Aller au contenu
publicité

Cataclaw

Membre
 Afficher le profil  Parcourir son contenu

  • Compteur de contenus

    6 349

  • Inscription

  • Dernière visite

  • Jours gagnés

    16

 Type de contenu 

Tout ce qui a été posté par Cataclaw

  1. Cataclaw
    Ah ben, ça explique ben des choses! Finalement, nos politiciens savent ce qu'ils font!
  2. Cataclaw
    Voilà pourquoi la séparation n'est pas possible ;)
  3. Cataclaw
    Je me retrouve pas mal à la gauche sur la plupart des choses, mais les syndicats.. les os$@! d'syndicats.. ça va faire. Les syndicats ont déjà trop de pouvoir et d'influence au Québec.
  4. Cataclaw
    Good point Cyrus. The border wait times are ridiculous. For bus travel it's the same deal, taking no less than 30 minutes up to 2 hours to clear the darn border. Why don't they just do the necessary checks in Canada at the bus station and then proceed express into the USA, except for maybe a short 5 minute stop just to confirm everything is in order? You might say "well somebody might board the bus after it left..." well then just put a security camera on the bus that records whenever the bus' doors open. When the bus gets to the border, staff can check the security cameras and confirm with the bus driver that nobody else came on board. Additionally, when the bus leaves Montreal, staff at the bus terminal can electronically send data about who's on board the bus to the border crossing, so that those people can then just do a quick check to confirm nobody has left or come on the bus. There's ways to make this quick and simple. The security will never be foolproof, but then again, if somebody really wants to cross into the USA, it ain't that hard. I know personally a half-dozen places out in the country in southern Quebec where you can just cross. Dirt roads that extend into the USA, or even just go through the woods. Heck, at Derby Line / Rock Village, you can just bypass the border crossing by driving through the town, using local streets, which is half inside the USA and half inside Canada. What i'm getting at : if you're a terrorist and you WANT to get in the USA, you'll do it. You'll find a way. In the meantime, we're hurting our economies by putting 2 hour waits at the border...
  5. Cataclaw
    Yahooo! Merci Memphis!
  6. Cataclaw
    Habsfan is right, we've strayed a bit off topic here. I believe there are oil-related forums. Perhaps we can continue this discussion there? On the topic of the TGV, i think it has to be an all-or-nothing thing. If you spend billions just to build a train that is 50% faster than the current train, then it's a waste of money. If you want the NYC-MTL TGV to be attractive, it has to be very fast. It needs to be 220km/h or more. It has to make the trip to NY be 3.5 hours or less. That's just my view... make the train fast and i'll consider taking it, otherwise i'll just drive down there, it's the cheapest option.
  7. Cataclaw
    Ah but there is a drop in oil reserves. I love my car (i also love public transit, but yeah, i do in fact love my car and driving it) but we have to be realistic here Cyrus. Oil supply IS decreasing. It's already started. In fact it started a long time ago. Yes new reserves are being discovered, but the rate of their discovery has fallen sharply over the last few decades. This isn't a "normative issue" where you're an environmentalist or not, or a pro-car or anti-car person... this is an issue of raw numbers and raw facts, and the raw facts are we are running out of oil... and it's a huge f-ing problem! Look at this graph of USA oil production: It isn't just in America, look at this graph for oil discoveries. Yes there are new discoveries all the time, but their rate has fallen. That's a fact. So yeah.. we can't kid ourselves and tell ourselves that we'll have oil forever. It is a finite resource and we WILL run out. Put the environmental issue aside. Put the fuel efficiency issue aside. Just focus on this : if we want to still be driving cars in the future, we have to move away from oil and develop better technology. Period. WTB nuclear fusion plz.
  8. Cataclaw
    This is a complicated question but i'll try my best to explain : the basic problem is there is a finite supply of oil and it's dwindling fast. The free market has a power of adaptation in the form of supply and demand. As the oil producers are forced to obtain oil from more and more expensive places (such as the outer continental shelf or Alberta's oil sands) the cost of obtaining said oil increases. As a result, the price of oil increases too. The increased costs associated with buying, owning and operating a vehicle shift the supply curve upward, meaning the market equilibrium point will have a higher price and a lower quantity. This in turn will encourage suppliers to develop ways of mitigating the impact of higher oil prices by inventing more fuel efficient engines. Unfortunately, in a free market with zero intervention or oversight, the supply-demand interactions are reactionary. Suppliers won't feel the need to change their ways unless they are forced to in order to make a higher profit. One of the problems is there is a time delay between when suppliers are forced to make changes and when those changes are implemented thereby affecting price. This is due to the fact that technology isn't just developed over night... there are a lot of factors at play. Although the market is great at finding an equilibrium and settling on it, that equilibrium is not always the most efficient outcome because of external costs. If oil supply drops sharply in the next few years, as it has already started to do, consumers will be left scrambling to adapt their ways of life and suppliers will be left scrambling as well. If the decline is more gradual and the transition to alternative energy sources is smoother, that difficult and sharp adaptation period (one that could conceivably lead to numerous wars driven by the socioeconomic implications of oil shortage) could be avoided. So in a nutshell, the free market is good at what it does, but it isn't perfect. It needs some help every now and then. In some cases adaptation to drastic changes is too slow and in other cases the market settles on outcomes that are inefficient. Incentives help alleviate the problem. The idea behind incentives is not to override the free market.. on the contrary. The idea is to provide a boost and get the market to "do its thing" faster and better! --- Just so we're clear, i'm talking about the issue of energy. I'm not talking about the use of cars... i personally believe in the availability of personal mobility. I love to travel and i would hate a world in which my options for traveling were severely limited. That's why, in fact, i'm a supporter of regulation and incentives designed to promote alternative energy vehicles that can allow us to continue to use cars well into the 21st and 22nd centuries!
  9. Cataclaw
    We need a combination of strategies and incentives to tackle this issue. We do need price floors, consumption taxes, supply quotas, subsidies and other incentives. Malek's point regarding quotas is certainly a valid one, however taxing gas is also an excellent (and necessary) means to alter the supply curve. Shift the supply curve upwards and the market settles on a new equilibrium point with a smaller quantity demanded. That's just simple microeconomics. So again, taxing the heck out of gas isn't and shouldn't be the only solution. I agree with that wholeheartedly. However it should still be one of the many tools we have to curb fuel consumption and promote increased efficiency. One incentive i particularly like is raising efficiency and MPG minimums. The north american market is still a lucrative one, and we shouldn't be afraid of scaring off suppliers by enacting stricter regulations. Besides, lots of countries already HAVE stricter regulations and the supply-side of the market hasn't been affected all that much due to the marginal elasticity of supply.
  10. Cataclaw
    OursNoir: répondeur-de-questions-en-chef de mtlurb depuis mai 2007
  11. Cataclaw
    An interesting topic, to be sure. Nevertheless, I agree somewhat with pedepy..
  12. Cataclaw
    Cool. Good news. I'll take it!
  13. Cataclaw
    Je pense que Montreal a eu un gros choc dans les années 60-70 avec la destruction de quartiers entiers pour des projets "modernes". Je pense à la tour de la Banque Nationale à la Place d'Armes -- quelle gaffe. Il y a eu aussi la destruction de quartiers entiers pour l'autoroute Ville-Marie, le complexe de la SRC, etc. Donc, après cette période, Montréal a eu un choc et son peuple s'est mis à avoir peur de tout développement. Mais plus qu'on s'éloigne de cette époque, plus que les pendules reviennent à l'heure. Je trouve qu'on se rapproche de plus en plus d'un équillibre adéquat entre le développement du nouveau et la protection de l'ancien. Oui, il y a toujours des NIMBYs, des "Dinu Bumbaru" qui ne voient qu'un aspect de la situation, mais avec ce que je vois aujourd'hui en matière de développement, j'ai confiance qu'on est en train de tourner la page.
  14. Cataclaw
    The scale of the rendering is most likely correct. Floor heights are something that can vary widely.. from 2.5m to 6m per floor. As such, I see absolutely no reason to doubt the validity of the official rendering. Furthermore, if you look at Triomphe at roughly the 10th floor, you'll notice architectural elements that line up perfectly with the setback in the neighboring building. This is definitely intentional, and proves the accuracy of the scale and rendering.
  15. Cataclaw

    Le Port-Royal (2011)

    Cataclaw a répondu à un sujet de MTLskyline dans Complétés

    Still an ugly concrete building... but it's less ugly now
  16. Cataclaw
    Sans édifices, ou vont habiter tes individus?
  17. Cataclaw
    Lmfao. This post made me snort my drink. Si Richard Bergeron s'occupait de la Rive Sud, c'est probablement ce qu'il dirait!
  18. Cataclaw
    Ooooh! Merci pour le scoop champdemars! Hmm.. quoi faire avec ca..
  19. Cataclaw
    Ce débat, selon moi, est totalement absurde. Si tu veux des belles vues, va en campagne. Ici on est en ville. On construit des édifices. C'est ça qui fait que c'est une ville... si on aurait pas d'édifices, on ne serait même pas un village. Il est sympa notre cher Mont Royal et je suis entièrement pour sa protection, mais de là empêcher qu'un édifice soit construit à 1km de distance pour préserver une vue d'un point spécifique parmis un nombre infinie de vues... c'est irrationel. Construire dense, urbain et haut dans le secteur du centre-ville. AVANTAGES: rentabilité du transport en commun, éfficacité, plein usage des infrastructures, mise en valeur, pouvoir d'attraction culturel, avantages économiques, plus écologique, etc/ DÉSAVANTAGES: je ne peux pas voir le Mont-Royal, à moins que je me déplace de quelques mètres. Shit! Misère...
  20. Cataclaw
    L'ensemble de HoMa est plus dense que l'ensemble de Longueuil car il y a bien des quartiers de basse densité à Longueuil typiquement "banlieu". Ceci vient baisser la moyenne de Longueuil. Cependant, il y aussi des zones de moyenne-haute densité qui sont quand même très respectables et dans certains cas plus fortes que la plupart des endroits à HoMa.
  21. Cataclaw
    I'm all for public transportation taking up a larger percentage of the transit pie... but some of these changes are quite drastic and quite sudden. I can't say I agree with these changes. I've always said this and i'll say it again... transportation is about balance. You need buses, trains, metros, sidewalks, bike paths... but you also need cars. You can't completely eliminate cars from the equation without suffering. Sure, if we had a Manhattan-esque subway system spanning the entire city, i'd be alright with these changes. However, we don't have a Manhattan-esque subway system, so occasionally, people will need to drive around.
  22. Cataclaw
    Préserver chaque vue de chaque angle implique zéro développement, et je regrètte, mais si tu décides de vivre en ville, tu dois t'attendre à ce qu'il y a du développement. C'est comme si je décide de vivre sur une ferme et je me fache parce qu'il y a une odeur de fumier. Waterman: "la vue sur le centre-ville" n'est pas une ressource ni un bien. Et de plus, est-ce que tu réalises que notre centre-ville est formé d'édifices en hauteur? Se plaindre que des édifices en hauteur viennent ajouter au centre-ville c'est comme se plaindre que tu ne peux pas voir la forêt parce qu'il y a des arbres en face de toi pour cacher ta vue..... les arbres... sont la forêt....
  23. Cataclaw
    St-Urbain must not, under any circumstances, be closed. If they do expand the building, they should do over and around the street, creating a moderately spacious and well-lit tunnel with convention space overhead.
  24. Cataclaw
    The whole counter-culture basis of tagging and graffiti is that precisely, as IluvMTL says, nothing is sacred. The only areas off limits seem to art and murals created by fellow artists. They have respect for that.
  25. Cataclaw
    From what i've read, the work that will finish in 2012 is the removal of the existing tiles and the installation of "temporary walls" all across the station. Later on, in the years that follow, a new design may be implemented, though no such design has been revealed and no timetable has been offered. This first step that will go on for the next 2 years is the removal of the old walls and the installation of temporary walls that resemble the old white tiles -- that's it. Don't get your hopes up...
×
×
  • Créer...