{"id":4235,"date":"2009-10-01T09:53:55","date_gmt":"2009-10-01T14:53:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spacingmontreal.ca\/?p=4235"},"modified":"2013-01-21T11:49:04","modified_gmt":"2013-01-21T16:49:04","slug":"a-theatrical-take-on-quebecs-highway-infrastructure","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/montreal\/2009\/10\/01\/a-theatrical-take-on-quebecs-highway-infrastructure\/","title":{"rendered":"A theatrical take on Quebec’s highway infrastructure"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/p>\n

Cleaning up the mess: the de la Concorde overpass (Courtesy of the Daily Commercial News)<\/em><\/p>\n

It is now three years after the collapse of the de la Concorde overpass<\/a> in Laval and Porte Parole, Montreal theatre company, is taking a closer look at the events that led to this tragedy. In what must be the first infrastructural whodunit ever staged, Sexy B\u00e9ton<\/em><\/a> tries to identify those responsible after the official inquiry found no one ultimately to blame. (According to the Pierre Marc Johnson report, no single party was more responsible than the other, so the blame must be shared equally all around.)<\/p>\n

Drawing on interviews with survivors, the play highlights the absurdity of classifying a overpass collapse as a “car accident”; as a result of this bizarre classification, Quebec’s no-fault public car insurance provided no recourse for victims after they had been dutifully reimbursed for their injuries. In some instances, that meant as little as $2500, not even enough to replace their totaled vehicles.<\/p>\n

Sexy B\u00e9ton <\/em>aims to not just address what happened at de la Concorde, but explicitly seeks to draw parallels to the debate over the Turcot Interchange. Their aim: for Sexy B\u00e9ton <\/em>to prompt Montrealers to reflect on the future of their city. But therein is the challenge: how does a play that induces fear about the state of highway infrastructure manage to encourage citizens to reflect rationally about the future of the Turcot? As a warning about under-funded highway programs, this polemical piece could easily be interpreted as a support for the MTQ’s current plan for the Turcot.<\/p>\n

But I know that’s not how the playwright, nor her production company, intended it. The mistake may have been to confound these issues in the first place, although in many ways the link appears self-evident: both structures are built of concrete and steel, but the overpass incident is really about the failure of government systems to respond in a humane way to tragedy, while the Turcot issue is primarily about the future of transportation, secondarily about concrete.<\/p>\n

If you’re wondering whether I’ve given away the ending, I haven’t. However you feel about the Turcot or de la Concorde, this is gripping theatre and well worth seeing. Check out this cute animated preview. <\/a><\/p>\n

The first episode is over, but a second episiode – where answers begin to be revealed – begins in November.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Cleaning up the mess: the de la Concorde overpass (Courtesy of the Daily Commercial News) It is now three years after the collapse of the de la Concorde overpass in Laval and Porte Parole, Montreal theatre company, is taking a closer look at the events that led to this tragedy. In what must be theContinue reading “A theatrical take on Quebec’s highway infrastructure”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5006,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[102],"tags":[4373,4371,3862,92,125,4372,4375,292,28,4374,830,120,302],"class_list":["post-4235","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-spacing","tag-car-accident","tag-government-systems","tag-highway-infrastructure","tag-laval","tag-montreal","tag-no-fault-public-car-insurance","tag-porte-parole","tag-quebec","tag-spacing-montreal","tag-steel","tag-transportation-2","tag-turcot-interchange","tag-usd"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nA theatrical take on Quebec's highway infrastructure - Spacing Montreal<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/montreal\/2009\/10\/01\/a-theatrical-take-on-quebecs-highway-infrastructure\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"A theatrical take on Quebec's highway infrastructure - Spacing Montreal\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Cleaning up the mess: the de la Concorde overpass (Courtesy of the Daily Commercial News) It is now three years after the collapse of the de la Concorde overpass in Laval and Porte Parole, Montreal theatre company, is taking a closer look at the events that led to this tragedy. 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