bimmer318
New member
Hey guys. I was meaning to make a thread here before but the Featured article (state of roads in Montreal) made me compile this thread. But here I do not want to talk about only the roads - but I want to talk about the attitudes of the general public towards cars.
Maybe it's the winter blues talking, For a person like myself, a crazy (and maybe anal about the way I care about my car) car fan it just hurts to see the general attitude towards cars here. I can't be happy doing what I love in this city because I get huge setbacks left and right.
(please forgive the general USA and BMW bias in this thread )
Let me list my concerns:
1. The deplorable condition of roads OK. We all know about this one. We drive on roads fit for Northern Siberia, Russia.. Where the only cars that venture there are ZIL trucks and nothing else. Simply put I almost never want to drive in this city. Ever. I will cruise up St Catherine St. on a nice day but everything else sets off a major chain reaction of rage in me.. lol.
But then I look at this and I am happy again:
Los Angeles:
vs:
Houston: (go to 1:30 and cry)
I-170, I-64 interchange in St. Louis, MO
I realized that I would rather not drive here but pay 100/month just to store my car in a garage so that I don't get "accidentally" hit by a guy who says "sorry" and drives off with his bumper hanging off. I also try to avoid driving anywhere at night at high speed. Again, I don't want to be faced with a $1000 repair bill if I bend my rim or control arms on one of these:
2. Lack of general care for cars. To me it seems that people here don't care. My roomate works in a brand new car dealership. He is not a Montreal native. He has mechanical background as his dad is a car mechanic as well. Anyway he is appalled by some the customers who come with 5 year old cars - claiming they hear a noise. One look under the car reveals there are no bushings on the car at all, shocks completely gone etc. He tells the lady the truth, but he is appalled. A car like that could lose a wheel or go into a tailspin. Another really sad fact is that cars that are 1 year old or a few months old come to the dealership for work with rust on it! A car that has new plastic smell, no problems to speak of already developing rust! How can people be so clueless not to protect their car? Not to wash off the salt properly?
I can even go further and say people seem very apathetic to me in their attitudes. A lot of grown men seem not-embarrassed to drive a rusted out, poo-colored Toyota Echos. I don't know why, again. If you wash yourself, keep your house clean and tidy. Why shouldn't your car be in good shape as well? Don't even get me started on the people who want to ride bixis & the metro until they die.. Maybe it's a good thing, less of them cluttering the roads :bigup:
I will leave you with pictures of cars that are not special, these cars are of people I know in Toronto. No offense to you Montrealers but when I went to Julep last summer I simply did not see many good quality paintjobs, clean cars or people who generally modded properly.
oh look, someone is out of place:
3. Laws stacked against car ownership. Parking tickets starting at $53 dollars? Why? In Santa Monica, California, the wealthiest city in North America where an "low class" car is a BMW 335.. Even there their tickets start at about $47. Still, their gas is cheaper, climate, roads, car community are miles ahead. Can someone point out the logic here because I can't see it. What about the $500 it takes to pass a driving test and mandatory driving course? (Don't quote me on this). Still, even in Ontario it doesn't cost that much and a driving course is not a requirement. It may help lower insurance rates however.
Anyway the very low collision insurance we pay in Quebec is hardly worth everything else. Sure I may save a few hundred in insurance a year. But I will have to pay $500 to fix my suspension, $500 to do a PROPER (sand & prime) paintjob on my front and read bumper after all of Quebec's population bump into it while trying to park. $600 for a good set of winter tires..
4. Climate. I like to work on the car. Although it would be nice if I could get Synthetic oil and OEM parts at what Americans pay.. I'm not going to complain. We have free healthcare right?? *blah*
Regardless, It would be nice to be able to work on the car outside. But when the weather hits -15 and you have to change your thermostat it is not a very pleasant experience. To prevent your fingers from falling off, getting a garage and working away all winter sounds good. Which is exactly what I plan on doing. After a long day of that I can go home and play some racing video games to keep my car spirit alive. It's fun and all but I still have an empty feeling inside. I want to be in a car-happy place.
Thank you for listening and Merry Christmas
Maybe it's the winter blues talking, For a person like myself, a crazy (and maybe anal about the way I care about my car) car fan it just hurts to see the general attitude towards cars here. I can't be happy doing what I love in this city because I get huge setbacks left and right.
(please forgive the general USA and BMW bias in this thread )
Let me list my concerns:
1. The deplorable condition of roads OK. We all know about this one. We drive on roads fit for Northern Siberia, Russia.. Where the only cars that venture there are ZIL trucks and nothing else. Simply put I almost never want to drive in this city. Ever. I will cruise up St Catherine St. on a nice day but everything else sets off a major chain reaction of rage in me.. lol.
But then I look at this and I am happy again:
Los Angeles:
Houston: (go to 1:30 and cry)
I-170, I-64 interchange in St. Louis, MO
I realized that I would rather not drive here but pay 100/month just to store my car in a garage so that I don't get "accidentally" hit by a guy who says "sorry" and drives off with his bumper hanging off. I also try to avoid driving anywhere at night at high speed. Again, I don't want to be faced with a $1000 repair bill if I bend my rim or control arms on one of these:
2. Lack of general care for cars. To me it seems that people here don't care. My roomate works in a brand new car dealership. He is not a Montreal native. He has mechanical background as his dad is a car mechanic as well. Anyway he is appalled by some the customers who come with 5 year old cars - claiming they hear a noise. One look under the car reveals there are no bushings on the car at all, shocks completely gone etc. He tells the lady the truth, but he is appalled. A car like that could lose a wheel or go into a tailspin. Another really sad fact is that cars that are 1 year old or a few months old come to the dealership for work with rust on it! A car that has new plastic smell, no problems to speak of already developing rust! How can people be so clueless not to protect their car? Not to wash off the salt properly?
I can even go further and say people seem very apathetic to me in their attitudes. A lot of grown men seem not-embarrassed to drive a rusted out, poo-colored Toyota Echos. I don't know why, again. If you wash yourself, keep your house clean and tidy. Why shouldn't your car be in good shape as well? Don't even get me started on the people who want to ride bixis & the metro until they die.. Maybe it's a good thing, less of them cluttering the roads :bigup:
I will leave you with pictures of cars that are not special, these cars are of people I know in Toronto. No offense to you Montrealers but when I went to Julep last summer I simply did not see many good quality paintjobs, clean cars or people who generally modded properly.
oh look, someone is out of place:
3. Laws stacked against car ownership. Parking tickets starting at $53 dollars? Why? In Santa Monica, California, the wealthiest city in North America where an "low class" car is a BMW 335.. Even there their tickets start at about $47. Still, their gas is cheaper, climate, roads, car community are miles ahead. Can someone point out the logic here because I can't see it. What about the $500 it takes to pass a driving test and mandatory driving course? (Don't quote me on this). Still, even in Ontario it doesn't cost that much and a driving course is not a requirement. It may help lower insurance rates however.
Anyway the very low collision insurance we pay in Quebec is hardly worth everything else. Sure I may save a few hundred in insurance a year. But I will have to pay $500 to fix my suspension, $500 to do a PROPER (sand & prime) paintjob on my front and read bumper after all of Quebec's population bump into it while trying to park. $600 for a good set of winter tires..
4. Climate. I like to work on the car. Although it would be nice if I could get Synthetic oil and OEM parts at what Americans pay.. I'm not going to complain. We have free healthcare right?? *blah*
Regardless, It would be nice to be able to work on the car outside. But when the weather hits -15 and you have to change your thermostat it is not a very pleasant experience. To prevent your fingers from falling off, getting a garage and working away all winter sounds good. Which is exactly what I plan on doing. After a long day of that I can go home and play some racing video games to keep my car spirit alive. It's fun and all but I still have an empty feeling inside. I want to be in a car-happy place.
Thank you for listening and Merry Christmas
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