The car has met its match in Projet Montréal

Observing Montreal Island’s governing structure without plucking one’s eyes out requires an appreciation of dysfunction, a love of the absurd and possibly some very good drugs. It takes 103 elected officials, about as many as Toronto and New York City combined, to govern the roughly 89 per cent of its population that lives in the city of Montreal. To understand exactly why the remaining 11 per cent of the island’s population in the on-island suburbs needs an additional 113 elected officials is to delve into Quebec language politics of yore. There aren’t enough column inches or good drugs to do so, and I need my eyes. Yet if there is one nice thing we can say about this structure, it’s that it works despite itself. The city has thrived since a short-lived attempt at unification was rolled back a dozen years ago in the crucible of tongue-related polemics. The obsession with language itself has virtually disappeared, if only because the city aptly and enduringly reflects Quebec’s French fact. OK, make that two nice things about Montreal’s governing structure: Without it, we never would have had a mayor named Valérie Plante. This isn’t a paean to Montreal’s 45th mayor, who recently celebrated one year in office. Her party, Projet Montréal, began as a lefty environmentalist experiment 14 years ago; now in power, it is at times doctrinaire in its own righteousness. Its summertime ban on vehicle through traffic over Mount Royal, a terrific idea in principle, was implemented with little subtlety and even less forethought. The result was scattershot enforcement and scads of confused tourists — many of whom simply ignored the rule. Yet the ban also had the intended effect, which was a drastic reduction in the number of cars travelling through the city’s most iconic green space. And this sort of effort is the enduring and endearing thing about Projet Montréal: it has brought environmentalism to a tangible level, showing that politicians can win elections by running against the almighty automobile. And Projet Montreal exists and succeeds thanks to Montreal Island’s radically decentralized dysfunction. The party’s first taste of power was on the Plateau, the formerly working-class Montreal neighbourhood now inhabited by swaths of the province’s cultural and media elite. Plateau mayor Luc Ferrandez took office in 2009 and promptly closed some streets to traffic, reversed the direction of many others and generally made life a pain for commuters. He measured success by the square feet of asphalt he turned into parks. He was widely pilloried as a elbows-first crackpot as a result. Yet he was re-elected, again and again. Moreover, the Plateau disease so dreaded by suburbanites and political foes alike spread, slowly capturing pieces of the city’s cacophonous machinery of borough councillors, borough mayors and city councillors in successive elections. The party’s 2017 victory was a continuation of this, as well as a reflection of a deceptively simple truism: Montrealers by and large like parks, recycling, good public transportation and streets unclogged by commuter traffic. Many cities are slaves to their suburbs. Montreal isn’t one of them. Today, Projet Montréal is in a commanding position. Plante has dulled many sharp elbows within the party, those of Ferrandez very much included. Her opposition is without a permanent leader and will probably remain so until the eve of the next municipal election in 2021. Her predecessor, Richard Bergeron, was a onetime 9/11 truther who also believed in the therapeutic effects of cigarettes. By contrast, thanks to her success, Plante can now surround herself with top-tier, decidedly un-crankish candidates. And there’s the party’s list of hitherto unthinkable projects: a giant park on the St-Jacques escarpment, hugging Highway 20. A pedestrian-only McGill College Ave. The whispers I’ve heard about Mount Royal, which include shrinking the existing roads and an outright ban of through traffic, will be the next chapter in the party’s war against the car cartel. Any bets as to who will win?

Many cities are slaves to their suburbs. Montreal isn’t one of them.