What could have been — old visions and plans for Ottawa

[Kitchissippi]

I thought it would be fun to repost some ancient concepts from the Holt and Greber plans here.

Original concept for the Ottawa city Hall and the Mackenzie King bridge. This would have been interesting as it would have defined the west of the canal as the federal realm and the east side with a more civic focus:






This pre-Queensway vision for the Hurdman Bridge area approach to Nicholas kind of reminds me of Nüremburg, a bit scary:

[Kitchissippi]

The old streetcar routes:

[Kitchissippi]

The Champagne arterial. This would have replaced the tracks that the O-train now runs on, and probably have connected to Bronson around Carleton U, funneling traffic out of the west side of the Glebe.

[lrt's friend]

Great stuff! Thanks for contributing it.

[Kitchissippi]

I wish they would still follow through with some aspects of this plan for the area between the Supreme Court and the Archives. That area is such wasted space as a parking lot:

[the capital urbanite]

M. Greber was definitely a product of the neoclassical era...thank God the Speeresque imperialist city hall was never built! (then again, the Soviet-style NDHQ buildings aren't much better)

[Mille Sabords]

The reference to Speer is not altogether misplaced... that's a very insightful observation.

[Rathgrith]

Some of those plans would have been nice. But image being a predeistain if the Gréber plan was put in place. There would be no where to walk.

[Richard Eade]

I do like some of Greber's ideas. Opening up several vistas and the addition of boulevards and plazas would have made for a much more regal Capital City.

A friend of mine recently went to Washington, DC for work and while there, took a city bus tour. She took a short one of only three hours. She returned in awe of the scale of the grandeur of their Capital. The number and importance of the monuments and the buildings impressed her to no end.

Later that month, her parents were in from Barcelona so she took them on the downtown bus tour of Ottawa. Apparently it lasted just over half an hour and was filled with inane chatter about the guide’s family and friends. “I have a friend who works at the Mint. He makes a lot of money there.”

After the War Museum, Supreme Court, Memorial Arch (over Lyon), Parliament Buildings, brief reference to the Sparks Street Mall, War Memorial, Rideau Canal, NAC, Chateau Laurier, U.S. Embassy, pointing at the Civilization Museum, Peace Keeper’s Monument, Art Gallery, Basilica, Mint, home of the British High Commissioner, Old City Hall, NRC, French Embassy, 24 Sussex, the Governor General’s Residence, and maybe a loop around Rockcliff, what is there really to see downtown if you are on a bus tour? Maybe your bus would stop at Rideau Falls so you could stretch your legs.

This city really has lost its ego over the years. The lumbermen built a huge wooden arch out of 10s of thousands of board feet of lumber for the King’s visit: The first electric merry-go-round was in Rockcliff Park. In 1899 when Laurier appointed the first Ottawa Improvement Commission and since then there have been many attempts to get good ideas implemented. Greber’s ideas were grandiose and would have created a spectacular ‘World Class’ Capital City. (Oh how I hate that term, ‘World Class’! So over-used; so meaningless.)

It has long been recognized that Ottawa SHOULD be more of a show-piece, including by Mayor Jim Durral who said that Ottawa should build a huge monument. That it didn’t matter what it was for, but it should be big and expensive.

OK, I thought Durral’s idea was a bit too expensive, but he had a point. How do we get back to the mentality of those ancient lumbermen and build a monumental arch just because the King is coming to see the Chaudiere Falls. (The arch was built with no nails so as not to mar the wood; which was reclaimed after the King left.)

[rodionx]

Originally Posted by Richard Eade

A friend of mine recently went to Washington, DC for work and while there, took a city bus tour. She took a short one of only three hours. She returned in awe of the scale of the grandeur of their Capital. The number and importance of the monuments and the buildings impressed her to no end.

Later that month, her parents were in from Barcelona so she took them on the downtown bus tour of Ottawa. Apparently it lasted just over half an hour and was filled with inane chatter about the guide’s family and friends.

That's Canada! Nothing too impressive, but one of the best places in the world to live. I mean, given the choice of actually LIVING in downtown Washington D.C. or downtown Ottawa, most people would take downtown Ottawa any day. And yes, I know there has been some gentrification in Washington D.C. over the past five years or so. But really.

[adam-machiavelli]

In general, individual people who've proposed 'grand redevelopment plans' regarding any problem turn out to cause more problems than solutions.

[Rico Rommheim]

That would of been so cool!

[lrt's friend]

I have seen photos of a number of historic archways in Ottawa. There was one at the entrance to Rockcliffe Airport and one at the Experimental Farm and a very elaborate one at Landsdowne Park. They succumbed to road widening projects and neglect during the Depression. In fact, Ottawa's historic limestone city hall located where the NAC is today, was demolished during the Depression because City Council couldn't agree on repairs to the building following a fire.

Ottawans are now fearful of proposing monuments that will truly be focal points in the city. Why? Fear of accusations of wasting money and NIMBYs who particularly run wild on public beautification projects. Just look at the Canal footbridge that took 25 years to build, and there are still accusations about what a waste of money that was. Then there was the fiasco with the Windmill to honour Canada's liberation of the Netherlands. What a slap in the face that was to the Dutch community. And the Botanical Gardens with silly 'Disneyland' arguments (I have never seen a true Botanical Gardens that resembles Disneyland), and the declaration of a 'historic landscape' to prevent any such development on the Experimental Farm, although we all know that the plantings have always evolved throughout the years on the farm and they will continue to do so.

With people who seem to make it a career to oppose any civic improvement project, why would any public spirited resident want to spearhead such a project and get ongoing abuse and headaches that will last for years?

[eemy]

Thank god Greber's plan wasn't fully implemented. Can you imagine the space between Laurier and Wellington where the War Memorial/NAC/GCC are? It would have been one giant interchange! I must confess that I actually like a lot of the parkway system that was implemented, but really, that plan would have been terrible.

If you're interested in what might have been, Canberra has always struck me as having an uncanny likeness to Greber's vision for Ottawa. You decide which you like better.

[Rathgrith]

Canberra is a good example. But Canberra as build/created to be the capital of Australia. That was not the case in Ottawa. I would like to see a great boudlvard in Ottawa leading up to parliment but that won't happen unless there is a huge fire or aliens invade.


My money is on the aliens.

[p_xavier]

I think we got the capital that represented its people the best: bland, undecided, low profile and without leadership.

[sumo]

Originally Posted by Rathgrith

Canberra is a good example. But Canberra as build/created to be the capital of Australia. That was not the case in Ottawa. I would like to see a great boudlvard in Ottawa leading up to parliment but that won't happen unless there is a huge fire or aliens invade.

I'd like to see that boulevard so that the aliens can invade in style.

[Acajack]

The wide boulevard would be Metcalfe St. from the Nature Museum up to Wellington, right? I think when Jean Chrétien was PM there was a grandiose plan for this that involved the demolition of some buildings along the northern part of this stretch to open up the view. Pretty sure it was shelved.

As it stands now Metcalfe St. isn’t too bad an approach to Parliament with some nice old buildings along it. Metcalfe has a modestly urbane feel to it.

Pretty good also are the views of Parliament, the Château Laurier and the canal from Nicholas St. (although the road itself is very ugly and should be beautified).

[c_speed3108]

Originally Posted by Acajack

The wide boulevard would be Metcalfe St. from the Nature Museum up to Wellington, right? I think when Jean Chrétien was PM there was a grandiose plan for this that involved the demolition of some buildings along the northern part of this stretch to open up the view. Pretty sure it was shelved.

As it stands now Metcalfe St. isn’t too bad an approach to Parliament with some nice old buildings along it. Metcalfe has a modestly urbane feel to it.

Pretty good also are the views of Parliament, the Château Laurier and the canal from Nicholas St. (although the road itself is very ugly and should be beautified).

What I think should happen is as follows:

If the City and the NCC could trade Nicholas for the Aviation Parkway.

Then the NCC could turn Nicholas into a really awesome gateway into the core with the Canal on one side and the U of O's interesting Architecture on the other with some Rail mixed in (use nice fence railings and such). This would have the nice views of Parliament etc.

Then the city could Aviation Parkway could link up to the a new bridge. This would give trucks an excellent route from the industrial park area around the 417 to Quebec. In a truck inter provincial traffic origin destination study the industrial park was the most common destination on the Ottawa side. Why not just link it right up then.

[Mille Sabords]

I remember it quite well. What an idiotic and self-important plan that was, widening Metcalfe to "open up" the view of Parliament. Thank God that one was killed. We already had a Prime Minister deal with the "grandiose view of Parliament Hill". It was MacKenzie King and the street he chose was Elgin. He considered Metcalfe, but there was too much commercial property to expropriate, and the Feds owned more land along Elgin and the Canal, so we got the diagonal grand view instead of the head-on grand view.

Case closed.

How many freakin' views do we need? We've already lost a big piece of urban fabric between Elgin and Rideau Streets thanks to the Grand Diagonal View of the 1940's. Then Chrétien comes along and wants another goddamn view that will shave off another slice of the city. Like I said, I'm glad they killed it. If that idea even looks like it's still moving in the grave, I'll take out my Uzi and pump a few dozen extra rounds in it.

Personally, I think there is already plenty of (maybe even too much) open space around the Parliament Buildings and the front lawn is there exactly to provide a grand view. That was the design idea in 1859. A big city that lends itself to exploration doesn't reveal too much of itself right away, it pulls you that extra block or two and surprises you with a different view at every corner.

If you're a tourist and you get off the tour bus, and you have everything in front of you at the foot of the Grand View, you shoot a couple of pictures and you move on to the next city. Nothing to explore here folks, seen it all in one view. Next.

Ottawa needs to intrigue people a lot more than that. Pull them into its little streets, charm them with the unexpected at every corner. That's what makes a city pleasurable to walk.