When it comes to quotes that spoil a debate, it is difficult to do better.
Posted at 5:00 a.m.
“Who am I to say to a young family: since the fashion is for densification, are you going to live in a 12-storey tower? »
It comes from the Minister of Transport, François Bonnardel, who defended himself against criticism of urban sprawl accelerated by the third Québec-Lévis link.
For those who missed a few episodes, there is still no military police imprisoning families in skyscrapers where the green week is broadcast in a loop*.
Freedom remains, both in terms of place of residence and television entertainment. But there is nothing heretical about guiding people’s choices.
There is an expression for this: doing politics.
The Caquists like to caricature urban planners as snobs who despise the suburbs. Please, let’s not fall into this trap.
Curbing urban sprawl does not mean that everyone has to live downtown, let alone in a skyscraper. Suburbs like Terrebonne can also be densified.
Do you dream of a reasonably priced house with a small backyard? A tree and birds? An above ground pool? It’s correct. There’s nothing wrong with that.
The report of the panel of experts on climate change does not contain any value judgement. It recalls a fact: our individual decisions also have a collective cost.
Citizens’ need for space is legitimate, but the State must respond to it with an overall vision that serves the public interest. In this case, by finding the best way to occupy the territory.
Right now it’s not working well.
Some examples :
- In 2018, traffic congestion cost $4.2 billion in Greater Montreal. By adding the indirect costs, the bill rises to 7.6 billion.
- Road transport – excluding trucking – costs between $43 and $51 billion per year.
- In urban areas, infrastructure (streets, water distribution, sewers, electricity distribution) costs $1,416 per household. In the peripheral zone, the bill is 2.4 times higher.
- SUVs are twice as often involved in collisions with pedestrians as a standard car. And in crashes with other vehicles, they are 28% more likely to be killed**.
The committee of experts asks the question: is this the preferred model?
Obviously, no. Especially not when you also consider the impact on the environment.
Urban sprawl is not inevitable. From 2006 to 2016, Toronto became denser. But Montreal and Quebec have spread out. Their second crown jumped 11% and 19% respectively compared to their central city.
Cars are bigger and they travel longer distances. Houses are also getting bigger.
As for wetlands and natural environments, they are shrinking, which increases the risk of flooding. And the agricultural territory is shrinking, which is detrimental to our food self-sufficiency.
Of course, the impact of this concretization cannot be measured only in dollars. Nature is not reduced to its usefulness. It also has intrinsic value.
The report of the committee of experts simply reminds us that even according to an economic analysis, our town planning is sick.
The Legault government will soon table its National Architecture and Land Use Policy.
In the meantime, we can only judge him on his record.
His vision is clientelist. The best example: the green plan, which is mainly based on the electrification of transport.
It promises a green revolution by changing few things except the type of engine in our vehicle.
True, it offers an alternative option, public transit. In Quebec, the tramway project is progressing. And in Montreal, the blue metro line will be extended, and the REM de l’Est project is under study. But roads remain twice as funded as public transport. The dice are still loaded.
If the number of automobiles, even electric ones, continues to increase faster than the population, there will be more congestion, sprawl and destruction of natural environments and agricultural land. Not to mention the trade deficit that results from the purchase of imported cars.
People are free to choose where they live and how they travel. But the State has a role: to ensure that these individual gestures do not result in too high a collective bill. It must establish rules that serve the common good.
The question that Mr. Bonnardel asked himself can therefore be answered quite easily. Who are you ? But you are the minister!
Fortunately, a new generation of mayors is assuming their responsibilities. It wants to densify and green cities, promote active and public transportation, clean the air and reduce noise pollution.
This may exist outside the Plateau Mont-Royal. As in Drummondville, Granby or Longueuil, led by green mayors.
They do not judge their citizens. They don’t want to sequester them in towers. They are simply looking for another model to improve their quality of life.
It’s not a value judgment, it’s a unifying project.
* Note that if you had to choose a show to watch in perpetuity, green week wouldn’t be a bad choice.
** This SUV stat comes from Équiterre, not the Expert Panel.