« Women who seek to be equal with men lack ambition. »
– Timothy Leary
One must not discount the candidacy of Louise O’Sullivan. She and her Parti Montréal Ville-Marie do not belong in the same category as the other long shots; O’Suillivan had worked in the current administration under Tremblay as a member of his executive committee. I applaud her actions. Not approving of the direction of City Hall, she decided to set forth and improve the city herself. She could have stayed around and paid lip service to her boss, thereby capitalising on the politicial patronage so many of the other unscrupulous elected officials pursue. Yet, she did not. She has principles. Perhaps we are witnessing the debut of a new « Projet Montréal » on the civic scene.
With that, I wish the Part Montréal Ville-Marie team all the best. It is possible that this may not be their year. However, their platform raises some important issues that desperately need to be addressed in our fair city:
- – Montréal is renown on an international scale in terms of its quality of life. Unfortunately, the municipal government has failed when it comes to contributing to the creation of sustainable wealth for its citizens and the situation continues to worsen. At present, Montréal is the poorest city in North America.
- – Currently, Montréal ranks fifth among the five major Canadian cities with the highest concentration of entrepreneurs.
- – Montréal has too many elected official to be effective. Better results and better quality of public services can be obtained with fewer elected officials; Montréal councillors [should be] reduced by 50%, from 105 to 52 and the position a borough mayor will be replaced by presidents of the Borough Council, as was the case before the forced mergers. This reduction will result in the emergence of a truly effective leadership for the Mayor of Montréal.
- – The boulevard Notre-Dame is not even close to being completed; but Gérald Tremblay has been talking about it over his two terms.
- – Montréal is not as densely populated as European metropolises saturated with cars. Why should the City invest heavily into one luxury transportation mode, while neglecting other methods of public transportation?
- – The attempt to banish the use of cars downtown is unreasonable. We must encourage the diversity of transportation methods and transport design in Montréal to ensure economic development.
and above all:
- – Before making expensive promises, we need to consolidate, improve and develop what already exists.
24 comments
“At present, Montréal is the poorest city in North America.”
Isn’t Mexico part of North America? And even if we didn’t include it, I’d really like to know what this is based on.
I must agree totally with your comments.
Louise O’Sullivan is experienced; competent; a businesswoman; fluently bilingual; & has a love of Montréal that is more infectious than H1N1.
For some unknown reason, the main stream media has chosen to ignore; downplay; and occasionally even ridicule her campaign.
I am convinced that if she is given proper media coverage leading up to the election on Sunday, that informed voters would be very impressed with her logical policies to keep Montréal as a world class city.
Thank You
The problem with O’Sullivan is that you’ve pretty much outlined her entire platform above. There’s not much more except for something about celebrating Montreal’s 375th birthday and employing mini buses on lesser-used routes (a bad idea for a number of technical reasons). If O’Sullivan wants to be taken seriously, she needs to be a serious contender and a 4 page .pdf platform in 14(ish) pt. type filled with populous ranting isn’t going to cut it.
Actually, Montreal is the poorest city in US/Canada.
I have actually heard her speak and she is rational, eloquent, and makes a lot of sense. I know a lot of people here are fans of Bergeron, but he is far more out there than O’Sullivan.
Harel is going on about another Expo (please) and centralizing services (disaster).
The problem with O’Sullivan is that she is a dinosaur.
Right after the last debate on Radio-Canada, she gave a short interview where she said that public transit is only important to students but should otherwise not be a major issue.
What a nutbar! Luckily, she’s only polling 2%!
Sorry Emile, but this whole Montreal is the poorest city talk is a joke, and one that seems to be repeated time after time without much thought. Have you ever walked around downtown Atlanta or Miami or Balitmore or the downtown Eastside of Vancouver late at night? Montreal may not have the riches of many other cities in North America, but we are blessed with a much tamer social environment, and there’s gotta be a massive value in that. Sure, on the whole Montreal may be poorer, but the lack of the major degree of extreme contrasting wealth and poverty is something we should celebrate. Also, the on-paper wealth of many other North American cities is tied up in a property values, and even with major price increases over the last decade or so, Montreal is still a very affordable city to live in. Money is part of the wealth equation, but the true level of wealth is not merely in per capita GDP, but also in the level of comfort, acceptance, safety and fun of a place. But having a lower number of entrepreneurs is a sign of future trouble though, and encouraging more young people to start businesses should be a priority!
I’m having a hard time believing that Montréal is poorer than Detroit for instance.
What metric is being used to measure the wealth of the city?
Poorer than Detroit or New Orleans, to say nothing of several Mexican cities, and many in the US Deep South? This is ludicrous crap.
She is the pro-pollution candidate. Public transport is important for EVERYONE in a city, including those who drive cars. For one thing, it means fewer cars on the road. We won’t go into people who can’t drive for a variety of reasons – people who can’t afford to are nothing but shit in the eyes of such a “pro-business” candidate, and those of us who refuse to for environmental convictions are unrepentant hippies, ageing or not. Fuck her. Thatcher was a woman too, and did more to harm women (and men) in the UK than any male PM.
Kyle, I think most everyone would agree about fostering enterprise, but it is such a vague motherhood slogan. That could be done in several ways – in her case I suspect it means no checks on pollution and environmental destruction.
I’d just love to take her on about that ludicrous public transport statement.
You’re right that she deserves more attention BUT O’Sullivan scares me…
The metric used is the usual federalist propaganda to tar Quebec as a backwards place, in order to scare the Toronto area immigrants into voting liberal, because only the federal liberals will be able to protect the Toronto immigrants from the bad separatists who will violate their rights by forcing them to speak french.
Take note that she is also involved in Opus Dei (a scarily right-wing Catholic organization) and was vehemently opposed to same-sex marriage during that debate.
All the left-wing comments here are a disgrace. We finally have a candidate that proposes something DIFFERENT from the stagnation and big spending of the 3 others, and the trolls come out of the woodwork. It’s like you want this city to fail!
Maria Gatti – Margaret Thatcher was the best Prime Minister in British history. She brought the country out of the grasp of prolonged Labour rule. When she started there was massive unemployment and the UK was in decline. By the end, the UK regained its position as one of the economic powerhouses of Europe. You absolutely do not know not of what you speak. Don’t you have an anti-George W. Bush protest to attend?
Here is a really scary article about Louise O and Opus Dei: http://www.ccmm.asso.fr/spip.php?article1077 Remember that this movement is closely associated with the Franco dictatorship in Spain, and the equally bloody fascistic dictatorships in Chile and Argentina; it is not just nice Catholic ladies who attend Mass rather often.
Sorry, Mr Robertson, we’ll never agree about the Iron Lady. Or anything else.
I have a master’s degree in history: labour and migration history. And many years’ experience fighting Thatcherism, the Bushes and their ilk.
Why are so-called “left-wing comments” a disgrace? You like environmental destruction and mass murder of people in Iraq? If they were left-wing comments say, supporting Pol Pot or the North Korean régime, you’d have a point, but nobody here was supporting any kind of totalitarian rule.
I most definitely do not want our beloved city to fail. I want us to be a guiding light unto the world, or at least North America, to see a way out of petroleum and car-dependency.
By the way, I didn’t attend the protest against that semi-literate war criminal, because I was working. Do confess I love this sentence structure:
“You absolutely do not know not of what you speak” (sic).
I guess the best thing that can be said about this petroleum-mad religious nutcase is that unlike Osama, so far she hasn’t called on anyone to commit crusade – le pendant chrétien du jihad. With the Opus Dei stuff, at least she is good for a laugh.
Emile, can you please provide us with the data source you used for Montreal being the poorest city in North America? A somewhat deep google search only turned up this blog post and a few other un-cited blog posts. This fact may be based in truth, but it seems like it’s just becoming an internet rumor that people are accepting as fact. Thanks.
Just to be clear, I am not saying Montréal is the poorest city in North America. I’m just quoting Louise O’Sullivan’s platform
But don’t worry, I’ve been getting down to the bottom of this interesting piece of « information ». More to follow…
There’s a recent table of Montreal’s Per Capita GDP at the bottom of this page: http://www.fgmtl.org/en/VitalSigns/context.htm
(in 1997 dollars)
1996: $24,547 per capita
2006: $30 442 per capita
That’s about a 24% rise in local “wealth” in a decade.
The disgrace is the apology for those politicians who will give everything to the rich (entrepreneurs) while telling the ordinary workers
to put-up or shut-up.
Margaret Thatcher helped create millions of precarious jobs without any security whatsoever so the entrepreneurs could get rich by not properly paying their workers, exactly like back in Dickensian times.
Louise O’Sullivan wants the entrepreneurs to have a free time with the city. This means that they will be able to open all sorts of disruptive businesses without any input from the well-established neighbours, all in the name of the sacrosanct “economy”.
Mr Robertson, although the Economy is indeed important, it is not the only thing there is. There are many things in life besides the Economy that are just as important, and it would be as foolish to dismiss them as it is when one dismisses all things besides the Economy.
The current banking crisis has demonstrated beyond any doubt that the economic actors are utterly incapable of disciplining themselves, and they will gleefully wreck the economic system in order to make a quick buck.
You may look fondly upon Margaret Thatcher, but the antics of Bush and his gang of robber barons have made sure that such behaviour will not be tolerated for a very long time in the future.
Expect far more economic regulation; it may choke the Economy, but if that’s needed to keep it from eating itself, we’ll gladly have that.
Poorest in N.A.? Like others, I think that’s plain erroneous.
As for cars/autos… if there’s one huge thing the Tremblay admin’s right on, it’s getting lots of the autos out of Centre-ville.
Wake up, it’s 2009!!! We’ve toasted our planet. Every major city is enrobed in a blanket of smog. Not to mention the congestion and loss of productivity that comes with traffic (so, hybrids/electrics won’t solve the dilemma, either. They’ll just make it a cleaner case of inefficiency).
When will we EVER learn?!
It ain’t all about choice and money. Can’t you see that by looking south to the all-too familiar failures of the USA?
– Montreal is not the poorest city in North America. Ever been to the prairies? Now THAT’s poor.
– The idea of a car-less downtown core is perfectly reasonable. vancouver is one of the most car-centric cities in North America, yet they have a car-less dowtown core that functions effectively.
– Too many elected officials? Yes, because cronyism is so much better than elected officials.
– Notre Dame may not be finished but Tremblay did a very good job with the Parc-Pin interchange.
– A rich, white, blond chick with a anglo last name sounds like a fabulous mayoral candidate, for sure.
Yay Maria. You go.
If anyone is truly interested in the future of the City of Montréal, they might want to review a small paper written by a Michel David that concerns Montréal as a City State.
You might not agree with all of of his comments – but I believe that he has made a number of valid points – especially on how the population & economy of Montréal is somewhat different from the rest of Québec.
His document (about 35 pages) can be found in English or French at:
http://www.montrealcitystate.ca/index_en.html
Louise O’Sullivan is ignored by the mainstream media because she’s anything but eloquent.
She answers questions like a squirrel crosses the street.
Bergeron is just as much of a nutbar, but at least he can string a sentence together while talking about only one subject.
From Naomi:
“- The idea of a car-less downtown core is perfectly reasonable. vancouver is one of the most car-centric cities in North America, yet they have a car-less dowtown core that functions effectively.”
Are you serious? I’m from Vancouver and I can attest that there is not a single car-less street in downtown Vancouver, and that most of the streets are busy thoroughfare type roads like Rene-Levesque, Sherbrooke or Guy, not like the easy-to-jaywalk narrow sidestreets of most of Montreal. Not trying to nitpick Naomi, but I just don’t want people to think Vancouver is some pedestrian paradise….cause it ain’t. Montreal is much more of a pedestrian-frineldy city than Vancouver! Even on the transit front, Vancouver has 2 metro lines and one commuter train, while Montreal’s has 4 metro lines and 5 commuter trains! But more can definitely be done in Montreal to enhance the pedestrian experience, for sure!
EMILE:
“Just to be clear, I am not saying Montréal is the poorest city in North America. I’m just quoting Louise O’Sullivan’s platform”
Super! Judging by the comments to this post, the fact that there may be erroneous facts in Louise O’Sullivan’s platform itself are just another reason why nobody will take her seriously, whether they’re from the Reaganomics or Che Guevara end of the political spectrum. From a quick glance to her website, her entire campaign appears to be based around graffiti eradication.
Huh, the Montreal City State is an interesting proposal! So where do we sign up to make it happen? Also, who will design the license plates? I say the first move after Montreal becomes a City State is to invade P.E.I. and seize their potato holdings in order to corner the market in poutine supplies.