With city covered in snow, disabled Montrealers facing big mobility challenges

After back-to-back snowstorms covered Montreal’s streets and sidewalks in snow as far as the eye can see, it’s no surprise getting around the city has posed a challenge for many.

That’s especially true for Montrealers with reduced mobility.

“It’s horrible being disabled in the middle of winter,” Paralympian Alison Levine told CityNews. “My autonomy goes down, always like crazy, but then when you get a storm like this, I mean, you know that you’re pretty much stuck at home.”

It was no easy task Tuesday morning for Levine to leave her home and get to an appointment.

“It’s frustrating because being disabled has its problems when it comes to getting around in general, and then you just add snow on it and you feel very helpless,” said the three-time Paralympian in the sport of boccia.

Levine’s training on Monday was cancelled because of the snowy conditions.

“I’m going back tomorrow hopefully,” she said. “The coaches are very flexible and knowing that we obviously have a lot more limitations than the average athlete, but it’s frustrating that we can’t do what we love, we can’t do our jobs.”

Living in the same building as Levine are 14 other residents with disabilities, including Sandra Molloy and her husband Marc Baillargeon. Both rely on adapted services.

“We’re stuck,” said Molloy. “We can’t go out. I won’t be able to go out until at least Friday.”

Added Baillargeon, who is blind: “Yesterday, we had an appointment, I had a doctor’s (appointment in) Lachine because I had surgery. We couldn’t go. We couldn’t get out of here.”

Linda Gauthier of RAPLIQ, a Quebec-wide organization that supports and assists people with disabilities, says pickup zones for paratransit buses are often full of snow.

“Myself, I’m going into chemotherapy treatment,” said Gauthier, RAPLIQ’s co-founder and a senior consultant there. “So we have to miss it. And it’s not good for our life. It’s not good for our health.

“They put the snow, they dump it in our spot, you know. So, I mean, we don’t know where to board.”

Levine says just a bit of snow can be a big obstacle for people with reduced mobility.

“When people start digging themselves out and start dumping snow on the sidewalks because then whatever the city did, they completely block our paths,” the Paralympian said.

Levine’s mother helped her shovel her path Tuesday so she could get to the street – and get to her appointment.

The City of Montreal is indeed asking citizens to pitch in.

“Any Montrealers to be kind enough to help their neighbours,” said city spokesperson Philippe Sabourin. “Shovel from the entry to the street in order to help senior citizens and people with mobility issues. We know it’s going to be a rough ride for everyone, including people with physical mobility.”

“Hopefully we’ll have it easier in a few days,” added Levine.