Comments on: And the winner is: Louise Harel!

By: Edward

Edward — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 19:58:12 +0000

I don’t have a problem with having many different municipalities on the island. First off, this is very common all over the world and smaller cities are simply run better; more efficiently and with significantly better level of service, cleanliness and better responsive to the needs of the citizens. Indeed, smaller is more democratic. Also, West Island cities for example are suburban in character, lifestyle, and layout and would not necessarily be a cohesive match with the City of Montreal.

Also, there are a lot of sensitivities in these municipalities that cannot be ignored or scoffed at… in a political process (Quebec) where many feel like they have no voice and don’t matter, having these cities allows people to at least have some voice…

That said, I can see the island joined with but 4 or 5 boroughs. Much like New York City.

By: the Dude

the Dude — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 14:00:13 +0000

It’s only a matter of time, the old cities/demerged cities will come back in the fold, eventually.
It makes no sense, as J. Lawlor says.

Only by being close to the power can you enable changes in your favor.

Right now the CMM has much more power over the demerged than in the old C.U.M.

I still believe that the mergers are good, they were just not well received due to haste, lack of information, lack of discussion with the mergees, no intermediate solution between 29 cities to 1 (they could have first merged into 3 or 4 bodies with the expected final merger 4-8 years later, just to smooth things out between neighbors).

In the meantime, west islanders should really look into merging with one another to create a real West Montreal.
That’s if they have any long term vision and want to regain some power. Big if…
I bet they could even attract more currently merger old cities to join them like Ile-Bizard, Pieerfonds-Roxboro, St-Laurent, etc…
Make it a one island 2 cities…

By: James Lawlor

James Lawlor — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 21:21:39 +0000

You also should hypothesize what would have been the results if the west-island had not been de-merged as Harel kept saying was a terrible liberal mistake.
To do that you would need to make an assumptions about how the west Island would have voted…
I think you would find that Harel would have been a massive loser in that situation. Since the W-I is so car dependent and not receptive to Projet Montreal’s message, Bergeron would have also been a big loser. Tremblay would have been re-elected in another landslide just like 2005.

Look at the results for un-de-merged boroughs – they voted heavily for Tremblay.
Projet Montreal only did well in central city boroughs.

Ironically, in voting to de-merge, anglophones reduced their political power in the city. Had the west island stayed merged, mayoral candidates would have to court the anglophone vote. Now, the small anglophone cities do not have a common voice and are demographically outweighed by Montreal in the agglomeration council.

By: cheese

cheese — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 17:56:40 +0000

Thanks for posting these maps, I wasn’t in Montreal for the whole merger/demerger thing but what a mess. The history of it is really interesting though.

We need to be setup like a modern functional city. I also (mostly) agreed with Harel on this topic, the numbers Vision Montreal supplied about boroughs and city representatives in Toronto and New York made Montreal look like a wasteful joke.

Looking at the maps it seems that the island could be split into four super-boroughs with a few extra rights extended to some areas like Westmount, TMR, or Est-Montreal to preserve their feeling that they are different from their surroundings. I guess we just need a benevolent dictator in chared to make it happen.

By: Jody

Jody — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 14:11:11 +0000

Thanks for the great article and before/after maps… Very helpful and indeed ironic.

By: Alex

Alex — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 05:27:25 +0000

Ca serait quand même moin stupide de voir les villes qui sont “land-locked” dans une autre ville (voir Westmount dans Montréal par exemple) être fusionnée quand même!

Ca rendrait le jeux des fusions plus amusant :P

By: Fagstein

Fagstein — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 03:46:36 +0000

Jean-François Lisée made the same calculation. It's cute, but of course academic. The demerger referendums happened in June 2004, by the way. They took effect in 2006.

By: soup

soup — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 02:04:18 +0000

heh. You wrote “Bergerone”. Sounds Italian!

By: Leila

Leila — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 01:40:23 +0000

What a fascinating exercise, thanks Chris. Ironic indeed.

But I have no patience for the anti-merger people. One look at the pre 2002 map show just how ridiculous things were. Every one of those tiny fiefdoms were there as satellites of Montreal, benefiting from their proximity to, and association with, the city. I just with I trusted Harel more, cause she probably would have had my vote, separatist or not.

By: Adolfo

Adolfo — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 00:17:39 +0000

Chris, the actual numbers when rounded up or down to their closest integer are actually 33, 38 and 29. Not that it changes what you’re trying to say.