'News to me': School community surprised by lack of notice for roadwork blocking drop-off zone

And I couldn't walk you all the way to the school because of the unplanned construction or planned but didn't tell us construction. School drop-off was a little trickier than usual Tuesday morning for Jacqueline Mills and her kids. She was driving them here to La Petite Bourgogne Elementary School in the Sud-West Borough. But just in front of the school, she was surprised to see road signs closing off a stretch of Desseigneur Street. She says that blocked the drop-off zone and forced drivers to make U-turns and detours. News to me, just showing up in the morning for the drop-off and finding all the detours. Found out on the city website that it was planned maintenance for either a sewer system or aqueduct work. So no notification from the school, no notification from the city for the people who live in the area. Nobody knew how long it was going to be or really sort of where to drop off the kids sort of more safely. So who dropped the ball here? Well, there was quite a bit of back and forth trying to figure that out. I reached out to the school service center of Montreal about the street closure, and a spokesperson said, "...the school has not received any official communication from City Hall or the Sudwest Borough." Okay. But then the borough got back to us and said, "...the school administration was notified last Thursday and a signage board was issued." Okay. So I asked the borough official how the school was notified. By email? They wrote back, "...there was no email sent to the school administration. A borough employee went to the school on Thursday and spoke to the principal." And back to the school service center, an employee spoke to the school administration in person without providing much detail about the work being done. We're accustomed to receiving written notices regarding municipal work. This prevents misunderstandings and gives us a point of reference for contacting the people in charge. That does not appear to have been done in this case. All right, so regardless of who said what to who and when, once CBC reached out to the borough and the school service center, both said they would send out notices with more information. But Mills says that should have been done before. To plan our routes better or to leave earlier to know that there were going to be arrangements that have to be made. Ideal, ideal world that the construction would have been planned better and would have been done in the summertime when the school was closed. While that wasn't done in this situation, the borough says the work will happen between the morning and afternoon school bells on Friday and next Monday. The official also says in the future, the borough will make sure to send out the information in written form instead of sending an employee.