Fines are best weapon

The screech of a siren is one of the most dramatic and attention-grabbing elements of urban life. The sight of a fire truck rushing by, its lights flashing and horn blaring, can instil unbridled excitement in people of all ages.

Thankfully, the hoses usually stay on the truck and the emergency vehicles block traffic for only a few minutes before the all-clear signal is given, because, more often than not, it is a false alarm.

Back in the good old days when Westmount had its own fire department, the Examiner was able to publish a weekly log of all alarms that came into the Stanton Street station. The Fire Calls column was no longer possible once the City of Montreal took over the operations and all media enquiries had to be channelled to a central downtown office, where the duty officer was far too busy to disclose all the trivial false alarms in Westmount. But we have since received many comments from long-time readers who miss the Fire Calls and their amusing details. How many times was a birthday party at a local seniors' residence interrupted by a visit from firefighters when the heat generated from 90-plus cake candles set off the alarm? How often did burnt toast result in sirens? And who could forget that one address in Cote St. Luc which summoned the Westmount brigade about once a week, only to be "cancelled en route" each time?

While providing Westmount taxpayers with complete accountability of their fire department's activities for the week, the Fire Calls column also illustrated the number of false alarms the crews have to answer on a regular basis. The most common reason of all was simply "defective alarm" — and that must have accounted for hundreds of lost hours and cost thousands of dollars over the years. As quaint and amusing as some of the calls are, there is no question that defective alarms are a costly problem.

Now the Montreal Fire Department has announced a new rule imposing hefty fines on those responsible for repeated false alarms. This initiative may actually work well, although the fire alarm that turns out to be Grandpa sneaking a cigar in the back stairwell may never be completely eliminated. It will be interesting to see how this will affect the statistics next year, but in the meantime, there is a good chance we may actually see fewer spectacular displays of blazing lights, blaring sirens and nervous motorists trying to pull over to let the big trucks pass — for money is always the most effective deterrent.