Montreal at Night
Wednesday, January 12, 2011
Sunday, January 9, 2011
The Great Ice Storm of 1998
We have reached yet another anniversary of the Great Ice Storm of 1998. It began in Montreal on January 5th of that year. The storm hammered the Montreal area. Not only was Montreal affected, but so was a wide area of southern Quebec and eastern Ontario. There was also ice accumulation in New Brunswick. Northern New York and Vermont were also hit hard.
Nobody really saw the storm coming. Three storm waves of freezing rain came through and lasted for 80 consecutive hours. Some parts of the affected region were hit with 100mm of ice or more.
Life in Montreal become paralyzed as the ice continued to accumulate. Roads were almost impassable, and travel became nearly impossible as the bridges and tunnels to and from the island of Montreal were shut down. People would literally stuck on the island.
By far the biggest impact of the storm was on the power grid. Ice accumulation brought down immense hydro pylons, cutting power to huge population centres. For a time, around 4 million people were without power, and most of them were in Quebec. it would take weeks, if not months to restore power for some. The power situation was particularly brutal on the South Shore. Montreal’s water treatment plants were also affected by the power outages and people were forced to boil their water.
Quebec, Ontario and New Brunswick requested the Canadian military be called in on January 7th. About 16,000 troops would help with rescue and clearing operations. It was the largest non-combat-related military mobilisation in Canadian history. Municipalities also set up special centres to house people who had lost power. Some people were afraid to leave their homes for fear they would be looted.
By the time the storm ended on January 10th, 28 people had died in Canada, and most of them died of hypothermia. The cost of the damage was estimated to be over $2 billion in Quebec alone. Harm was also done to the landscape. Over 80 per cent of Mount Royal’s trees were damaged, and 5000 of them would have to be cut down. Farms were devastated and the maple syrup industry was also hard hit.
As far as radio was concerned, the storm knocked out CJAD's antenna. They would reach a deal with CKGM to broadcast on 990 kHz for several months until their signal was re-established on 800 AM. Many listeners switched over to the now-defunct CIQC when CJAD got knocked out. That resulted in them gaining a whole new audience. They were not able to translate that into any long-term success, and most listeners returned to CJAD once they got back on the air.
Some smaller Montreal stations also managed to stay on the air despite the ice. I've heard stories of how CINQ continued to broadcast using auxiliary power. Yes, the Internet was around by 1998, but when the power grid goes down, just about everything else goes down with it. Even if you have battery power for your computer or mobile device, the relay centres may be overwhelmed or down. You may have to go back to the basics and get your local information from old-fashioned terrestrial radio.
Here are some classic Ice Storm YouTube clips from January 1998:
Nobody really saw the storm coming. Three storm waves of freezing rain came through and lasted for 80 consecutive hours. Some parts of the affected region were hit with 100mm of ice or more.
Life in Montreal become paralyzed as the ice continued to accumulate. Roads were almost impassable, and travel became nearly impossible as the bridges and tunnels to and from the island of Montreal were shut down. People would literally stuck on the island.
By far the biggest impact of the storm was on the power grid. Ice accumulation brought down immense hydro pylons, cutting power to huge population centres. For a time, around 4 million people were without power, and most of them were in Quebec. it would take weeks, if not months to restore power for some. The power situation was particularly brutal on the South Shore. Montreal’s water treatment plants were also affected by the power outages and people were forced to boil their water.
Quebec, Ontario and New Brunswick requested the Canadian military be called in on January 7th. About 16,000 troops would help with rescue and clearing operations. It was the largest non-combat-related military mobilisation in Canadian history. Municipalities also set up special centres to house people who had lost power. Some people were afraid to leave their homes for fear they would be looted.
By the time the storm ended on January 10th, 28 people had died in Canada, and most of them died of hypothermia. The cost of the damage was estimated to be over $2 billion in Quebec alone. Harm was also done to the landscape. Over 80 per cent of Mount Royal’s trees were damaged, and 5000 of them would have to be cut down. Farms were devastated and the maple syrup industry was also hard hit.
As far as radio was concerned, the storm knocked out CJAD's antenna. They would reach a deal with CKGM to broadcast on 990 kHz for several months until their signal was re-established on 800 AM. Many listeners switched over to the now-defunct CIQC when CJAD got knocked out. That resulted in them gaining a whole new audience. They were not able to translate that into any long-term success, and most listeners returned to CJAD once they got back on the air.
Some smaller Montreal stations also managed to stay on the air despite the ice. I've heard stories of how CINQ continued to broadcast using auxiliary power. Yes, the Internet was around by 1998, but when the power grid goes down, just about everything else goes down with it. Even if you have battery power for your computer or mobile device, the relay centres may be overwhelmed or down. You may have to go back to the basics and get your local information from old-fashioned terrestrial radio.
Here are some classic Ice Storm YouTube clips from January 1998:
Friday, December 31, 2010
Good Riddance, 2010
Emergency planning is usually lacking in far too many instances. Just look at what happened in Europe recently, as a dozen centimetres of snow shut down airports and caused total chaos. Things like that could very well be avoided. Then there is the other end of the spectrum, when “experts” go overboard in their apocalyptic predictions and preparations.
It is no secret that the attention span of western societies is pretty short. No matter how horrible the disaster, few will literally change the world and the way we see it. In other words, an event must have a direct impact on our lives in order for it to remain on the radar. 9/11 was probably the last such Earth-shattering occurrence.
In 2010, there were two news stories that blanketed the media for long periods of time. The earthquake in Haiti and the Gulf oil spill. For a while it seemed that there was nothing else happening. But as it goes, both eventually became yesterday’s news…
It seems the situation in Haiti has not improved much since the quake hit almost a year ago, but with some exceptions, we don’t hear too much about it now. Likewise, as disastrous as the Gulf oil spill was supposed to have been, it too isn’t talked about that much anymore. Either there has been a miraculous environmental recovery, or it just isn’t as interesting to look at live shots of a capped well. Has anything been learned from those two events and how the world responded to them? Maybe. Will anything change as a result? Probably not. Most policies are reactionary not visionary.
So take note of some of the predictions that are being made about the year 2011. There is little doubt that some of the biggest news stories of the coming year will be things nobody saw coming - even if they should have. As for 2010, it wasn't that great...
Friday, December 24, 2010
Monday, December 13, 2010
Montreal TV in Canada
There was a recent article that appeared in a local newspaper that lamented the lack of English TV production in Montreal. To be more specific, the lack of "openly" Montreal fictional TV produced. It is truly amazing how non-existent it has been, not only in recent years, but for decades. 
Gone are the days of local programming aimed at Montrealers. Still, it wasn’t that long ago that quite a few shows were based here. Some even managed to be seen by a much wider audience. Some CBC shows were produced here, but you'd probably have to go back to the 1980s to find the last time that happened. On channel 12, Travel Travel was hugely successful and sold abroad. It didn't really focus on Montreal, but the hosts were always local television personalities. As for shows that were produced for the local market alone, they are too numerous to name. They are now all gone, and that too is a damn shame.
So what were some of the more "memorable" contemporary - and I use that term very loosely - shows that were supposed to be set in Montreal? The last one that I remember was a CBC show called "Urban Angel". It only ran a couple of years, and that was nearly two decades ago... A cool fact about that show was that it was picked up by CBS and shown once a week in what is now David Letterman's time slot. Urban Angel was unique in that it was actually watchable. The same can't be said of the next two gems on the Montreal list...
Do you remember a show set at a ski resort near Montreal back in the early 1980s? It was called "Snow Job". It might quite possibly go down as the worst show in the history of Canadian television. I remember one episode in particular where a young Wayne Gretzky made a cameo. No doubt Wayne would probably want to have that tape burned, if it hasn't been already...
And the last show on my list was highly touted by CTV before it went on the air. It was meant to mimic what had been very popular American prime-time soaps. Unfortunately for Mount Royal , by the time it premiered, powerhouse shows like Dallas and Dynasty were beginning to fade. Even more unfortunate for the program was that it had no plot or point to it. You did get your weekly fix of Montreal location shots, but that was not enough to save it from the inevitable.
What is quite amazing is that Montreal-centred English-language theatre and fiction are thriving right now. I see it with the endless line of talent that makes its way onto the Arts Notebook program on Radio Centre-Ville every week. Why this hasn't translated onto television screens is a mystery. And it is rare that a work of Canadian television fiction ever portrays the interaction between anglophones and francophones in Montreal. Almost everything you have seen on Canadian TV to this point has presented the groups are the stereotypical two solitudes. There seems to be a fear of presenting any other reality, because some people might be offended.
Maybe all the Montreal TV talent has left for greener pastures... Or maybe the decision-makers down the 401 just don't care if there is any Montreal representation on the airwaves. Having said all that, don't expect anything to change. Even the control rooms are in Toronto now!
Gone are the days of local programming aimed at Montrealers. Still, it wasn’t that long ago that quite a few shows were based here. Some even managed to be seen by a much wider audience. Some CBC shows were produced here, but you'd probably have to go back to the 1980s to find the last time that happened. On channel 12, Travel Travel was hugely successful and sold abroad. It didn't really focus on Montreal, but the hosts were always local television personalities. As for shows that were produced for the local market alone, they are too numerous to name. They are now all gone, and that too is a damn shame.
So what were some of the more "memorable" contemporary - and I use that term very loosely - shows that were supposed to be set in Montreal? The last one that I remember was a CBC show called "Urban Angel". It only ran a couple of years, and that was nearly two decades ago... A cool fact about that show was that it was picked up by CBS and shown once a week in what is now David Letterman's time slot. Urban Angel was unique in that it was actually watchable. The same can't be said of the next two gems on the Montreal list...
Do you remember a show set at a ski resort near Montreal back in the early 1980s? It was called "Snow Job". It might quite possibly go down as the worst show in the history of Canadian television. I remember one episode in particular where a young Wayne Gretzky made a cameo. No doubt Wayne would probably want to have that tape burned, if it hasn't been already...
And the last show on my list was highly touted by CTV before it went on the air. It was meant to mimic what had been very popular American prime-time soaps. Unfortunately for Mount Royal , by the time it premiered, powerhouse shows like Dallas and Dynasty were beginning to fade. Even more unfortunate for the program was that it had no plot or point to it. You did get your weekly fix of Montreal location shots, but that was not enough to save it from the inevitable.
What is quite amazing is that Montreal-centred English-language theatre and fiction are thriving right now. I see it with the endless line of talent that makes its way onto the Arts Notebook program on Radio Centre-Ville every week. Why this hasn't translated onto television screens is a mystery. And it is rare that a work of Canadian television fiction ever portrays the interaction between anglophones and francophones in Montreal. Almost everything you have seen on Canadian TV to this point has presented the groups are the stereotypical two solitudes. There seems to be a fear of presenting any other reality, because some people might be offended.
Maybe all the Montreal TV talent has left for greener pastures... Or maybe the decision-makers down the 401 just don't care if there is any Montreal representation on the airwaves. Having said all that, don't expect anything to change. Even the control rooms are in Toronto now!
Monday, December 6, 2010
Tuesday, November 30, 2010
Musings...
Not that long ago, you could never envision a day when people in far away lands would be able to listen to your program. I remember the first time I found streaming radio stations in the mid-1990s, and just how amazing that seemed. Of course now we are completely shocked when a station doesn’t stream.
The concept of all-news actually began as all-news, rather than all-news and an endless stream of talking heads. Back then, you had to watch for the news, because you could not go and get it yourself on the Internet. The audience is now very fragmented. But don't feel too bad for the old-school broadcasters - their parent companies own just about all the specialty channels. One way or another, they are capturing the audience...
I'm still amazed to see where podcast audiences tend to come from. I don't know how much this holds true for other places, but ex-Montrealers seem to have maintained a deep attachment to their home town. There are so many people out there who are deeply nostalgic for the Montreal they grew up in.
Things are different in Montreal now, as with the exception of newscasts, local TV in English has all but disappeared. Local radio has changed dramatically since the 1970s and 1980s. There are far fewer big "names" out there than there used to be. Will people be nostalgic in 30 years time for anything they see or hear now from Montreal broadcasters?
On a somewhat related note, in terms of television, they keep telling us we have more choice than ever before. Technically that is true, but most people can relate to flipping through thousands of channels on their cable or satellite systems and finding nothing on worth watching. There were only about 30 cable TV channels 25 years ago, so why did they seem so much more interesting?
The concept of all-news actually began as all-news, rather than all-news and an endless stream of talking heads. Back then, you had to watch for the news, because you could not go and get it yourself on the Internet. The audience is now very fragmented. But don't feel too bad for the old-school broadcasters - their parent companies own just about all the specialty channels. One way or another, they are capturing the audience...
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