People back home call it “une traque” in French, but they are not as erudite as the Minister for International Trade. They say “une traque”, but it is true that the proper term in French is “une voie ferrée”.
These people are experiencing a veritable nightmare, a veritable hell. When cities were being planned in the last century, people were not always as concerned about having separate residential and industrial areas. It was believed that people should be able to live near their place of work and be able to get there on foot.
Obviously this type of urban planning no longer has any currency. Nobody today would accept having big, polluting companies in their residential neighbourhood, nor would they accept having a railway line.
The railway is closely linked to the port of Montreal. Economic development is at stake, and this cannot be ignored. I can understand this. East Montreal needs to have some prosperity. It was a manufacturing district from the 19th century until the 1960s and now services, such as Vidéotron, Mediacom and other companies, are setting up there.
However, we must not sacrifice quality of life in the name of economic development.
The advantage of Bill C-26 is that it will allow the Canadian Transportation Agency to hear complaints about railway companies that are guilty of making too much noise.
Allow me to explain the situation of the people I referred to a moment ago. First, there are five trains per day that leave at all hours. That means that there may be a train entering or leaving the rail yard at 3 a.m. Obviously, it is hard not to hear it when a train stops or starts. The average train has three or four engines and any number of railway cars. It affects the quality of life of people, and we need to be concerned with this.
When I met with CN-CP representatives, they were intransigent and told me that one of the factors of economic development—and I believe I have heard the Minister for International Trade say this—is just in time delivery. It means that deliveries have to arrive when requested.