Light Rail and Public Transit in Ottawa

George Nelms and Charlotte Whitton,  Mayors, period 1954-1964

Looking back in how the Capital-City of Ottawa was governed in that period we see many poor decisions taken at a time when the enthusiasm of the final Victory of 1945 did not support the hoped long term results in terms of urban development. There was wild hopes that the years after the war and the long economic depression would bring unparalleled prosperity and growth. Out with the old and in with the new, no matter if the ideas were not fully formed or even wise.

Ottawa saw a complete re-organisation of the infrastructure of the City, dramatic changes took place. The infamous Queensway 417 was built in what was then the Southern border of the old downtown, with further housing development south of the highway in the 1960's to 1980's this road permanently divided the City from East to West without really providing any solution to traffic congestion we know all too well today. No one really wants to cross the City from East to West or vice versa on any day after 3pm if it can be avoided. Had the City fathers and mothers thought about it and invested properly that highway would never have been built and today we know how difficult it is to remedy this problem, so it is being expanded as we speak with further lanes of traffic being added, a band-aid solution we are already regretting despite the millions spent.

The other disaster in poor decision making from City Hall we have to contend with today is the very unwise decision by City Council to remove all public transit within the City and the suburbs with the exception of very poor bus service on congested roads. The thinking back then was that in the very near future, say 1984 everyone would have a car like George Jetson and fly around town. The car was the solution of the future and everyone would have one. In the following decades this is how Ottawa developed, giant shopping malls along Hway 417 and in the 1980's the Rideau Centre in the downtown core. You have to have a car to access those malls. A suburb called Kanata, so far removed from the City that to this day it stand at 35 Km from the city centre, back then everyone was waxing poetic about it, not so much today. Or building a new City Hall on Green Island far removed from the core centre and unconnected to anything else in town. The building was finally abandoned in the 1990's and is now an annex to the Foreign Ministry.

The same was done with the Union Train Station in the heart of Ottawa, it was banished to an isolated area south of the City difficult to access. The City up to 1960 had an extensive system of Street cars and suburban trains, all was done away with by the 1960's, leaving commuters to fend for themselves or drive to work. It is strange to see photos of the time with people taking a suburban train into the City as far as Wakefield on the Quebec side of the river. One such person to do this was Prime Minister Mackenzie King, difficult to imagine today with our current PM Harper fancying himself as the Emperor of Canada with his gigantic motorcade of 15 cars.

In 1960 the population of Ottawa was still relatively small at 328,000 pop. today in 2014 the population is at 1,200,000. But little has changed since the 1960's in terms of public transit, hence the urgency to solve the problem. The current Mayor Jim Watson proposed and his now seeing the implementation of Phase I of the Light Rapid Transit (train) which will go from Tunney's Pasture to Blair Road, it is a first phase but already a great improvement and a plan with a vision. A tunnel under the city is approaching completion and there will now be stations at Rideau Centre and University of Ottawa Campus, the Train Station. It is a system for all users and not just a commuter system as detractors (mostly Conservatives and Reformers). It is hoped that the Phase two which will fan out West, South and East will also cover the Airport and the suburb by 2028.

What you realize when you see this plan is that it had been proposed in 1915 but lack of vision and money saw no action at all. We are doing today what should have been done in 1960 instead of the obtuse decision of a City Council dominated by rich and powerful merchants who did not think much of the people of Ottawa.  This LRT Project is the largest and most expensive since the building of the Rideau Canal in 1820 by Colonel John By at $3.1 Billion dllrs. The project phase I of the LRT with the Stations is to be completed by 2017.

What the Station at St-Laurent shopping mall will look like.

What is to my mind the number of angry and anti-public transit voices. During the last Municipal Election a small but vocal minority of extremist supported by John Baird and other Conservative Ministers of the Harper Cabinet all directed by the Prime Minister's Office came out strongly against the project. Their candidate who was another puppet with a less than credible plan tried to discredit the rapid transit project. Mayor Watson won his re-election with a strong and clear mandate, so his vision is going ahead, we, Ottawans can only win. However the attacks against the plan are still being waged by the National Capital Commission another puppet of the Harper Regime, who will try to block the project and the Federal government has not said they will participate financially to the Phase II. By then hopefully we will have another government in Canada more inclusive and open minded.

Map of Phase I the names of the Stations have been changed since this map was first published.

Downtown East is called Parliament now, Train is now called Tremblay Rd. and LeBreton is called by an Algonquin name PIMISI. 

The day the music died.

Today and the last 2 days have been gray and rainy in Ottawa. Typical Fall weather, low clouds, some  burst of sunshine and winds. The Rideau Canal has been emptied and all the flowers beds in the parks have been cleaned and prepared for Winter.  It is also the last week of the Ontario province wide Municipal Election.  A thing I learned about this election is how nasty some of the candidates can be especially if they are business people or from the Suburbs and Rural areas, they are not shy about displaying their prejudices in public since they believe it's ok because they have money and talk for the oppressed White folk they think they represent.

We may think ourselves above certain hatreds but it is all surface, look at the supporters of Doug and Rob Ford in Toronto.  It does not take much to see the haters come out in full force, it is always the same thing, hate of Bilingualism in the National Capital, hate of the poor or the homeless, illogical debates about not wanting to pay taxes for any basic services all the while demanding more and more services, refusal to recycle waste, hate for the environment or anything to do with the green movement, hate of public transit systems as one candidate put it, if you do not have a car you're a loser.

It is not clear what type of City Council we will get in Ottawa on 27 October but it can be hoped that it will be a stable one like the one we had prior to this election. It also looks like the current Mayor Jim Watson will be re-elected since no credible opponent has been able to mount a challenge. Which is a very good thing for this City and for all of us, the last thing we need now would be some clown beholden to business groups and private enterprise to come and impose a right wing agenda.

Let's change the channel, today I went to do some grocery shopping at my favourite store, I say favourite because the service level is good and the staff is pleasant which is a rarity in this city, most businesses treat the word 'service' as if it was some kind of perversion.

This song is amongst my second favorite after Peggy Lee ''Is that all there is'', they were playing it in the store and I stopped shopping to listen to it. Thing is if you can remember this song and what it talks about, the events, that time, you are at least over 55. It would really mean nothing to a younger person. It was not an easy time in the world, but the world was a very different place. It all seems so distant now. But I like the fact that I remember and lived through this period.

Evolution

We returned to Ottawa from Rome after a 7 year absence in August 2011 to discover that Jim Watson had become Mayor, a man of many achievements. He describes himself as a careful prudent man and having met him a couple of times at public events I can also say that he is a nice, decent person, quite affable and easy to speak to. Jim is a home owner and you can sense that he understands the concerns of other citizens since he has the same concerns about living here. Under his mild manner though I suspect a strong will and a man with a plan for our Capital. I see someone with a vision for what Ottawa can become as a Capital. He has brought order to the city management and has made with the help of Council changes beneficial to the Citizens of our City.

Ottawa can be a difficult city to govern, given that it is the National Capital, saddled with several layers of governments, Provincial, Federal and the National Capital Commission. Then the many neighbourhood groups and various other special interest urban groups concerned with architecture, design, etc... Groups love to be consulted at lenght and in details many would prefer if the City Council simply implemented their recommendations as is, in other words our wishes become our command. They wish to govern forgetting that we elected a City Council to do just that.

I remember several projects in the past which generated endless consultations and town hall meetings where every one expressed ideas and concerns but few solutions and often advocated for the status quo. I always came away thinking that we would never see any progress. In any such discussions or consultations there is always resistance, some groups appear against every new idea or project. I am against it and am not offering any solutions, goes the tired refrain.

Years ago, there were consultation on replacing the building on the corner of Rideau and Sussex drive, it had been a department store, architecturally said to be of the Chicago school style, it was finally demolished and replaced by a post-modern condo tower after years of debate. Then there was the Rideau street mall idea which went through several incarnations and consultations. Rideau street still requires work and an extension of the Rideau Shopping Centre has been announced, developer Cadillac Fairview appears to have new tenants and a clear idea of what will happen. However already concerns have been raised about the old Ogilvie store now closed and derelict, will it be restored or pulled down? This is also tied to the LRT Station to be located near this mall extension, already the Ottawa Citizen (OC) is speculating which is not helpful.

Lansdowne Park and the new Casino project or the Light Rail Train (LRT) all produce lots of consultation and endless debate. Hopefully the idea of a new water treatment plant put forward by the Mayor will receive wide support, simply for its positive environmental impact.

Finally, Lansdowne is now going forward and construction has begun. Many opposed the project for a host of reasons, but what do they offer as an other option? The Mayor rightly pointed out that we had to move, Lansdowne had become derelict and an eyesore in one of the nicest neighbourhoods of the Capital. People should look at other World Capitals where similar sites have been transformed through urban renewal, think of Les Halles in Paris.

Each time the media in this case the OC will take sides often against a project on the reason as one reporter puts it; obsessed with process and planning. Does that imply that our elected officials and Mayor will not follow due process, the City cannot plan? Has the media assumed the role of unelected Opposition or Guardian of Public discourse replacing the Citizens? It would seem so.
Some reporters wish to question every word or phrase, looking for hidden meanings or messages, when careful reading of City Council minutes or the Mayor's statements already provide clarity. I see this as a search for controversy where none exist. Twitter encourages this as we saw recently between one OC reporter and the Mayor.

Same for the idea of intensification of the downtown or central core, if we are to make Ottawa a vibrant city after 5PM, we need to bring people to live in the centre and lots of them, to re-invent the old neighbourhoods and give them a new lease on life. It will also save the city money, suburbs call for lots of infrastructure and roads which are costly and required years of financing. It is easier to re-develop a built up area inside the city centre than some far away suburb. A pattern so many cities in Europe and Asia have followed to positive results.

Ottawa is on the cusp of great change, much change has already happened in the last 7 years and much more is coming and far more rapidly. We all need to get into our collective head that we live in a National Capital of a great country and as such we need to think along those lines. Ottawa is not some inconsequential small town in Ontario.

Jim Watson is good for Ottawa and he is a Mayor with vision and we need it. We are on the count down to 2017, the 150th anniversary of Canada an important milestone, Ottawa needs to reflect the country as a whole. Leave behind your view of my street, my neighbourhood first against everyone else. Whenever you oppose a project based on narrow blinkered interests you damage the interests of every community in the city. It also has to be understood once and for all, that we cannot achieve anything if private interests are not brought in or if we refuse to pay for a project. We cannot as a Capital stand still forever until the perfect solution materialize.

The Mayor has promised to hold up on taxes and he has been good to his word. So let's trust his prudent and bold management and go for it.