Redistribution of Federal Electoral Districts 2012

[Poirot]

Hello. I'm a new member. Inspired by the discussion on page 6 of this thread about Vaudreuil-Soulanges in Québec, I have tried to make something for the western part of the Montérégie région.

Some suggested to join part of Vaudreuil-Soulanges and west island of Montreal. That would be a quick way to solve Vaudreuil's overpopulation. It would cross over two administrative regions (Montérégie and Montréal). So instead i tried the other way someone suggested, and retrieving most of the Soulanges part of Vaudreuil-Soulanges and putting it with Salaberry and see the consequences on neighbouring ridings in Montérégie.

VAUDREUIL
The nothern half part of Vaudreuil-Soulanges would become Vaudreuil and would be 106,424 people:
Ile Perrot (4 towns 37,399), Ile Cadieux, Vaudreuil sur le Lac, Vaudreuil-Dorion, Saint-Lazare, Hudson, Rigaud, Pointe-Fortune, Très-Saint-Rédempteur, Sainte-Marthe.


SALABERRY
The rest of Vaudreuil-Soulanges is 32,929 people (Rivière-Beaudette, Saint-Zotique, Les Coteaux, Coteau-du-lac, Les Cèdres, Pointe des Cascades, Saint-Clet, Saint-Polycarpe, Saint-Télésphore, Sainte-Justine de Newton). There is a bridge linking Valleyfield to Coteau du lac and a toll bridge will open to complete highway 30 that lands near Les Cèdres from Beauharnois I believe. So this area joins the Salaberry riding.

Valleyfield would be the center of the Salaberry riding, it would keep all of the MRC Haut Saint-Laurent  (Huntingdon area) and its 21,197 people.
Salaberry would lose the territory of MRC Jardins de Napierville (Saint-Rémi, Napierville).
But the MRC of Beauharnois-Salaberry is 61,950 so with MRC Haut-Saint-Laurent and part of Soulanges it would make a total of 116,076. Perhaps a bit too big since the quotient is 101,320.

Ideally numbers wise, Beauharnois (about 12,000) would be transfered over to the Châteauguay riding. Melocheville has merged with Beauharnois so now Beauharnois is on the two sides of the Beauharnois canal so crosses over onto the island. The canal could have been a geographic limit without that.
The other option would be to transfer to Châteauguay Sainte-Martine (easy road link) and Saint-Urbain-Premier (total of 6,114 people). The commission doesn't seem to like breaking up an MRC but there it goes. If I go with the second option the total for Salaberry riding: 109,962.
After doing the next riding Châteauguay, I think I would need to add some population for the Quebec portion of the Akwesasne indian reservation here, meaning I would need to transfer more people over to Chateauguay or bring less people from Soulanges and that would make Vaudreuil bigger.


CHATEAUGUAY
Châteauguay riding would be composed of the western part of MRC Rousillon so Châteauguay, Mercier, Léry, Saint-Isidore for 62,376 people. The MRC Jardins de Napierville to the south (26,234). The northern part of that MRC, Saint-Rémi has more easy connections to Châteauguay. The southern part, Napierville, is a bit far but they were with Valleyfield before so its an improvement I think. The territory of MRC Jardins de Napierville and MRC Rousillon are together and make one school board in the education system.

Riding population would be 94,724 (it would be 100,000 if Beauharnois doesn't mind being put in Châteauguay instead of Sainte-Martine/Saint-Urbain). The Kahnawake indian reserve is usually put with Châteauguay. Statcan doesn't have numbers since they don't do the census. I imagine Elections Canada still count them in a riding, i will put approximitaly 7,000 people and the riding total is over 100,000.

LA PRAIRIE- SAINT-CONSTANT
The rest of the present riding of Châteauguay-Saint-Constant (Saint-Constant, Sainte-Catherine, Delson, Saint-Mathieu) is joined with Candiac, La Prairie and Saint-Philippe from the present riding of Brossard La-Prairie. This is all the MRC Rousillon east of Kahnawake. Population of 99,811. We can refer to it as Rousillon or La Prairie-Saint-Constant.

BROSSARD-SAINT-LAMBERT
Moving east would be Brossard-Saint-Lambert. Only these two suburban cities that are part of the Longueuil agglomeration. 100,828.


So one new riding created in west Montérégie has solved the overpopulation of Vaudreuil-Soulanges and Brossard-La Prairie. Chambly-Borduas needs to be reduced in size. The present Saint-Lambert riding would become entirely inside Longueuil.

Would this proposition be acceptable to the commission or it involves too many changes?
If they decide to go with making a part of west island with Vaudreuil-Soulanges it will not help the other Montérégie oversized ridings. Brossard-La Prairie needs to lose 20,000 people which is the population of Candiac but it can't be put into neighboring Châteauguay-Saint-Constant it would be oversized. The only other option is to carve out 20,000 people of Brossard and put them in Saint-Lambert.

I don't know how the commission deals with the indian reserves of Akwesasne and Kanhawake if there is no census figures.

[Poirot]

I would worry about the future of Algoma-Manitoulin-Kapuskasing. It is only 70% of the average Ontario size and the growth trend is not good. It lost 9% of its population between the two census. If there is no turnaround, if the riding doesn't disappear this time, it will in 10 years.

Perhaps there are a few thousand people living just south of the Ontario ridings that could be moved in and remap the some ridings. Algoma-Manitoulin needs about 10,000 people to be around 85% of average like many other northern ridings.

I looked at the commission's composition and the president is from North Bay so maybe he will have sympathy for Ontario northern ridings.

[Poirot]

I see the Quebec proposal is out but I wanted to make some comments about Wilfred Day's proposal.

Le Haut-Richelieu 114,344 + Brome-Missisquoi 55,621 + Les Jardins-de-Napierville 26,234 + Le Haut-Saint-Laurent 21,197 = 217,396 (2.15 quotients), so make two ridings there.

La Haute-Yamaska 85,042 + Rouville 35,690 less Saint-Mathias-sur-Richelieu 4,618 and Richelieu 5,467 = 110,647 (1.09 quotients), one riding.

First thank you for your input. I like to see what people come up with.

For the two ridings covering Haut-Richelieu, Brome, Napierville, Haut-Saint-Laurent, I think it would imply splitting Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu. Having one riding on the west of the Richelieu river with MRC Haut-Saint-Laurent, Jardins de Napierville and about 50,000 of people from Saint-Jean. The rest of Saint-Jean and the rest of the MRC Haut-Richelieu with Brome-Missisquoi on the east side of the Richelieu river. Not sure splitting Saint-Jean would be ideal.

I like what you did with what is Shefford. Haute-Yamaska with a bit more of Rouville, I believe Marieville would be added. The riding would lose the part of MRC Val Saint-François it included, so would have territory of only 2 MRC. 

[Poirot]

And the naming is terrible. The people behind this should be shot.

I don't know where to start there is so much to say. These people need help. On the Alberta commission report they thanked a geograph. Do commissions have support staff or they work at three people only.

I was not a fan of people's names as ridings. Like when they added Marc-Aurèle Fortin and Alfred Pellan names, it didn't say to me where it was located. But now there is a deluge of them. Some of them I don't even know so I have to click on the riding to read about the reason for the name, some names i know but can't associate with a specific place. It's like they are trying to give history lessons.

They even justify why they go for person's names after talking about the guidelines for electoral district by the Geographical Names Board of Canada.

The Board also recommends that the names selected be those that "immediately lead one to recall the province" in which the districts are situated, ideally geographical names. However, given the large number of districts to which we had to assign a new name, we considered it appropriate to designate a number of them by the name of a person rather than a geographical name. This avoids any ambiguity. It also gives recognition to certain persons and sites prominent in Quebec's history and connected with the areas in which the districts are situated.

The intro to the report talks uncessarily about scenarios like what if there were not three more  ridings added what would be the variance of actual ridings to the mean. 

[Poirot]

They just like writing names like in the 19th century.

Maybe the names come from historical societies input. Or they spent time research this instead of working on the map and trying not to cut towns in two.

[Poirot]

For the new Quebec map, the quotient is 101,321. There are 3 more ridings than previuously. They chose to put 2 ridings in Montreal's northern rim (the biggest population growth area) and 1 in the south rim. And then because Gaspésie Bas-Sant-Laurent region has a riding below the 25% treshold, they remove one and decide to put it on Montreal island.

With the quotient Montreal island should have 18.6 ridings. It will now have 19. I was against adding .5 riding (sharing one half with Vaudreuil) because it would cross ove another administrative region and would not help solve over other overpopulated areas on the south shore. I didn't think the commission would make city ridings over represented. With changes to a couple of ridings on the island, they would be all withing 10% variance of the quotient. Now they have redone the Montreal map and will face opposition from the region that lost a riding.

In a reversal of fortune the region that was overrepresented is now underrepresented !
Bas-Saint-Laurent Gaspésie had three of the least populated ridings:
Haute-Gaspésie-La Mitis-Matane-Matapédia 71,389  (29,5% under quotient)
Gaspésie-Iles de la Madeleine 81,991 (19,1 under quotient)
Rimouski-Neigette-Témiscouata-Les Basques 84,809 (16,3% under quotient)
Montmagny-L'islet-Kamouraska-Rivière-du-Loup 97,261

These are made into three ridings and they are now the most populated ridings in the province. Gaspésie les Iles 111,761, Rimouski 112,450 and Elzear Bernier 111,239. The first two are the only ridings to be over 10% of the average. And the biggest has Iles de la Madeleine in it, so these constituents are isolated from the rest on the mainland.

After the New Brunswick proposal I thought the Quebec commission might pull a Miramichi (let one be under 25%). Or they would try to move around some people and have three ridings under by 20-25%. It would require breaking up MRC's boundaries but maybe locals would prefer that than lose one riding entirely.

The Saguenay region seems to have lost part of a riding because now part of the city of Saguenay (Chicoutimi) is sharing a riding with the Charlevoix region.
 

[Poirot]

The name would be Chemin du Roy.

Trying to guess where Anne-Hébert was located, I remembered one of her novel is Kamouraska, so I thought it would be in that area. Looking at the map and it was east of Quebec City i remembered she was from there.

Big on the front page of Le Quotidien newspaper in Saguenay: Linked to Charlevoix.
The commission will get negative reactions from Saguenay and the Gaspé peninsula.

It all depends on how much people find acceptable less populous ridings. Like Saguenay region, two were a little under average population and one by a lot (-22%). Regional entity and representation vs numbers equality.

I didn't think the Quebec commission would go so much for vote equality. Last time they proposed a map that was very equal in numbers but then changed. When I read the report they said things like we changed backed more to like the riding was before, we heard from MRC and cities they don't like to be split. They do a map more with numbers in mind first and then have to readjust based on connections and communities.

I don't know, Alberta did a map with ridings within 5% of mean and people seem to find it good. I don't know if it's different geography that makes it difficult in other provinces.    

[Poirot]

One thing I'll say for it: how they handled the Outaouais problem. The Outaouais region has 3.64 quotients. What to do? Their solution is to add 42,661 residents of Antoine-Labelle and parts of Les Laurentides (0.42 quotients), included in Hautes-Laurentides--Pontiac. This puts Mont-Laurier into the same riding as Maniwaki, which makes sense. (If you're worried about names, shouldn't it be Papineau--Pontiac--Hautes-Laurentides?)

The alternative was to add the 32,117 residents of Argenteuil including areas on the border of metropolitan Montreal. I think they made the right choice.

About the alternative. It would be MRC Argenteuil, MRC Papineau and the western border would be moved west, probably take in Buckingham and Masson Angers. The negative is it mixes part of Gatineau to the more rural east. There is an easy road connection with highway 50 to link all the territory.

With Hautes-Laurentides-Pontiac, it is more all dispersed small towns (maybe more homogenous) but the territory is big, west of Gatineau, north of it and even Hautes-Laurentides and east of Gatineau.

The name Outaouais is suggested for the riding with Hull in it. Outaouais is generic, could be anywhere in the whole region, or along the river. The last commission suggested the name Outaouais for the riding that became Argenteuil-Papineau-Mirabel. 

[Poirot]

The new south riding might be viewed as being Vaudreuil. No new name created like Lignery but Vaudreuil-Soulanges had the highest population on the south shore. If they worked like I did, I created a new Vaudreuil and the rest was the domino effect. That is how Lignery appeared.

I imagine you view Vaudreuil has being a shrunk version riding, Soulanges a modified version of Beauharnois-Salaberry, so Lignery with is creating from joining parts that were in two ridings is the new one.

I spotted the use of the name Mille-Illes too. Removed from one riding's name and put in the neigbouring one. Why if it was not mostly a renaming exercise to give a person's name to former Rivière-de-Mille-Iles.

Also the name Labelle was in Laurentides-Labelle before and on the new map there is Curé-Labelle used in the Saint-Jérôme area this time. Not that he is not associated with the area but the name was used in another riding before.

Perhaps they don't want to use the name Gatineau in one of the ridings because Gatineau spreads in many ridings. And part of the pre-merged Gatineau is in Petite-Nation.

[Poirot]

They did respect the boundary between Outaouais and Laurentides to the south but had to break it to the north. But they had no choice since Outaouais doesn't have the numbers to have fully 4 ridings.

I read comments about Centre-du-Québec today. The MP for Arthabaska is not happy about losing some villages from MRC Arthabaska to Paul-Comtois riding (Nicolet Becancour). Some villages territories are in two ridings because they used highway 20 has the boundary.

In the Cap de la Madeleine area of Trois-Rivières, three ridings touch there. So in that area you can be in Trois-Rivières, or Shawinigane or Anne-Hébert which stresses to the limit of Quebec city.

Crossing the Saint-Lawrence to make a riding with the Mauricie is probably not in the solution for the commission. I think there is this rule about crossing the river (physical barrier). The bridge is close to Trois-Rivières so maybe Nicolet Bécancour would have to join with Trois-Rivières Ouest and parts of Maskinongé. It could be interesting to see what it would look like and what people think about it or it is unthinkable.    

[Poirot]

While some of Cotler's complaints might be political, like being afraid of losing part of Côte-des-Neiges would not be good for him / the Liberal party if the Conservative are a threat next election like the last one, I agree with him if it's about a Dorval area being added to John-Peters-Humphrey.

Looking at the map on the commission's website, the part of Lachine north of highway 20 looks to be commercial / industrial area. Not sure there are voters there. The Dorval area in Humphrey (west of airport, north of highway 20) is isolated and far from the rest of Humphrey riding. There are also three streets east of the airport and the Dorval circle.

It's on the border of Lac-Saint-Louis and split from the rest of Dorval. Difficult to find the logic. I imagine it's numbers ?  Lac-Saint-Louis has 96,000 people. Maybe adding the Dorval part left out would make it too big, but it doesn't look like a big area.

I would also have small boundary issue details. Someone mentioned earlier there is a street from Parc-Extension included in Humphrey. Why not stop at the town of Mount-Royal border. Also a tiny bit of south west Côte-Saint-Luc has been cut off near Westminster avenue and Montreal-west.  Côte-St-Luc road is the boundary between Côte-St-Luc and NDG / Montreal West. The old Mount Royal riding bounday went a small weird shape south. I think it is because it followed the Côte-Saint-Luc boundary. Why cut the appendage. It is cleaner to follow the road but I think it's a city limit and should be respected.

The borough and former city of Saint-Laurent is practically big enough to be a riding in itself. I understand not wanting to be cut. The St-Laurent in Langstaff is put with other Montreal territory along the river and part of a divided city, Dollard-des-Ormeaux east of Des Sources boulevard

George-Etienne Cartier riding perhaps could have Bordeaux in its name for the Ahunstic part in it. Or Acadie for the boulevard in the middle of it. Acadie is the name of the provincial riding with almost the same boundaries (it is smaller). Acadie could be confusing on the federal scene because of Acadie New Brunswick.

The Liberals should be happy about having one more riding in the western part of Montreal. It is their strongest area.

My vote for the what is the new riding on the island is George-Etienne-Cartier. It looks like a riding almost copied on a provincial one that is inserted there and causes touble to the east and west of it.  
          

[Poirot]

My analysis of Western Quebec

The Conservatives did hold the riding of Pontiac from 2006 to 2011 thanks to the heavily Anglo Pontiac MRC which will now be in this proposed riding. However, this new riding would be considerably less Anglo, as it leaves out the northern Gatineau exurbs which helped the Tories win the Pontiac riding.

An argument can be made that linguistic minorities should be in the same riding if possible to give them weight. Could it be an issue to have the anglophones from Pontiac in a less anglo riding.     

[Poirot]

I am not a fan of the big crescent so I like better the general geography of this version with Outaouais Est. It would depend if cutting the city of Gatineau can be done in an elegant manner. The actual Hull-Aylmer would need about 25,000 to be placed with the other side of Gatineau river. 

[Poirot]

Looking at the proposed Montreal map, when connecting by road from Ile-des-Soeurs (Nun's island) to the rest of the Verdun, you have to go through Ville-Marie because the edge of the Verdun borough is part of Ville-Marie.

Outremont takes in downtown north of Maisonneuve street. I see some Concordia building north of Maisonneuve. If they want a name change they could go for Three Universities (McGill, Concordia, Université de Montréal).  Or more seriously something like Le mont Royal since the riding goes all around it. Outremont is around 25% of the riding anyway, it's more Côte-des-Neiges.

I am still amazed at the Maurice Richard riding. Parts of it come from three boroughs (Ahunstic Cartierville, Villeray Saint-Michel Parc Extension, and Saint-Léonard). Going all the way to take a slice of Saint-Léonard and at the same time Bourassa takes more of the Sault-au-Récollet neigbourhood of Ahunstic than previously.

The southwestern corner of Maurice Richard goes south of highway 40 and turn on Liège. It is just a little territory taken from Papineau and can't find why. The limit between boroughs in that area is the highway.

Maybe Maurice Richard could trade its Saint-Léonard part to Bourassa in return for Sault-au-Récollet.

       

[Poirot]

The Montérégie, south shore of Montreal proposal looks like what I was working on in the west. Minor thing, in Vaudreuil I put 2 more villages in it. Soulanges I had made bigger, maxed to 110,000 people. The proposal is 105,000 people but they broke MRC Haut-Saint-Laurent and I didn't. We both broke MRC Beauharnois at the same place.

My Châteauguay riding was a little less populated but I was leaving room for Kahnawake (population number not in census). The commission put Kahnawake with Lignery.

Now for Longueuil and Chambly areas. In Urbain-Brossard, they put Brossard with a part of Saint-Hubert bordering Brossard and they put part of Greenfield Park that is on one side of Taschereau boulevard.

Saint-Lambert riding has the other part of Greenfield Park (previously Greenfield Park was all in Saint-Lambert) and was added part of Saint-Hubert to increase its low population.

The rest of Saint-Hubert is put in a riding called Montarville with Saint-Bruno. A sort of Saint-Hubert-Saint-Bruno transformed with less St-Hubert and more of other things. Chambly-Borduas riding was too big. So they took Saint-Basile and McMasterville to join Montarville. Also the part of Saint-Julie between highway 20 and Saint-Bruno is in Montarville, that is territory that was in Verchères.

When I was thinking of reducing Chambly I had trouble because I didn't like splitting the MRC Vallée-du-Richelieu in 3 ridings. They don't seem to have that fear. They cut Saint-Hubert in 3 ridings, Greenfield Park and Sainte-Julie in 2.

Saint-Hubert and Greenfield Park are boroughs of Longueuil, they were seperate before the merger. The former city of Longueuil is the borough Vieux-Longueuil. Brossard, Saint-Lambert, Boucherville and Saint-Bruno demerged from Longueuil (so they exist legally) but are part of the Longueuil agglomeration.

My idea is put Brossard and Saint-Lambert together.
For Chambly, remove Marieville and put it in Shefford. Remove the 7,000 from another MRC at the eastern part of Shefford and put them in an Eastern Township riding. Shefford is now 110,631 (at 10% variance so on limit of being big). Remove Saint-Basile, Chambly or the new Ozias-Leduc riding is 102,485.
McMasterville stays with Beloeil, Mont-Saint-Hilaire and Otterburn Park. These 4 are bunched together on the map and seem to form a group.

I would leave Verchères-Les Patriotes intact, no changes, no splitting of Saint-Julie. It is 104,355 people. It has half of Boucherville. I tried to join all Boucherville with another demerged town Saint-Bruno but I would have to add many people to Verchères like put Beloeil in it and break that area apart.

My version of Montarville is Saint-Bruno, Saint-Basile (together 42,843 people) and around 60,000 people from the Longueuil borough of Saint-Hubert.     
 
That leaves around 20,000 to take from Saint-Hubert (taken from the area the commission has put in their Saint-Lambert riding), 17,000 from the borough of Greenfield Park and 60,000 from Vieux-Longueuil. 97,000. I need a name for this one. Longueuil-Taschereau or Longueuil south.

The remaining of Vieux-Longueuil is 78,500. Half of Boucherville in the present and proposed Longueuil riding by the commission is 18,500 by my calculation. Longueuil-Boucherville is 97,000.

The numbers I worked with for Longueuil's boroughs are not official latest census numbers from statistics Canada. I found them on Longueuil's website.

[Poirot]

The 2008 Québec provincial election results put on the new map (including byelections results up to January 2012) is at http://www.electionsquebec.qc.ca/documents/pdf/transposition.pdf

The provincial map is not as egalitarian as the federal one. The federal commission seems to try to get as many ridings as possible within 5% of the mean. The provincial one put out a new map with ridings already 20% over the mean.

Maxime Bernier, Beauce MP, said he will support the 8 town and villages that have been removed from his riding with redistricting and oppose the plan.

[Poirot]

Good work. For those not familiar that colourful map is a provincial electoral map, not a federal district one.

To stay on topic on federal districts, I haven't heard much comments about the northern Montreal suburbs In Laurentides and Lanaudière.

In Mille-Iles I don't like they split Rosemère along a rail track. It is a town of 14,000, so not that big. At first I thought Terrebonne being one riding was great since it has the numbers to be one, but I am thinking maybe being in two ridings would give more possibilities to Mille-Iles and Pierre Le Gardeur to make other combinations.

Saint-Sulpice just east of Repentigny is in Gille-Villeneuve which stops just before Trois-Rivières. It is the only town from MRC L'assomption included. Maybe with another configuration it could be rapatriated with the rest of its MRC.   

[Poirot]

I prefer the Beauce you described. The Mégantic part in Beauce was a bit strange. The city of Lévis map could be changed if they modify the plan with Bas Saint-Laurent / Gaspésie. Unless the goal is to packed the ridings of that region so in ten years they are around average, the commission might change this. What they do impacts Lévis.

I see Gaspésie Iles-de-la-Madeleine being 94,079.
MRC Matapedia, Matane, La Mitis and the town of Rimouski for 106,161. That would split Rimouski from the rest of the MRC Rimouski Neigette and would not please people.
The rest of MRC Rimouski Neigette, Les Basques, Rivière-du-Loup, Kamouraska, Temiscouata for 93,816.

Then there could be MRC Montmagny, L'islet, Bellechase, Les Etchemins. That is 93,966. Would have to add some people from Lévis, like the Pintendre area south of highway 20. Up to 10,000 from the souteast of Lévis. A riding exclusively Lévis with around the average 101,000.

I have a round 25,000 to 30,000 people from Lévis left on the west side and put them with MRC Lotbinière and Appalches (72,737 for those two) and 6,177 from Saint-Lambert-de-Lauzon from MRC Nouvelle-Beauce (was not part of Beauce riding before either).

That puts city of Lévis territority in three ridings. They probably started mapping Lévis because it is more nicely divided. 

[Poirot]

Now, if you don’t want to have a large part of Levis in a riding with Thetford Mines, here’s a new alternative, based on the Centre de santé et de services sociaux Alphonse-Desjardins which serves Lévis, Lotbinière, La Nouvelle-Beauce and Bellechasse.

LÉVIS has about 102,100 people, just over quotient.

LA NOUVELLE-BEAUCE—LOTBINIÈRE—CHUTES-CHAUDIÈRE has about 101,393 people, right on quotient.

BEAUCE—LES APPALACHES includes Beauce-Sartigan (50,962), Robert-Cliché (19,288 less Saint-Odilon-de-Cranbourne 1,459 = 17,819), and Les Appalaches 43,120, total 111,911 (10.5% over quotient). I shaved off Saint-Odilon-de-Cranbourne because it fits with Les Etchemins and helps bring down that total.

BELLECHASSE--LES ETCHEMINS—MONTMAGNY—L'ISLET has 93,966, and with Saint-Odilon-de-Cranbourne it has 95,425 (5.8% below quotient).

I think there would be opposition from the Beauce region because of the regional identity, not wanting to be split (MRC Nouvelle-Beauce being with Lotbinière). I like seeing possible options.

The Bloc aked the Quebec commission to postpone the process (hearings start early September) because the type of people involved in politics are busy with the provincial election. It was refused. I don't know if having to make submissions in August will decrease participation.

I can tell the Quebec commission was slow to mail paper copy of the proposal. I asked for one when the proposal came out. Last week I checked and was told they would receive them and mail them in the next days. I receive a copy today. The deadline is in one week. 

[Poirot]

I imagine it was easy to make the decision on the road if there was big opposition to the proposal. Not sure how a commission works but members of the commission must look at the written proposal before the hearing to be familiar with issues. They recognized a problem with their proposal, and I don't think it causes population numbers problem, and in that case putting the communities in one riding or the other doesn't impact other ridings on the map.

The commission will probably not make decisions on the road in more urban areas if it affects other urban areas. They could have made other scenarios since the first proposal with the input they received, see different options they have. That is what I hope they do anyway.     

[Poirot]

The Quebec hearings covering mostly the eastern half of the province are completed. I have read some opposition to name change, like keeping Saint-Maurice instead of Shawinigane or wanting to have Bellechasse in the name (Louis-Fréchette).

Besides the obvious opposition when the proposal came out, there is the case of Saint-Augustin just west of Quebec City. Part of it is in the riding of Cap-Rouge and part in Anne-Hébert. I think it was the council who told its preference of being in only one riding and if possible linked to Quebec City and not with all the territory of Anne-Hébert.

Lotbinière says it has more links to Lévis than Thetford Mines and Mégantic. If Mégantic can't be expanded in Beauce or Lotbinière, maybe they will try adding from Eastern Townships.

The commission has added three dates for hearings in November in Montreal. I guess more people than they expected are not happy.

A newspaper article stated that the councils of Crabtree, Saint-Paul, Saint-Thomas which are located south of Joliette and part of MRC Joliette, will oppose being put in the Gilles-Villeneuve riding instead of staying in Joliette. The NDP will soon make public a document about their position for Québec. I don't know if every party does this.   

[Poirot]

From what I understand, at the Montreal hearing the Bloc, NDP and LPC-Q have said they prefer Montreal island to have 18 ridings (18 is status quo number; the commission is proposing 19 with the transfer of 1 riding from Gaspésie).

I think the NDP is proposing just changes to ridings that have become too large in population, but I have not found detail on the web so far. 

The Liberal party has made a map based on 19 ridings.
www.liberal.ca/files/2012/10/Proposition-PLCQ-2012-Montréal_small.pdf

Their website says the commission has asked they submit a map also based on 18 ridings.

With many federal parties agreeing, is this going in the direction of the Gaspésie not losing a riding and Montreal not gaining one?

The new names have some negative comments in Montreal and Laval. MPs don't like the name change. A commissioner admitted one new proposed proper name in Laval would not be kept.   

[Poirot]

Using google news I found MRC Papineau in the Outaouais region will make a proposal. The commission puts them in a Hautes-Laurentides-Pontiac riding, the big crescent around Gatineau. This was discussed in this thread some time ago.

MRC Papineau is proposing to be put with L'Ange-Gardien, Notre-Dame-de-la-Salette, Val-des-Monts and the eastern part of Gatineau up to Labrosse blvd. 

[Poirot]

I have links to the Liberal Party of Canada - Quebec proposals.

The proposal originally made with 19 ridings on the island of Montreal, description and map is here:
http://quebec.liberal.ca/en/uncategorized/new-electoral-boundaries-of-the-island-of-montreal/

Now they have published a proposal with 18 ridings since parties commented they would prefer to stay at 18.
http://quebec.liberal.ca/en/uncategorized/electoral-boundaries-island-montreal/

In bonus I also give their proposal for Montreal South Shore suburbs (in French).
http://quebec.liberal.ca/uncategorized/nouvelles-delimitations-des-circonscriptions-dela-rive-sud-de-montreal/

They make a riding called Lemoyne which is long and narrow with part of Longueuil, Greenfield Park and part of Saint-Hubert. Saint-Hubert is split in three three ridings.

I have not seen other parties proposals. I hope the commission is not influenced more by one party in making decisions.

[Poirot]

Each commission finalizes its report on the new electoral districts no later than December 21, 2012. The CEO may grant a two-month extension if requested. (section 20).

To come: Ontario, Quebec, BC, Saskatchewan, and New Brunswick. Any bets?

Well, they haven't looked to keen on extension. Maybe so close to the deadline and now the public hearings are done, they can give an extension (for example to complete the translation). If not, the next three days will be busy for reports!