular ones, which could confuse users. And then there’s the cost of replacing hundreds of bus stop signs.
Still, it’s not necessarily such a bad idea. It makes it easier to see at a glance whether a bus is a local or express bus, and giving reserved-lane buses their own category makes less sense now that we’re adding reserved bus lanes all over the island.
But some of these numbers have historical significance. The 210 has a special place in John Abbott lore. The 167 and 169 are no doubt on a lot of tourist information, and the 132, 182 and 184 have existed for many years.
But I guess people will just get used to it.
More evening service on three routes beginning Sept. 5/6
There are some changes, though most are minor, that are taking effect now. They are:
77 Cégep Marie-Victorin gets 5 new departures northbound and 5 new departures southbound added to the end of its day, extending its service from 3pm to 7pm northbound and from 6:15pm to 9:45pm southbound. This represents an increase of 1,000 hours a year to this route, according to an STM press release. The route remains a school-day-only route.
173 Métrobus Victoria gets evening service, now going to 10pm instead of 7pm in each direction. Nine new departures eastbound, with service about every 20 minutes during that span. Westbound, service during rush hour drops to every 15-20 minutes from every 10-15, so the total number of departures actually only goes up by one. Still, the STM says these changes will add 2,800 hours of service a year.
194 Métrobus Rivière des Prairies gets evening service, running until 10pm weekdays instead of 7pm, in both directions. Six new departures in each direction will add 4,000 hours of service a year to the line, the STM says. It remains Monday-to-Friday only.
West Island routes to synchronize with trains
The STM has announced additional departures for West Island buses serving the Roxboro-Pierrefonds and Sunnybrooke train stations, so they are better synchronized with trains to and from Montreal during rush hour. As far as I can tell, these are not reflected in the posted schedules for these buses. Changes that are marked are noted below:
205 Gouin gets two new departures eastbound – one in the morning and one in the early afternoon – so wait times are reduced. It gets a single new departure westbound at exactly 6pm (other departures remain unchanged), five minutes after the 5:25pm train from Central Station arrives. The STM says departures are being synchronized with the train, but if that’s the case it hasn’t been reflected in the fall schedule yet.
206 Roger-Pilon gets three new departures eastbound in the morning rush-hour, and the times synchronize well with the Deux Montagnes train inbound, with buses arriving 5-10 minutes before the scheduled departure. Those taking this bus for the 9:12am departure are screwed though, as it comes in the middle of a bizarre 48-minute gap in service (otherwise it’s about every 20 minutes). Those people will have to take a bus that leaves Fairview at 8:04am (16 minutes earlier than the one they’d currently take) and wait about 45 minutes at the station.
208 Brunswick gets two new departures westbound in the afternoon rush-hour and three new departures eastbound in the morning rush-hour. They don’t appear to be properly synchronized with train departures and arrivals.
209 Des Sources gets three new departures southbound before 8:30am, dramatically reducing time between departures in the morning rush from about 30 minutes to about 15. Northbound schedule is identical. The route remains Mondays to Fridays only.
Major changes to seniors’ shuttles
Route changes, more stops and additional departures are some of the changes for seniors’ shuttles, which are minibuses that take zigzag routes to serve residences, shopping centres and other points of interest a senior might choose to go to.
252 Navette Or Montréal-Nord will serve Place Bourassa and the local Wal-Mart with stops in their parking lots, reducing the distance seniors will have to walk. Otherwise the route is unchanged. (Press release)
254 Navette Or Rosemont gets a major route change, so much so that it’s barely recognizable. Now instead of a circular route with service in one direction, it’s a linear route with two. Gone is service to the Viau metro station, the borough office on Iberville and the mall (and other stops) on Jean-Talon. Added are the CLSC Rosemont, Loblaws and Angus Square on Rachel St., and the Galeries d’Anjou. The number of departures also goes down, from 10 departures in one direction to eight departures in two (four in each direction). Departures are now two hours apart instead of about 45 minutes, though it will mean less of having to go round in an hour-long circle to get from Maisonneuve-Rosemont Hospital to Beaubien and Lacordaire. (Press release)
256 Navette Or LaSalle has its route made a bit more complex, adding stops. It will also see an additional departure – westbound at 3:30pm – and the schedule changes a bit. (Press release)
257 Navette Or Rivière des Prairies sees a route change, adding stops along Maurice Duplessis, and cutting the detour that takes it to the CLSC. It adds one departure eastbound at 3:35pm, making four in each direction. The departures are also a bit less predictable, no longer exactly two hours apart and leaving each terminus on the hour. (Note someone screwed up the Planibus, marking eastbound as westbound and vice-versa, and referring to its terminuses as Angrignon Blvd. and Jean-Milot St., which are the end points of the 256) (Press release)
Following two days of rumours (thanks mainly to Pierre Trudel), Cogeco this morning confirmed that it is switching formats for CKAC 730AM, Montreal’s only major commercial French-language AM station. It will go from being an all-sports station to an all-traffic station effective Tuesday morning. After the announcement, Cogeco immediately pulled the plug on sports broadcasting, and is running music until then, interrupted every half hour by a three-minute announcement by Cogeco VP Richard Lachance.
Live sports broadcasts will be carried on Cogeco’s news-talk 98.5FM, and some (but not all) personalities will move there as well. Lachance tells LCN that seven employees will be affected, four of whom will find new functions at 98.5. Michel Villeneuve and Ron Fournier, notably, will have shows on 98.5, in the evening (when the station currently rebroadcasts shows from earlier in the day).
In a bitter and ridiculous press release, Cogeco mainly blamed its competitors, who opposed a fast-track process for Cogeco’s all-traffic licenses to be approved by the CRTC. It complained that nobody was interested in the vacant 690 and 940 frequencies formerly held by Corus’s all-news stations and purchased by Cogeco when it bought Corus Quebec, without addressing the claims by competitors like Bell Media that Cogeco was unwilling to negotiate selling the former stations’ transmission towers and other facilities.
But mostly it stresses that it had to establish an all-traffic station by the day after Labour Day, when supposedly the fall traffic season will begin. Waiting until October (or later) would be unacceptable. It’s “urgent” that it has to be up by September, Cogeco says. People relying on traffic reports every 10 minutes just isn’t enough.
What’s not said in the press release is that this is all about money. Cogeco’s not in a rush to get this all-traffic station on the air because it cares about Montreal drivers. It’s in a rush because it cares about the $1.5 million subsidy from the Quebec government. The agreement between Cogeco and the Ministry of Transport says the stations must be operating by Oct. 31, but the contract actually begins Sept. 1. (It doesn’t make clear what happens if Cogeco misses its deadline.) Once that happens, the station begins collecting $125,000 a month from the government to pay its staff.
Thankfully Cogeco doesn’t own a popular English-language AM station, so it can’t shut that down to turn it into an all-traffic station. Instead, it will wait for the CRTC to decide on 940AM, and is asking them to hurry in making a decision (they are hurrying, and had already tightened deadlines for applications for that frequency).
When this all-traffic station idea was announced in May, I panned it as a waste of $9 million of government money over three years for something that just about every radio station already provided for free ad nauseam. Cogeco’s competitors agreed, and demanded an open call for applications for those frequencies, which the CRTC granted.
Now it seems even more obvious how bad an idea it is. Cogeco has compared its $1.5-million subsidy against the ad revenue from CKAC and decided it would rather the government subsidy. The Quebec government is essentially using public money to push Cogeco into shutting down a popular all-sports radio station and replace it with something that is redundant to every other station in the market.
(One might ask if Cogeco didn’t want to shut down CKAC, why not apply for an all-sports radio station on 690AM and bring it back? The press release is silent on this.)
It’s a sad day for Montreal radio, and an even sadder day for common sense and government spending.
CKAC 730AM will go all-traffic Tuesday, Sept. 6 at 4:30am. The CRTC hears applications for 690 and 940AM (Cogeco has withdrawn its application for 690) on Oct. 17.
Updated Feb. 23, 2012, with the latest information on transmitters (CKMI now on permanent antenna, CFTU transmitting in digital).
Mount Royal tower is about to go digital
I wrote a feature that appeared in Saturday’s Gazette (Page E3, for those clipping) about the transition from analog television to digital, whose deadline is Aug. 31.
The main story focuses mainly on how local broadcasters are coping with the transition. It’s a big endeavour, and with less than 10% of Canadian households still using antennas to get their television service, it’s difficult to justify the cost (in the neighbourhood of $1 million per transmitter, but varying widely) of replacing the analog with digital.
That’s to say nothing about the consumers, many of whom are on the lower end of the income scale, who must now spend money on new equipment.
The sidebar focuses on consumers, and tries to explain how people can prepare. If you haven’t already heard 1,000 times, cable and satellite subscribers are unaffected. If you get your service by antenna, you either need a TV with a digital ATSC tuner (most new HDTVs have one) or a digital converter box.
My editor was very generous with the assigned length (in all it clocks in at a bit under 2,000 words), but even then there’s a lot of information I had to leave out, including a few conversations I had with actual TV viewers. I’ll try to include most of that information here.
The digital transition in Montreal
First, here’s how the digital transition is going for the nine television stations broadcasting in Montreal (updated 9am Sept. 1):
Five (CFCF/CTV, CFTM/TVA, CIVM/Télé-Québec, CFJP/V and CJNT/Metro 14) have completed the transition, switching off their analog transmitters and replacing them with digital ones that are now transmitting. They should all be at full power from their permanent antennas.
Three (CBMT/CBC, CBFT/Radio-Canada,CKMI-1/Global) have shut down their analog transmitters and have digital ones operating on their permanent assigned channels, but are not yet operating from what will be their permanent antenna on top of the Mount Royal tower. (CBMT and CBFT are also running at reduced power.) Those who don’t get these signals now may see that improve over the coming weeks.
One (CFTU/Canal Savoir) has been given a two-month extension to make the transition. It is still broadcasting in analog until the digital transmitter begins running.
Aaron Rand's ID card from 30 years ago, unearthed by Rob Braide in May. (I've blurred out his social insurance number so you don't identity-theft him)
When your goal is to get a job as a radio host at a commercial English-language radio station in Montreal, your choices are rather limited.
Aaron Rand left CFQR (the Q) in May after more than 20 years when it became clear management wasn’t eager to renew their contract with him. At the time he wasn’t sure where he would go, but he knew he wanted to stay in Montreal, he wanted to stay in radio, he didn’t want to work at a station like K103 and he wanted to have some editorial freedom wherever he ended up. With the Cogeco door slammed pretty tight behind him, the only game left in town was Astral, and he was hoping for something at either CHOM or CJAD (the latter being the better choice because it would mean more talk time and less of being a DJ).
Now it seems Rand has gotten his wish. He won’t be reunited with his former partner Paul (Tasso) Zakaib, but he will have a show on a popular radio station. Rand announced on Facebook and The Gazette published an article about the same time, both saying he is taking the weekday afternoon slot at CJAD, 3 to 7 p.m., starting Sept. 6 (the day after Labour Day). Note that this puts him directly opposite Mitch Melnick on Team 990.
The CJAD timeslot Rand is taking over is currently held by Ric Peterson, and there’s a bit of musical chairs as people are shuffled into new slots. The details, according to The Gazette and other sources:
Ric Peterson moves to 12-3pm, the latter two hours of which will be with Rand’s former cohost Suzanne Desautels. This replaces Kim Fraser’s show and the first hour of Dan Laxer.
Kim Fraser moves to weekends, 1-4pm, which replaces Anne Lagacé Dowson on Saturdays and a few shows on Sundays.
Dan Laxer loses his weekday afternoons gig but keeps his Sunday trivia show from 9am-12pm. He writes on Facebook that “I won’t lie, I am disappointed, and I will miss weekday afternoons. Having my own radio show on CJAD has changed my life in so many ways, and opened so many doors. I’m hoping to nudge them open just a little bit wider and see where they lead.” But he says he isn’t leaving CJAD.
Barry Morgan gets a new show 7-10pm weekdays, bumping Dan Delmar. He’ll also contribute sports news to Rand’s show.
Dan Delmar writes on his blog that he’ll stay at CJAD as a daytime programming producer, and says the change is bittersweet, because he loses a show he’s worked very hard on, but at the same time he’s not “a radio guy” and will enjoy having more free time. He also writes that he’ll be hosting two weekly shows, details to come later.
Legal Lounge with Christopher Dimakos, Ann Shatilla’s Hollywood Trend Report and the Dr. Schwarcz Show, which are on Sunday afternoons and being displaced by Kim Fraser, will find new homes on the schedule. “All those shows will remain part of our line-up”, says Brand Director Chris Bury. A final schedule is expected within a few days.
Rand’s Facebook fans are thrilled, and the positive reaction to his return to the airwaves easily drowns out those who are disappointed by Laxer, Delmar and Dowson losing their shows. (On the Radio in Montreal discussion group, moderator Sheldon Harvey is a bit skeptical, suggesting that people might not be sufficiently prepared for a switch from music to news/talk programming)
It’s disappointing that young talent has to suffer to bring back a star, but as many people in the industry have told me: That’s the business of radio.
Meanwhile, at Rand’s old home at 92.5, changes are afoot for the same day. Cat Spencer takes his job as Rand’s morning-show replacement, and the station is rebranding itself “The Beat”, less than two and a half years after rebranding itself from “Q92” to “92.5 the Q”. It’s unclear what kind of format change will come along with the rebranding, but there’s speculation that the station will try to be more like CJFM (Virgin Radio 96) in order to steal some of the No. 1 station’s audience and give Montrealers even less choice in music selection on the radio.
John Bartlett to be voice of Habs for Team 990
It’s probably a coincidence, but competing AM station Team 990 also has a Thursday announcement that was leaked to The Gazette. John Bartlett, formerly the announcer for the Toronto Marlies (the Leafs’ farm team) will join CKGM as play-by-play man for the Canadiens. The station won the rights to Canadiens games away from CJAD this summer.
Ted Tevan, one of Montreal’s talk radio greats, inconveniently died on Friday night, the time when statistically news has its smallest impact. Though it might have taken a few days, his colleagues and others have taken notice and offered their thoughts and stories.
I never met Tevan myself, so I have nothing to add, but I wanted to compile everything in one place.
Two bargaining units of The Gazette’s production department were locked out on Sunday after rejecting the employer’s final contract offer.
One unit is tiny, representing a grand total of two platemakers (a position the Gazette wants to abolish because of advances in technology). The other is larger, representing 20 full-time employees and many more part-time and temporary employees in the mailroom.
Because of my obvious conflict of interest with this case (and, frankly, my lack of familiarity with the issues), I won’t comment on it. But I’ll post this for the record and link to coverage elsewhere, which discusses the main issues (hours of work is a major one):
For the sake of clarity, I’ll point out that most departments at The Gazette are unaffected by this lockout. Editorial, advertising and other employees who work downtown are part of an entirely separate union, the Montreal Newspaper Guild. The people who actually deliver newspapers to your doors (well, the few of you who still get home delivery of a newspaper these days) are also not affected. The plan is for the paper to continue being produced, and so far that is exactly what has happened, with managers filling in for locked-out employees.
In meta news, Montreal City Weblog’s Kate McDonnell has said she will no longer link to Gazette stories online until the lockout is settled (she did the same thing for the Journal de Montréal during its lockout).
It’s one of those things I wanted to do for so long. I’ve lived in this city my entire life, watched countless performances by stand-up comics (in both languages) on the Just for Laughs stage at Théâtre Saint-Denis, and wanted to go myself. But for various reasons (mainly a lack of availability combined with a fear of the price tag), I never saw one of its famous galas in person. I’ve been to outdoor events (much of which isn’t exactly funny, the giant screen showing Gags reruns notwithstanding), but never bought a ticket to watch an indoor show.
Last Saturday, I finally did. It was the only night I was really free to see anything. I went down to Place des Arts and decided I would plan my night based on what cheap last-minute tickets were available. I was actually a bit surprised when I found out that a 7pm show on a Saturday featuring Craig Ferguson still had seats available (singles, for the most part, mind you) that they were willing to give me for a significant last-minute discount. I picked it up, paying less than $40 in cash.
After a successful event last year, the group Les Évenements T’es po game is organizing a second water gun fight around the fountain outside Montreal city hall this Saturday at 2 p.m.
The Facebook page shows more than 200 set to attend, though experience has shown that number to be as much as 10 times the eventual actual turnout. Last year about 100 said they would attend, and about 50 did, so that bodes well for this year.
The weather forecast for Saturday shows sunny, low chance of precipitation and a high of around 30 degrees. Also a good sign.
The event isn’t organized in any official way with the city, and participants are reminded to follow rules of common sense – particularly not to target people who are not participating in the fight.
Michel Godbout has found a new career opportunity over the horizon
Quebecor’s soon-to-be-launched TVA Sports specialty channel isn’t just looking to RDS hockey analysts like Dave Morissette and Yvon Pedneault (or La Presse’s Réjean Tremblay) for on-air talent. Their hiring spree has also poached CBC Montreal’s sports anchor.
Michel Godbout confirmed Monday that he will be leaving the CBC to join the TVA Sports channel set to debut this fall. His last day is July 30. (He was cut off early: see below)
Godbout (who is, as you can imagine, fully bilingual) worked for 15 years at Radio-Canada and then CBC Montreal – most famously as the evening news anchor between 2005 (when Dennis Trudeau retired) and 2009 (when Andrew Chang and Jennifer Hall took over a revamped newscast). He starts an anchoring job at TVA Sports on Aug. 22.
No word yet on who will replace Godbout permanently. CBC Montreal News Director Mary-Jo Barr is on vacation until August.
You can follow Godbout on Twitter at @GodboutSports (fortunately he won’t have to change that name – but expect it to be a bit more francophone in the future).
UPDATE (July 21): Thursday was Godbout’s last day. He says during an interview this morning on CBC Daybreak that he gave his two weeks’ notice on Friday (July 15), but was told that Thursday would be his last day, being let go because he was leaving for a competitor.
Godbout had a brief goodbye on air with Debra Arbec (Andrew Chang was off):
The interventions (two are opposed to the application, while Astral is negative but not quite so categorical) are based on these main points, which have been responded to by Cogeco:
Concentration of ownership: The interventions point to the fact that Cogeco asked for and received an exemption to a CRTC policy that forbids any owner from having more than two stations on the same band in the same language in the same market. This allowed them to purchase all of Corus Quebec’s radio assets in Montreal, adding CKOI and CHMP 98.5FM to CFGL Rythme FM, giving them three French-language FM stations. Now they want to add two more stations to their empire, giving them five French-language stations (they also own CKAC) and two English-language stations (with CFQR). Cogeco responds by saying that exception was, well, exceptional, and that owning two French-language AM stations would not be a further exception to CRTC policy. Cogeco also says it doesn’t believe an all-traffic station (even one that solicits advertising) would be a significant competitive threat to existing broadcasters.
Use of clear channels: The interventions agree with me and other radio watchers that 50,000 watts and a signal pattern that stretches into the Maritimes and northeastern Ontario is overkill for a Montreal traffic station. They say that if the application is approved, it should be for two frequencies that are not clear channels. Cogeco responds that the frequencies have been vacant since June 2010 (when the CRTC announced it had revoked the licenses) and no one has applied for them.
Unfair competitive advantage: The interventions question the entire point of a publicly-funded all-traffic station. And while there’s nothing the CRTC can do to change how the Quebec government spends its money, the incumbents object because the funding would give the traffic stations an unfair competitive advantage. The funding “will allow Metromedia (the Cogeco subsidiary that owns the stations) to aggressively sell advertising in the marketplace, potentially offering lower rates than what is offered by the incumbents. This potential strategy will only serve to further undermine an already weak market,” writes Bell Media VP Kevin Goldstein in his intervention. Cogeco responds by quoting news articles demanding better communication about road conditions from the government and says they only expect about a quarter of its advertising revenue ($600,000 for the first year) will come at the expense of their competition.
Guarantee of format: The interventions say there’s no guarantee that their all-traffic format would be maintained once the contract with the Quebec government runs out. Cogeco responds that it would accept a condition of license making such a guarantee.
No public bidding: The interventions feel this project should have been open to a public bidding process. Cogeco responds that any broadcaster could have responded to the notice from the transport ministry that it intended to award this contract to Cogeco, but none ever did. The lack of demand meant the government did not have to open bidding on the project.
Here’s where the intervention from Bell gets interesting: They state that they have been trying, since Corus shut down CINW (940 Hits) and CINF (Info 690) in January 2010, to purchase the transmitter and antenna from them, to no avail. Bell says that if the CRTC wants to approve this application, it would be prepared to perform a frequency swap, taking either 690 or 940 kHz and taking up a clear channel that allows them to broadcast 50,000 watts day and night.
Propagation patterns for CKGM (Team 990AM) in red (day) and black (night) vs. CINW (940AM) in purple and CINF (690AM) in blue, as provided in Bell's CRTC intervention
As Team 990 gains broadcast rights to Canadiens games in the fall, nighttime propagation becomes more important. As a Class B frequency, 990 requires the transmitter to modify its signal at night, reducing its coverage. Switching to 940 would give CKGM a much larger coverage area.
The idea makes a lot of sense. Montreal sports teams – and the Canadiens in particular – are going to have a lot more interest in the outlying regions than Montreal traffic information. It makes sense for that station to have a larger coverage area. And, of course, most people interested in traffic will listen to the radio in their cars, which should not have trouble picking up a giant transmitter just a few kilometres away.
But Cogeco responds by criticizing Bell’s suggestion that it would have been too expensive to retune its existing transmitter and antenna from 990 to 940 kHz. It quotes an engineering expert it hired that said in the worst case scenario of having to replace everything, it would cost less than $250,000.
We’ll take them: Tietolman
Tietolman Tétrault, in its intervention (PDF), suggested the stations use frequencies of 600 and 850 kHz (formerly of CIQC and CKVL, respectively) and said the 690 and 940 frequencies should be open to applications. It said it would be willing to apply for both:
Tietolman Tétrault Média est déjà prêt, intéressé et apte à appliquer pour l’obtention de ces fréquences. Nous avons en main un plan d’action que nous estimons bénéfique pour la diversité radiophonique nécessitant ces deux fréquences-clés. Évidemment, ces deux fréquences seraient en ondes peu de temps après l’obtention des licences.
Tietolman, whose family once owned CKVL, had tried to offer a competing $81-million bid for Corus Quebec, including 690 and 940. They’ve indicated for a while now that they’d like to bring back 690 and 940, though they haven’t said what kind of format the stations would have.
Other interventions
A few other smaller groups and individuals also filed interventions in this application.
Jacques Blais of S.O.S. Québec Radio filed a handwritten note (PDF) – he wrote that he had computer problems – in which he called the project useless and a waste of public money, and appealed to common sense in rejecting it. He also repeated that 50,000 watts was too much for this station, and said the 690 and 940 frequencies should be reserved for French-language stations only, because the French language is threatened in Quebec.
That last part is kind of funny because his supporting documentation was my previous blog post and an article from The Suburban.
Marc St-Hilaire of the Syndicat général de la radio union said (PDF) endorsed the new station but said it was worried that Cogeco would deduct the number of people it hires for these stations from its commitment to hire journalists for its Cogeco Nouvelles news agency. Cogeco made the commitment as part of the deal that got it to own three francophone FM stations in Montreal.
Cogeco says each station would have six full-time announcers, plus a full-time traffic journalist, and that these would be in addition to the commitments they already made for the creation of Cogeco Nouvelles and the hiring of journalists.
Finally, Miguel Therriault of Quebec City filed a very brief intervention (HTML), saying, in its totality: “Les coûts sont outrageusement exagérés. De plus ce service est complètement inutile. Les stations de radio actuelles répondre très bien à la demande. C’est une dépense inutile.”
The hearing to discuss Cogeco’s application was supposed to happen next Monday, but the CRTC announced last week that the items have been withdrawn from the agenda and will return as part of a later hearing. No explanation was given and no date has been set yet.
Nagata writes that his decision to leave is not the result of any falling out with CTV or any personal issues, but is more of a philosophical decision based on what he sees are the limitations of the news media, and television in particular. Among them:
“… there is an underlying tension between ‘what the people want to see’ and ‘the important stories we should be bringing to people’.”
“I admit felt a profound discomfort working in an industry that so casually sexualizes its workforce. … The idea has taken root that if the people reporting the news look like your family and neighbours, instead of Barbie and Ken, the station will lose viewers.”
“… the target viewer, according to consultants, is also supposed to like easy stories that reinforce beliefs they already hold.”
“the Kate and Will show. Wall-to-wall, breaking-news coverage of a stage-managed, spoon-fed celebrity visit, justified by the couple’s symbolic relationship to a former colony. … On a weekend where there was real news happening in Bangkok, Misrata, Athens, Washington, and around the world, what we saw instead was a breathless gaggle of normally credible journalists, gushing in live hit after live hit about how the prince is young and his wife is pretty. And the public broadcaster led the charge.”
“I have serious problems with the direction taken by Canadian policy and politics in the last five years. But as a reporter, I feel like I’ve been holding my breath.”
“Within the terms of my employment at CTV, there was a clause in which the corporation (now Bell Media) literally took ownership of my intellectual property output.”
Nagata makes it clear that his criticisms of the television news industry apply as much to the CBC (where he worked before) as to CTV. And presumably the others as well.
“I quit my job because the idea burrowed into my mind that, on the long list of things I could be doing, television news is not the best use of my short life. The ends no longer justified the means,” Nagata writes.
Nagata, who’s all of 24 years old, isn’t sure what he’s going to do next. But he’s already heading out west to Vancouver to be with his family.
“I’m broke, and yet I know I’m rich in love. I’m unemployed and homeless, but I’ve never been more free,” Nagata writes.
I had only one real question for Nagata: “Are you insane?”
His response: “Fair question, and one I’ve been asking myself for a week. … I mean what I say about feeling free. And calm, and happy. And yes, sane. The tradeoff, so far, is worth it.”
Debra Arbec (left) on CBC at 5, and Catherine Sherriffs on CTV at 11:30
Monday was a pretty big day for local TV watchers, with new faces debuting on CBC and CTV newscasts.
Debra Arbec, who left CFCF in May for an evening anchor position at CBMT, saying she wanted a shot at a supper-hour newscast, finally got her first night on air after her contractual obligation to CTV ended on July 1. She co-anchors with Andrew Chang from 5pm to 6:30pm, replacing Jennifer Hall, who has moved back to southern Ontario.
CTV, meanwhile, gave Arbec’s old job of 11:30pm weekday anchor to Catherine Sherriffs, who wasn’t even part of the permanent reporting staff at the time. Sherriffs’s first shift as a television anchor was Monday night.
Both Arbec and Sherriffs were flawless on their first nights, and got lots of praise from their bosses.
Smooth transition for Arbec
“It could not have gone smoother,” said CBC Montreal News Director Mary-Jo Barr, who has been working with Arbec for three weeks. “I was so excited to see the team on air,” she said. “It felt like Christmas morning.”
Asked what the biggest transition issue was, Arbec pointed to technology. CBC uses Avid video editing software, and Arbec had to learn to edit, something she didn’t do at CTV. And in HD, to boot. She and Chang edit the international news roundup themselves.
Arbec also said the change in the schedule took some getting used to. “My body clock has been used to late nights for so long,” she said. Now she has a day job and can spend evenings at home with her husband, Brian Wilde.
Chang, incidentally, also will have a more daytime schedule. It was decided to pull him off the late-night newscast (which runs 10 minutes from 10:55 to 11:05pm) so he could concentrate exclusively on the supper-hour show. Instead of coming in at 3pm and having only two hours to familiarize himself with the show, he can come in and shape it from the beginning. “The show was always a bit of a surprise to him,” Barr said. The move was done by rearranging existing staff, avoiding the need to increase the show’s budget by hiring another person.
Reporter Amanda Margison has been given the late-night host job, which includes some lineup editing and monitoring breaking news during the 5pm newscast.
Arbec heaped praise on her coworkers, including co-host Chang, who she said has been “such a godsend for technology for me.” She’s had a chance to meet the new team (she likened it to moving to a new school) and how to pronounce their names (try saying “Anna Asimakopoulos” without hesitating) and said they were all “really supportive and understanding” about her move there.
Aside from anchoring and preparing the newscast, Arbec will also be introducing a weekly segment called Montrealer of the Week, profiling people who make a difference in the community but aren’t otherwise recognized. Similar in style to the My Montreal series she did at CTV, but focusing on individuals instead of ethnic groups. They will air Fridays, with the first one this coming Friday.
A few hours later at CFCF, it was Sherriffs’s turn behind the desk. A smaller desk, as she was thrown the curveball of having her first day also be the first day of a new temporary set while they build a brand new studio.
“She went into that position a little cold,” said CTV Montreal News Director Jed Kahane. “It’s not a hermetically sealed studio. There’s a lot of distraction. I thought it was great that she was able to do it under those circumstances.”
For Sherriffs herself, it was a bit intimidating doing her first shift as a television news anchor. Other than some time with Todd van der Heyden on Crescent St. during the Formula One broadcasts, she hasn’t had any experience behind the desk. She got some voice coaching (standard for new anchors, Kahane said), but nothing beat the pressure of being live on air by yourself.
“I was more nervous when I came in at the beginning of the shift,” Sherriffs said. By showtime, she realized there was no going back now, and with every segment the nerves became more manageable.
The nervousness showed a bit on air, particularly in more light-hearted segments when she didn’t seem entirely natural. By Tuesday night, it seemed much less apparent and she looked a lot more comfortable in her new role. (Well, as comfortable as you can be with bright lights shining on you, a camera in your face and thousands of people watching you live.)
Like Arbec, Sherriffs credited her crew for helping her get through it. “The crew was amazing,” she said, offering her lots of support.
And in case you were curious, Arbec did watch Sherriffs’s first show, even though it was on what is now a competitor’s channel. She said Sherriffs did a fine job and she wishes her well.
CTV and RDS are really excited about upgraded studios that are being constructed on the ground floor of their building at Papineau St. and René-Lévesque Blvd. But before CTV can move in to the new set in September, it has to vacate its old one. Sunday’s 11:30pm newscast with Paul Karwatsky was the last in the old studio (he’s very proud of that). Starting Monday at noon, the newscasts were being done on a temporary set constructed in the CTV Montreal newsroom.
The temporary set has its issues. For one thing, there’s only one chair behind the anchor desk. Kahane says the plan is to only have one anchor at a time (summer vacations mean the newscasts that normally have two anchors won’t again until September). But it still causes some interesting situations, particularly when they have to switch between news and sports anchor. Currently, one of the two stands when they chat with each other during transitions, which is a bit awkward.
The other thing is that the newsroom is a pretty active place. There was a bit of noise in the audio from the anchor desk on the first night, and people working in the newsroom during a broadcast have to be careful what they yell or what they do when they’re in the camera’s view.
The set added a bit of awkwardness to the introductions, because the establishing shot of the studio can’t be done anymore. Since that’s where the booming voiceover introducing the anchors comes in, that’s gone too. Now, the newscast goes straight from the opening theme to a closeup shot of the anchor. It’s a bit of a jarring transition for someone used to the way the newscast works.
Kahane said most of the work in setting up the temporary studio came in fixing the lighting. There was a camera in the newsroom before that reporters could use to report breaking news and the late anchor would use to say what’s coming up at 11:30, but to do an entire newscast from there, the background needed to be a bit better than the drab and – by television standards – dark cubicles of a newsroom.
Still, the production has a kind of out-of-the-basement feel to it. It looks fine technically, but it doesn’t feel as comfortable.
Kahane said the summer was a good time to do this (it’s kind of a lull in the news industry, and TV ratings are generally down as people head out and do things with their lives). And the move into a new expansive studio (with windows!) will be worth it.
The new studio will be “HD-ready”, meaning the infrastructure will be suitable for HD broadcast, but there are no concrete plans yet to convert the newscast to high definition. CTV has prioritized its specialty channels, which are currently being transitioned. And Montreal hasn’t been made a high priority because of the lack of competitive pressure.
Kahane also said the temporary set will be used as the in-the-newsroom live reporter feed once the new studio is in place, and its look will fit in with the look of the new studio.
And what of their old set? Part of it is being used in the temporary studio, but the big desk and other elements have been donated to Concordia University’s journalism department, where it’s being used in their studio to teach students to become TV anchors themselves.
And so it ended, not with a bang, but with … I don’t know how to describe it.
As Montrealers were celebrating Canada Day and moving their stuff into their new apartments, the online news outlet Rue Frontenac, that began as a pressure tactic of locked-out Journal de Montréal workers and made of itself a solid source of news and investigative journalism, quietly shut down.
The website remains, but stripped of all its content. Its empty shell has been taken over by a new owner, whose identity is protected by a confidentiality agreement (UPDATE: The new owner, Marcel Boisvert, has revealed himself in an open letter). Negotiations about keeping Rue Frontenac running were unsuccessful, and all the writers, photographers, editors and others who shunned a return to the Journal or other jobs to try to keep Rue Frontenac running on its own have quit their project in apparent disgust.
The writing has unfortunately been on the wall since the Journal de Montréal lockout ended this spring. Salaries haven’t been paid since the end of April, and it wasn’t long before the organization that had split from the union filed for creditor protection. There was hope for a big name to come in with money and take over, then when that didn’t work they regained hope with another potential suitor. But for reasons that will probably only become clear once we know who this second party is, their ownership of Rue Frontenac caused everyone to leave.
It’s too early to say what these highly skilled journalists will do now. Most long ruled out rejoining the Journal de Montréal (in fact, only one news reporter and three sports reporters went back to their jobs, which required the paper to actually post for the remaining positions and hire new reporters). The most likely scenario is they go their separate ways, working for other media, freelancing (as many already do), writing books or doing other stuff.
It’s sad to see Rue Frontenac go. But let’s be honest, it’s for the best. Rue Frontenac wanted to be a generalist French-language news source in a market that was already oversaturated with competition. It was too big a project for two small a slice of the audience pie. Now those talented journalists can get on with their lives.
It’s also sad to see all the work done over the past two and a half years disappear from the Internet. Links to Rue Frontenac stories no longer work, and so far there’s no online archive of the stuff they posted. It’s a situation similar to what happened to MédiaMatinQuébec after the Journal de Québec lockout, although for a different reason. (UPDATE: Rue Frontenac’s archives have been reposted to ExRueFrontenac.com)
You can read more about the end of Rue Frontenac, including some interviews with its leaders, in stories from:
UPDATE (July 4): Marcel Boisvert’s open letter, which seems to present a reasonable case for why he thinks he’s the victim here, opens up a lot of new questions (and caused a lot of bitter comments from the Rue Frontenac people on Twitter). The letter is summarized in Le Devoir. I’ll try to make some sense out of this whole thing in the coming days if another journalist doesn’t beat me to it.
