When the news are slow, some creates them!

What more can I say after reading the news in the “Journal de Montreal”, on a poll of 400 persons, which 52% are non-working, asked about the traffic jams in the Montreal area during rush hours. Luckily, I saw the printed edition a few days later. I don’t know any professional truck driver that loves to drive a big rig in any major city at those times of day. If I take the example given about the city of Boston that bans heavy trucks in the city, there is no by-law of that kind in Montreal or Quebec City, I am not aware of one in Chicago or Los Angeles either, a driver with a lick of common sense will avoid a city if he or she does not have to be there. But, no laws bans from using a highway or an Interstate.

Sadly, if I compare the urban area of Montreal with the majority of cities across North America, no government in the past or present has had enough nerves to stand up and put the roadway resources where they were needed. For the past thirty years we have been waiting for a circle road in the greater Montreal. Each time an opposing group got in the way, the government backed off, waited, made a study, and it adds more cost to the project to pay for these studies, meetings and the inflation cost that climbs too.

I am fed up of paying, from my honest and hard work, thousands of dollars in taxes each year, for every kilometre I run with my truck and be treated this way. I could almost put forward that many carriers, large or small, have similar thoughts when we look at the lack of long term vision of our governments.

Did the journalists compare the way we are paid in North America with the European countries that are took as examples? I didn’t see anything on that in what I read.

What comparison is possible between Switzerland, that is 40 times smaller then the Province of Quebec (41,290 Km2 vs. 1,667,926 Km2) with almost the same population. Traffic jams must be heavier for our European cousins. The use of mass transit is part of their way of life. The car is only a princess there, the train is king. If we have here, like in France, a pilot project that would restrain truck traffic to only the right lane, how would other road users would react to merging in or out of an Autoroute? There is no mention in the article that the speed limits for cars in France is higher then on our roads in Quebec, 4 wheelers are going 15-20-25Km/h over the speed limit on A-20! But this is still under the posted speed in France

The best solution is not to ban delivery trucks; this would only create another parking issue, we are only trying to make an honest living. To favour mass transit with incentives, would be a better solution to ease on rush hour traffic. One last data that is not in the paper, there is an increase of over 60% of cars in Quebec.