I noticed this car parked outside St Vincent Hospital on Primrose, near Bronson. I wonder if the front plate elicits any action if s(he) crosses the US border. And I also wonder at the type of person who badges him or herself with symbols of one of the most repressive regimes in the world. Maybe there is a market in selling North Korea plates, or Iranian plates? Of course, the main market is limited to jurisdictions that don’t require a front plate, so that means Quebec. We have come a long way from Levesque’s dream of popular revolutionary expression … Continue reading Little Cuba on Primrose Avenue

  Gloucester Street, just west of Lyon, is site of several high rises. The red brick one on the right of the picture is city owned. Notice how some care was taken on the front edges to step the building back from the street, to soften the edges and transition to the next sites. The red brick one also has a front yard, albeit a singularly useless one, except on some garbage days. I guess the City can’t be seen to do something nice in front of public housing, lest it look extravagant. The concrete slab building under construction next … Continue reading Is this good planning?

  Picture: billboard at the intersection of the O-Train bike path and Gladstone. That billboard might cause a few moments anxiety explaining the facts of life to your kid. Presumably the decision to post it predates the appearance of an Elk further north on the path:  after being surrounded by humans, stressed, and then shot as a menace. And presumably the deer in the billboard isn’t a major collision hazard to winter cyclists, all swaddled up in bulky winter costume. As for motorists, I suppose there may be a slight collision hazard along Gladstone with deer. But it’s much more … Continue reading Rudolph on the OTrain bike path

It may only be early winter, but we may have found the most inconsiderate parker of the year. In the picture, notice the bare spot on the road where the vehicle was parked. It was probably a truck or van. Because the person shovelled all the snow off their vehicle, and from around it, uphill and onto the Primrose staircase up Nanny Goat Hill. The densely piled snow on the stairs was chock full of leaves and other ground debris, totally unlike the snow on the rest of the stairs. Possibly the motorist thought it funny.   Motorists have a … Continue reading Selfish Parker of the Winter

While there is a — probably temporary — slowdown in condo sales, the buildings continue to go up. And the exterior membranes continue to get brighter coloured. Here’s a view from the Bayview Station looking towards downtown: Continue reading High rise Christmas parcels

Many houses in the central, oldest parts of the City do not have off-street parking. The City sells permits for these people to park on the street without violating the time limits usually put on curbside parking. There are several problems with this approach. First, houses without parking probably have less market value, to either buy or rent, than does an identical unit with a driveway. This lower value makes housing more affordable to those who choose to be car-free. By creating an “out” from this disadvantage, the City reduces the affordability. People who value walking to work are priced … Continue reading Residential Parking Permits and other horrors

  Just a few metres west of the Ottawa’s famed Chinatown Royal Arch a car apparently crashed into concrete construction barriers just after midnight on Saturday night / Sunday morning. Film crews caught the crash and / or its aftermath. Barriers closed Somerset Street between Bronson and Arthur Streets. Police cars crowded the street at Bronson. Fortunately no one was hurt, as the suspiciously clean barriers were plastic, and the street was closed for movie filming. But it was still exciting.     Sort of. And makes a nice break from all the depressing news otherwise afflicting the west side … Continue reading Horrific Chinatown Car Crash caught on film

I have a college kid that travels to and from Ottawa by plane. The airfare to Boston is over $400 by Porter (via Toronto Island) and often $800 by Air Canada. Air fares fluctuate all the time, we keep our eyes out for bargains. Recently, said kid flew via Ogdensburg International, for $89, but we did have to rent a car to go fetch him. This is the International Air Terminal: Oh, the name of the airport:   It has a passenger lounge with airline check in:   The airline staffer is wearing a coat because he is about to … Continue reading Ogdensburg International Airport

The Preston-Carling CDP has a couple of sub-studies going on. The usual gang of high priced Toronto consultants has been brought in to make everything right. One of their proposals was to “recognize” Bayswater as a collector street; rather than a ordinary residential street. This, the traffic consultant told us, just tidies up the nomenclature. But it means way more than that. Some alert citizen involved in the process flagged the community association that these changes have consequences. The residents organized, very well, and started an impressive sign campaign:   They got an impressive number of homeowners to plant matching … Continue reading We we should NOT remove Bayswater from the plan

Asphalt shingles are so passe. They use carbon resources. They seldom last as long as advertised. They are a pain to rip off and dispose of. The roof sheds them as the base felt paper disintegrates over time. And for centretown type houses, often three stories tall, and on narrow lots, the labour cost of replacing them far exceeds the cost of the shingles themselves.   above: a bit of shingle roof as seen looking down from my third floor windows. The eave of the roof has eavestrough.Below are more pictures from the same position as the new steel roof … Continue reading Installing a metal roof

Spent a fairly pleasant day in a City planning exercise on the Gladstone CDP. A lot of time and focus was on the “Oak Street Complex”, or PWGSC warehouse complex that starts at 1010 Somerset and extends all the way up the east side of the OTrain corridor to Gladstone Avenue. As previously reported here, the southern half of the site is for sale. Most of the giant warehouse will be demolished next year, structurally unsound. The planning study focussed on what might be done with the area, once the warehouse is gone. But it is worthwhile to remember that … Continue reading What came before what is now about to be gone

Sparks Street has long exemplified “stodgy” to me. Whether it’s their strict interpretation of “pedestrian”, or even their benches. Old fashioned, locked down in place, don’t move them, don’t arrange them in conversation groupings. Pedestrians shall be see in splendid isolation and nothing more. I’m sorry about this view, as Sparks just seems to me to always underachieve its potential. Carlingwood Mall does a better job of making their mall furniture fit the public meeting place mode, be it their conversation groupings, lamps, or small collections of gather-round-the-table. St Laurent Mall has some giant tables in their food court, specifically … Continue reading Movable chairs as public seating

Just where to put all those transitway buses when the transitway closes in 2015 remains elusive. You probably read the Citizen story http://www.ottawacitizen.com/news/ottawa/Scott+Street+replace+Transitway+during+project+city+saying/9157057/story.html.  This will provide  some more info, and an alternative “solution” to Jeff Leiper’s. The transitway section of concern is between Tunneys Pasture and Empress (where the Good Companions Centre is, and the transitway joins the beginning of the Albert-Slater one way pair that goes into the downtown). The City has to take the buses off it, in order to build the Stations at Tunneys and LeBreton; and to convert the asphalt bus way to tracks for the trains. … Continue reading Putting the buses onto Scott-Albert

  Here is the Ottawa Tech high school graduating class in 1943: Here are the members of the graduating class that were going straight off to the defence of Canada:   Continue reading Graduating to what …

The Scott CDP (see yesterday’s post) seems to this outsider to be going pretty well. It includes new public access to the NCC’s riverfront lands. Consider this drawing, showing not one, but two new  multi-user paths giving residents easier access to the greenspace:   Presumably the consultant is working closely with the City cycling staff, and these proposals won’t be a shock to them. They will be unveiling the Scott CDP draft plan this Wednesday. Now consider the Toronto consultants doing the Preston-Carling public realm study. The Public Advisory Group (note, I’m one of the members) asked for a complete … Continue reading A tale of two plans: bike tracks

In a move that might surprise some readers to whom I appear a dedicated technophobe, I have a Presto card and like it. It works on the bus or OTrain when I try to use it. But reloading it is another issue. Register. Set secret passcodes. Register with Visa Online, with secret passcode. Go through various steps, hoping I get it right. Remember secret passodes, damn what were they? Have I loaded it? Damn, did I just lose every thing? Hey, it timed out ! Dunno, log on again later to see if it worked. All is lost if I … Continue reading Charlie is more fun than Mr Presto

Nothing can out-satirize or out-comment our society than some posted signs. Here is one I saw last week, on the exterior of a Boston fire station. I do think the sign has rather too much jargon, but it’s a valuable sign nonetheless. ______________________ I’m back from a few weeks on the road, including cycling Cape Cod,  stories and pictures will soon flood your inboxes. Continue reading Signs of the times

Continue reading Summer comes to an end

While cycling in the west end, I came across these plastic gizmos nailed down to the asphalt street surface. They were on several different blocks. They have a directional arrow, and there was always one pointing in each direction of traffic. Turns out they are new style traffic counters. Instead of using a cable that crosses the street and a passing vehicle activates the counter, these new ones sense the magnetic field of a passing vehicle. Some models of the new counters are capable of sorting vehicles by some criteria, but no word on whether Ottawa’s version does this. Nor … Continue reading new traffic counters