At the end of the week, Montrealers were ashamed. They have not digested, but not at all, the distressing decision to close four terraces on Peel Street, in the middle of the Formula 1 Grand Prix festivities.
In the grand scheme of things, there are much more terrible tragedies in Montreal. But seeing this restaurateur reduced to crying her distress on social networks, citizens were fed up.
Fed up with the work that transforms the city streets into a labyrinth every spring.
Fed up with all these permits which cost a fortune and which we wait for a long time.
Fed up with the blind bureaucracy which puts obstacles in the way of entrepreneurs whom the administration should rather help as much as possible.
Especially right now.
The city center is struggling to get back on track since the pandemic. Rue Sainte-Catherine is in the middle of construction. And when restaurants take the trouble to install terraces to create a minimum of atmosphere, through this jumble, what the Montreal Fire Safety Service (SIM) finds best to do is to close the places almost manu militari. It’s inconceivable.
Okay, okay, you can’t skimp on safety. But why did you wait until the Friday evening of the Grand Prix to make this radical decision? It feels like a power trip.
Whether you like car racing or not, the Grand Prix is a flagship event for the metropolis. Governments pump millions of dollars into it every year to give Montreal an incomparable international showcase and obtain economic and fiscal benefits.
With the Peel Street blunder, we did the complete opposite. We undermined Montreal’s brand image by stupidly throwing tourists out of a restaurant, between the starter and the main course. And we prevented SMEs from taking advantage of the most profitable time of the year.
Nice job, boss!
So what happened?
“Right now, there is the postmortem. I don’t have much more explanation to tell you,” replied Mayor Valérie Plante, who took part in an editorial interview with The PressMonday morning, to present its Urban Planning and Mobility Plan (PUM) 2050.
PHOTO MARCO CAMPANOZZI, THE PRESS
The mayor of Montreal, Valérie Plante, during an editorial interview with The PressMonday
After this post mortem, the SIM decided to conduct an internal administrative investigation and suspend two employees.
But the controversy could spread and stick to the reputation of the Plante administration, just as the failure of Formula E weighed down Mayor Denis Coderre.
The two situations are not comparable. And the next municipal elections will not take place until November 2025. But this terrace story could leave a bitter taste to the general public, like a bad cocktail that brings together several ingredients of which citizens are fed up.
Elected as “mayor of mobility”, Valérie Plante failed to clear traffic. She is right to defend herself by saying that she inherited decades of under-maintenance. “We will not abandon this plan, even if it is not popular, even if it is difficult, because we owe it to future generations,” said the mayor.
Valérie Plante adds that the City is only responsible for a quarter of the projects. Either. But citizens have so many examples of streets that have been reopened time and time again that they wonder where the coordination is in all of this.
The housing crisis is also very bad. This is not unique to Montreal. But here, obtaining a permit involves the stations of the cross.
Delays have more than doubled over the past four years, revealed The Press at the end of May1. In the city center, we had to wait a year and a half in 2023, compared to seven months before the pandemic. A real repellent for promoters.
The same day, the mayor reacted by promising to reduce deadlines to 120 days for projects as of right. A beautiful intention. But this announcement will have little impact, because full-fledged projects are rather rare for large-scale projects that need a host of exemptions, as the President and CEO of the Institute wrote in our pages. Urban Development of Quebec (IDU), Isabelle Melançon2.
The mayor replies that her PUM will make it possible to start more construction sites, without having to request an exemption. We really want it to work, because Montreal really needs a boost. Here, housing starts fell by 37% in 2023, while construction picked up again in Toronto (+5%) and Vancouver (+28%).
Building, however, is the key to rebalancing the market, bringing prices back down to earth… and slowing the exodus of families. Last year, Montreal lost 25,600 people to other regions of Quebec, 29% more than when the Plante administration came to power.
Looking forward to a major cleaning up of the municipal bureaucracy that we would like to see working with the private sector. Not against him.
1. Read the file “Building permits in Montreal: “endless delays””
2. Read the opinion letter “Building permits in Montreal: a way out of the crisis can be planned!” »