Next wave of tactics will target economy, but businesses say they are already suffering.
Public continues to avoid city centre
As gleeful students marched through Montreal on Thursday to protest tuition fee hikes, many who make their livelihood in the city or are shouldering the costs of dissent were considerably less enthused.
Student protests now into their sixth week are having a detrimental effect on the city’s economy, say merchants, truckers, business people and city leaders.
Hard figures are difficult to pin down, but the effects of blocked bridges, or stores and restaurants left empty because people are avoiding downtown, are tangible.
“It’s having a huge impact,” said Marc Cadieux, president of the Quebec Truckers Association.
“It causes a loss of revenues and an increase in operating costs when you’re stranded in traffic, as we’ve lived through the last days.”
Driving a truck in the city costs between $75 and $85 an hour, Cadieux said.
But protests like the one Tuesday that blocked the Champlain Bridge, which sees 10,000 trucks travelling over it each day, also affect dispatchers, customer service reps and clients scrambling to reorganize.
Trucking companies already demand a surcharge for coming into perennially congested Montreal. That will increase if the protests continue, Cadieux said.
The trucking industry is sympathetic to the students’ demands, he said, “but you shouldn’t hold hostage segments of the population that can’t do anything to change the situation.”
The protests “are a hard pill to swallow” for downtown merchants emerging from the lean winter months who were revelling in the boost brought on by summery weather, said Steve Siozos, co-president of the Crescent Street Merchants Association.
He estimates stores, bars and restaurants suffer a 30- to 50-per-cent drop in revenues on protest days.
Coming on top of some suburbanites’ perception that downtown is best avoided because of problems with traffic, parking and endless construction, the student protests “are killing us,” Siozos said.
He suggests protesters be allowed one or two days to demonstrate, but make further protesting illegal.
“We can’t stifle democracy,” he said. “But we can’t stifle everyone’s right to enjoy the city and to run a business.”
The more troubling aspect is the loss of reputation for businesses and tourism, said André Poulin, director of commercial development association Destination Centre Ville.
Several store owners hired extra security guards Thursday, some with dogs.
“We’re being taken hostage a bit for something we have nothing to do with,” Poulin said.
“It’s the government, but nothing is happening in Quebec City – it’s all happening in downtown Montreal.”
Strike supporters counter that, with a government that pays little attention to peaceful mass protests, economic disruption is the only negotiating tool left.
“We are targeting Jean Charest, because he says his main priority is the economy, so the pressure tactic is working,” said Anna Kruzynski, an associate professor at Concordia’s School of Community and Public Affairs and supporter of the strike.
She called on the public to be patient and think of the disruptions as short-term pain in exchange for the longterm gain of low tuition fees that make higher education more accessible.
Montreal’s Chamber of Commerce said there is no question the protests are having a negative effect.
Studies commissioned by the organization have estimated the cost of traffic congestion on Montreal’s economy at more than $2 billion a year.
Student protests that block bridges can be even more disruptive than the usual culprit – construction work – because they’re unpredictable, said Chamber president Michel Leblanc.
The Chamber favours tuition fee hikes so that Quebec “can have universities that are competitive, offer diplomas of quality and bring in the best professors,” Leblanc said.
Student leaders pledged to begin a week of protests Monday aimed at disrupting the economy if the government doesn’t agree to negotiate after Thursday’s demonstration.