The moment has finally come! After many months in the making, the much-talked-about Montreal public bike rental system, Bixi, has launched. Over the past few weeks the city has installed a number of automated
bike rental stations
and launched a web site allowing users to see availabilities in real
time (both the number of available bikes and available docking slots).
Although the system is geared mainly towards residents of the city,
tourists can take advantage of it as well, with monthly and even daily
tariffs available.
Read the rest of: "BiXi Launched"»
The voting process for the name of Montreal's citywide bike rental program is over and the winner is chosen. The system is going to be called "BIXI".
Over the next month, demo bikes will be wheeled around the city and public demonstrations will be held. According to the city's mayor,
Gérald Tremblay, by next spring Montreal will count 2,400 bikes at more than 300 solar-powered stations...
Read the rest of: "BIXI: Bike, Taxi, Montreal"»
The Montreal Jazz Festival - 2008 has just ended
and the city is already fevereshly preparing for the 2009 edition. You might think this is an overstatement - after all, there's almost a year left! But in fact, in this short year, one of the most important concert spaces, the plaza between the Place des Arts and the Rue de Bleury will have to be completely redone. The models and renderings for the new Place des Festivals were
made public a few days ago and the city's mayor took the opportunity to
assure everybody the project remains "on schedule, on budget"...
Read the rest of: "Montreal to Get New Plaza in 2009"»
Many tourists (not to mention the residents) find the lack of direct
transport links between
Downtown and
Old Montreal inconvenient. Sure,
the métro is there, but because of the U-shaped configuration of its
lines, a traveler who wants to go from centrally located Peel Street to
no less central
Old Montreal would have to travel a few stops west (or east) on the green line, switch to the orange
line, then essentially come back to the geographic center of the city
albeit 10-15 blocks south. Annoying.
Fortunately, the city is aware of that - in fact, many recent proposals
for building a tramway line cited this very inconvenience as the major
reason for building it. Well, the tramway, if it's ever built, is still years
away, but something much more feasible is already coming, the Gazette
reported:
Old Montreal and
Downtown Montreal are to be
linked by a new bus route...
Read the rest of: "Downtown, Old Port To Be Linked By New Bus Route"»
