The city is devising a new set of by-laws to try to limit damage caused by flooding – the official communiqué spells it out.
Updates from May, 2011 Toggle Comment Threads | Keyboard Shortcuts
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Kent Nagano directed a spring concert last night with the MSO at Carnegie Hall and you can listen to it on this NPR link.
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The NDP has picked up another seat after a judicial recount in Montmagny–L’Islet–Kamouraska–Rivière-du-Loup showed candidate François Lapointe beat his Conservative rival by nine votes. The Tory had been declared the winner on election night.
In another bit of federal news, the Liberals may delay a leadership vote indefinitely, although normally the party rules say they should pick someone within five months.
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The organization that runs Bixi had threatened to withdraw all the bikes and close the service to make the government cover its debts. Louise Harel is condemning the situation as did Richard Bergeron in a tweet this weekend. The standoff for funding went down to the wire.
I like Bixi and it makes me sad to think it may not be sustainable in the long run, even with sponsorship ads all over the bikes.
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ant6n
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David Tighe
Bixi, and bicycles in general, take some of the ltraffic load during peak hours, reducing the need for additional buses and freeing up road space for cars. This must be included in an evaluation of benefits. It would be very nice if Bixi were financially profitable and perhaps it will be someday but there is no reason why it should be.
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Chris
David, Bixi doesn’t actually take too many cars off the road, at least not so far: http://www.mcgill.ca/newsroom/news/item/?item_id=167406 Hopefully, in the longer term, there will be a greater modal shift. Still, I agree otherwise. Lord knows we sell other things at a loss, mostly notably parking space, which is often given away for free.
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Ian
Considering the existing budget shortfalls in Montreal, it seems foolish to spend a seriously huge amount of money on keeping bixi afloat. Seriously, a 37 million dollar bailout? That’s more than double what we spend on snow plowing.
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ant6n
It seems that Bixi lost 7$ million for the Montreal operations last year. On 3.3 million trips.
@Chris – I think the survey you cite is not very effective trying to find out how far bixi has helped people to decide against buying a car, or in how far it has helped the proliferation of bicycling in Montreal. Only if you already own a car could a bixi trip ‘replace’ a car trip.
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Stefan
there may as well be a significant transfer drivers->bus, bus->bixi – we do not know.
also, cycling reduces health care costs – by prevention and reducing pollution, which surpasses any collision-related costs. it does not create potholes and other wear on streets. in such a holistic perspective it may even be profitable, provided that it is well managed.it is a good move for the city to stand boldly behind the bixi as a concept to increase cycling. management of it is a different aspect though. when i read about the $108m loan figure, i got concerned that there may be some different interests, thinking of all those corruption scandals lately.
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Stefan
ant6n: i have tried but failed to understand the published bixi financial report, if this is the actual loss. the $37m which ian mentions are the initial investment though, which is now just transferred from the city to stationnement montreal. does anyone here have some background to understand that report and enlighten us?
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Chris
Ian, 37 million is more than double what we spend on snow plowing?!? You’re talking *per snowstorm* right? Otherwise, your figures are wrong. We spend about $150 million a year on snow operations. See: http://ville.montreal.qc.ca/portal/page?_pageid=5637,30739566&_dad=portal&_schema=PORTAL
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ant6n
@Stefan
I have trouble understanding their financial report as well. The 7 million figure comes from a Gazette article (http://blogs.montrealgazette.com/2011/05/06/bixi-lays-off-employees-blames-quebec/#more-90005), which cites a bixi plea on facebook where they try to make people understand why advertisement on bikes was necessary. So who knows… -
Singlestar
The auditor’s report on this subject, reportedly due out soon, ought to provide a cogent explanation of the background. In the meantime it is useful to remember that Stationnement de Montréal was set up in the dying days of the Doré administration as a gift to the Chambre de Commerce, giving them hundreds of thousands of dollars a year of parking profit, for them to distribute according to their own priorities, not the city’s. One might well ask why the city which can’t fix its own potholes, is busy floating loans in the 10s of millions so that speculators can provide services to NYC and London. Something very strange!!!
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Ian
Chris, I meant snow plowing only – not including removal, salting & sanding. I got my figure (average 14.5 million for snow plowing) from the city’s website, so if you think my quote is too low, take it up with them. http://ville.montreal.qc.ca/portal/page?_pageid=5637,30739566&_dad=portal&_schema=PORTAL
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Chris
Ian, you’re directing me to the same URL I pointed out to you, you know? :) Your comparison is unfair. The $14.5 million spent on mere plowing would increase if the $87 million was not spent on removal, due to the accumulation of snow complicating further plowing. A fairer comparison is: the bixi bailout cost 25% as much as one year of snow clearing operations.
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ant6n
I am still not sure it’s a fair comparison – what is this bailout for?
If you consider that Bixi is having a loss of 7 million on operations per year, than the 37 million might be mostly toward more capital expense or debt thereof kind of stuff over multiple years – comparing that to operations of a single year is probably not very meaningful.Imagine snow plowing was seen as a potentially profitable thing the city does – five years after starting from scratch, with some initial investment from the city, how much bailout would a ‘public snow plow company’ have to receive?
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qatzelok
It looks to me like Bixi is pissed that people aren’t accepting their advertising slush fund, so they are on the offensive: “Oh, we are so poor. We need to fire people.” When that didn’t work (at reducing grafitti on their bike ads) their PR department went with “We are ready to go bankrupt.” Bixi is run by sleazebags.
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Ian
@ Chris – I’m aware that is the same link you posted, I was directing you to re-read it more closely as my figures were clearly more accurate than you had suggested. ;) In any case I am sure that we can all agree that 37 million is a lot of money for a city that is ostensibly short on cash and has huge operating budgets.
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Most modes of transport are not sustainable, just check how much money is being spend on roads in Montreal this year. The question is how much money they lose compared to the benefits. Of course the benefits are not just the mobility for the people who use the system, but generally the increase of bike users, bike paths, hopefully creating a “critical mass” of bicycling in this town.