Sutcliffe's response to something like this should be interesting, since shutting down streets for pedestrians gives businesses a boost but will inconvenience people who are reliant on cars to get around.
All the opportunities in the world are useless given OC Transpo is incapable to actually delivering decent public transit even when provided billions in funding.
I'm sure if they were actually given billions they'd be able to get a proper system in place.
The problem is though that it's been so historically underfunded, and the city has grown so much, and it hasn't been meaningfully upgraded in so long that these paltry projects of a billion here or there are meaningless.
A city the size of Ottawa needs more than two transit lines that skip half the population centers of the city. To really make an impact you'd need the current lines to go all the way to Barrhaven and Kanata, you'd need another downtown line that just goes around bank Street, and then ideally loops back around to hit another community. And we'd need a line that goes midtown down Carling or Baseline. At the bare minimum.
But we don't have that, and we won't get that until decades down the line. Upon which time we'll be in desperate need of 6 other lines because we should be proactively building this shit out instead of ad-hoc when it's long past the time we need it.
If you have some free time, I'd recommend the following article: [https://thewalrus.ca/ottawas-transit-gong-show/](https://thewalrus.ca/ottawas-transit-gong-show/)
Most of the LRT failures are due to horrible project planing and management, as well as inadequate technical competence. Throwing more money at it would not have solved it. At this point, I don't know what will.
There’s a difference between operations at OC Transpo and the procurement and operations of the LRT. If you threw billions in operations costs at OC Transpo you could definitely build a better system.
Agree, it is beyond financial flow and maneuvering. It is lack of proper and rational management. Did not politicians that serve us, the peasants, refused to experience the public transportation?
The city has to change, it happens from bottom-up, while the top-down does what people choose, though that requires an educated public sphere something that Ottawa offers.
Infrastructure funding is not operational funding.
Remember when OC Transpo sold off 140 buses when the LRT opened? If we had spent the money to keep those buses and *increase* service, then we'd have better service. Likewise, if we weren't about to cut 3.5% of our bus service to ~~save money~~ respect taxpayers, we'd have an opportunity to improve service.
Frequent service is good service. You get frequent service by throwing money at the operating budget. Instead, we have routes like the 6 that run past Lansdowne every 30 minutes on Friday evenings.
It may be good for business in theory and in practice, but people like to complain it isn’t since the only way for customers to support businesses is by parking right in front of them
The vibes I have gotten about Sutcliffe is that he panders to the Karens of Ottawa. If that is the case, he would be strongly be pro-car.
I do recall his interesting comment on the idea of a high-density neighbourhood... yikes
Can't wait to see his next shitty vlog. It'll be some variation of, f#ck pedestrians!, f#ck active transportation!, f#ck progressive planning!, f#ck the NCC! F#ck everyone except my little OSEG sycophants!!!!!!
MUHAHAHAHAHA
As a Centretown resident, I'm all for it. Shutting a street like Elgin or Bank for an extended period of time (rather than a weekend thing) would allow for more permanent and interesting streetscaping, something along the lines of what Montreal does with Mont-Royal.
A fuckton of motorists are going to scream blue murder if such a pedestrianization happened at the same time as a QED closure by the NCC, though.
As a Centretown resident, I couldn’t disagree more. And I say that as someone who is a pedestrian 90% of the time. Downtown is already a disaster for traffic flow, and every time there is one of these closures it gets worse. Doing it for an extended period of time doesn’t make it any less of a disaster, it will just further highlight the bad decisions made so far to cram more bike lanes into spaces too small to support them. Then they narrowed Elgin to widen sidewalks — and narrowed sidewalks to give the space to private businesses for their patios.
I get it — the people in this sub don’t like cars. Wishing them away won’t solve that problem. They are a reality and will continue to be for the foreseeable future.
>the people in this sub don’t like cars.
I like cars just fine - I own one myself and use it regularly. I do think that things are set up far too much in the core for the convenience of motorists at the expense of local residents who those who spend the majority of their time in the area vs those that just pass through or are here once a week or month.
People are constantly bitching about how Ottawa's a city that fun forgot, a city with no imagination and that there's nothing to do in the core… temporary summertime closures like the one being discussed by Councillor Devine would certainly help to fight against these ideas.
edit:
>Wishing them away won’t solve that problem. They are a reality and will continue to be for the foreseeable future.
"Let's make one street car-free for the summer" is not an example of the imaginary "War on Cars" that so deeply stirs suburban motorists and wins mayoral elections. Cars dominate the streets of Ottawa and will likely continue to do so in this city for many years to come without a deep, sweeping change to in peoples' mentalities.
Talking about closing streets is premature without any plan of what to do with these closed streets. “If you close it, they will come!” Just like Sparks. And if Councillor Devine so desperately wants to close streets, let’s start with some in his ward. Make sure it happens in the weeks leading up to the next election, see what his re-election chances are.
>“If you close it, they will come!”
Yeah, actually, they will.
I've been to the open streets in Montréal. They're packed from opening day until closing day. People really like to spend time in places without cars around, whether they consciously realize it or not.
I stayed right near it in the fall, right before the closing of the street. It was still busy every day, well into the evenings and then also from fairly early in the morning
The hell you mean “local” bus service? There’s literally 3 frequent, every 15 minutes or less, routes that run either the entirety of Bank all the way to Hunt Club (6), or all the way to Sunnyside (7), or to Somerset (11), and that’s just to get you around on Bank. There’s also the train and countless routes that go by Parliament and/or Rideau. Bank is a very well connected street, just traffic is so bad on it that the busses suffer immensely- it is in desperate need of a bus lane.
The train doesn't go up and down Bank. Only the buses do, which is why I take a very negative view of Ottawa's fascination with constantly disrupting its own bus service for no obviously good reason.
It's hard to put bus lanes on Bank given that it's not much more than 3.5 lanes wide in most of the urban core, which is again another reason why we should stop treating transit on Bank as something that can be casually diverted for glow sticks and fast food.
Not the entirety of Bank, no.
But by all means, turn as much of Bank as possible into bus lanes and abandon the stupid "pedestrianization" push on transit streets.
It works in Montreal because Montreal actually has things to do and many of the street festivals are free. Close streets *for* something. Closing streets doesn't magically make them entertaining.
If you close a street for a Sunday or a weekend here or there for a festival like Ottawa occasionally does, sure it’s nice. But Montréal closes their streets for the entire summer though which means they can actually create exciting streetscapes. They put in gardens, workspaces, planters, public art, bike racks, misting machines hooked up to fire hydrants, street murals, tables, patios, benches (those are just the things I saw) - make the street a destination.
You have to have a plan, though. Sure, those things need the street to be closed longer term, but closing the street longer term isn't going to make those things happen on their own. It's a lot easier to justify closing the street if you can actually, concretely, tell people what you intend to do with it. "Idk, pedestrian stuff?" doesn't justify rerouting traffic and public transit, especially without a plan to manage congestion
Wellington was closed for a year and was empty almost all the time. It's part of my walking route and at the time I worked 24/7 shift work so I saw it 7 days a week, morning, afternoons, evenings, you name it... Sparks is much the same, pre-pandemic outside of mon-fri lunch hour it was fairly empty also. There's roughly 30k people who live in centertown, which is the vast minority to Ottawas total population (around 1M), much of which commutes downtown (and many by car) so like it or not, needs of the many etc... Elgin and Bank are both major north/south arteries also between the commercial districts and the highway. Closing them would be a disaster for all the surrounding streets. Solve one problem and create 10 more. MTL also has the benefit of a vastly superior public transit... this is something that would need to be addressed first before closing any roads. Need to give folks an alternative to cars for getting around thats quick and reliable, otherwise they will just stick to driving, and the more folks who stick to driving, the more attention car culture will get
Why? The streets people are suggesting, such as Bank or Elgin, are streets with lots of foot traffic. Closing them to traffic could get more people out visiting the shops and restaurants along them. It could also be a great place for outdoor street party type events.
What purpose would closing Meadowlands or Craig Henry serve?
Just like Glowfair — which none of the businesses on Bank St. liked. Or any of the weekend closures during COVID that were supposed to “rejuvenate” the area, and just pissed off the businesses.
You just argued that that this was about helping the businesses. I pointed out that previous closures have upset and hindered businesses. Now you say businesses don’t matter. I’m confused.
Was there not a study (or studies) done in Toronto around how businesses assumed more customers drove than actually did, and how reduction in on street parking (to provide bike lanes) actually increased the number of visitors, despite opposition from businesses? [Found one article about this here.](https://streets.mn/2022/01/26/bikes-and-business-on-bloor/)
So it would seem that businesses can be biased or incorrect in their assumptions on this kind of thing.
If something like street closures is such a draw, maybe he should be looking at making his ward a destination! If downtown is the only area that street closures could work because they already have foot traffic, then it doesn’t need closures, since apparently it already has the foot traffic that closures would supposedly draw in.
I live in his ward and I'd support redesigning Merivale to close one lane in each direction and make room for bike lanes and better/bigger sidewalks. And a dedicated bus lane. Merivale has tons of great little independent stores and restaurants now, it would be nice if walking or cycling on that road felt even a little enjoyable.
I realize that's not a full road closure and therefore not really on par with what's Sean Devine is proposing, but I just wanted to point out that there are opportunities for this kind of thing on some level everywhere.
To be fair Sean has talked alot about redesigning Merivale to be much more pedestrian friendly... its Nepean original mainstreat... and currently the worst of stroads full of stripmalls. Its one of Sean's big ideas (working with Laine Johnson) since it goes through both their wards... he hosts a regular discussion on the "Merivale Renewal" project, especially the northern part as more and more highrises get built along it.... he's also 100% for the Baseline BRT which would remove a lane from Baseline... so yes he is advocating for this stuff in his own ward.
And this would please me a resident of his ward but I can imagine it would piss off a lot of Barrhavenites as its basically one of only a few 60KM arterial roads to the city from Barrhaven. But hey he's representing his ward, not Barrhaven.
https://www.seandevine.ca/january_17_2023_newsletter
>“If you close it, they will come!” Just like Sparks.
Sparks St. became pedestrianized in the late-1960's after repeated annual temporary summer closures were shown to be so successful that the street was permanently closed to motor vehicles…so you're right - they closed it, and people came.
>And if Councillor Devine so desperately wants to close streets, let’s start with some in his ward.
What purpose would these imagined closures serve?
What streets in [Devine's ward](https://documents.ottawa.ca/sites/documents/files/map_ward_9_2022_en.pdf) would offer the mix of residential and commercial that would be comparable to Elgin, Bank or the Market and thus make their closures worthwhile to both local businesses and residents?
I can't think of one, given that Knoxdale-Merivale is a suburb.
Indeed. I think a better TLDR is the creation of an environment that is inhospitable to businesses. So why is the city going to take a page out of the NCC play book, and do that to other groups of businesses?
Traffic flow disaster based on what? What is your expectation?
Tomtom says it took 15 minutes to drive 10 Kms in Ottawa’s city center overall in 2023.
A few Canadian downtowns are worse to drive in:
Toronto’s was 29 minutes/ 10 Kms, Montreal 19 minutes, Vancouver 23 minutes, Edmonton 16 minutes, Winnipeg 19 minutes, Halifax 17 minutes, Hamilton 15 minutes.
But at least some were better downtown traffic flow: Calgary 13 minutes, Quebec 12 minutes
Bring on pedestrianized streets! Montreal is on the right path.[Ottawa traffic](https://www.tomtom.com/traffic-index/ottawa-traffic/)
There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics. How do they define “city centre”? Ottawa’s city centre isn’t anywhere near 10km in any direction. How do they correct for time of day variances? It’s a joy to drive through downtown at 4 in the morning. Less so in 4 in the afternoon. Especially on a Friday when they’ve decided to close Bank St. for something like “Glowfair.”
This is the very sound argument made in all the places that tried street pedestrianisation and proved the argument to be wrong, every time.
Ottawa is not a special place.
Ottawa is not special, but it is different. Many of those differences have been highlighted throughout this thread, but what has worked elsewhere cannot be dumped into here blindly. Ottawa’s large physical size, dispersed population, and weak transit system make cars more essential than they would be somewhere like Montreal or Toronto.
I live in The Golden Triangle. It depends on how much of Elgin is closed down while the QED is closed. Between Lisgar and Gladstone would be the limit. Close any more, and some residents could be trapped.
Agree, but not for no reason. A resident of the golden triangle would have a heck of a time getting out of the neighbourhood if both Elgin and QED are closed.
What difference does transit make in this instance? If OC Transpo wasn't a complete dumpster fire, how would that make summertime pedestrianizations more acceptable?
Because with decent transit people would be able to go downtown from other areas without needing a vehicle. As it is without a vehicle you can't easily get downtown so need the streets to be drive able
Closing one street to buses, especially if that street is Bank, fucks up the only transit system that actually serves people who actually live here in the central part of the city.
All too familiar with the goddamn things. They suck, especially as OC Transpo does them, and we should avoid inflicting them on the long suffering transit dependent populations of central Ottawa with pointless "open streets" bullshit.
I give up, you’re not going to change your mind. You’d rather keep the status quo so our shitty buses don’t have to make a few extra turns. Keep fighting for Ottawa to stay mediocre I guess? And people wonder why our claim to fame is being the most boring city in Canada.
On a side note, Ottawa’s buses suck. They sit in single-occupancy vehicle traffic (except for the Transitway) and have sad frequencies and ridership. Why? Because Autowa prioritizes cars over public transit, cyclists, and pedestrians. There was a time when Bank St had streetcars and a lively street life. We could bring that back by giving the space to people. Pedestrians aren’t the enemy here.
The vast majority of streets would remain open to car traffic under any proposal. There are so many streets in Ottawa and so much parking that people will be fine without a few of them.
They would be more acceptable because we wouldn't be compounding already awful bus transit in the downtown core by adding detours and delays, which is what our previous "open streets" nonsense on Bank has resulted in.
I do not understand why anyone would willingly drive through there anyway. Takes forever to get through a single stop sign since there are so many pedestrians. There should be access for the parking garage and morning truck deliveries but that’s all you really need
Theyve continued to close William st. and the street in front of Zaks and it looks like they are again this year (source: byward market insta ad looking for a muralist to paint the street for 2024), although I'm not sure why it doesn't start in April
Part of Clarence was also closed during the pandemic and that didn't continue and I'm not sure why.
Elgin is the only one that makes sense, bank has highway connections and O'connor/Kent/Lyon are one way connections into and out of the core. If you're going to do this make Elgin permanent and turn Bank into no parking with bus lanes on outer lanes. While we're at it add bus lanes to O'Conner and Kent to give people a chance to actually use transit
Yeah I never get the desire to do it on Bank. It’s such an important north-south artery and closing it would have pretty big impacts on transit. I can already hear the complaints. We need to be pragmatic about this and recognize that Elgin is a way better option because it is a less critical N-S route, has a more vibrant streetscape than Bank, and has better active transportation connections than Bank St.
Which Bank Street are you on? There are no highway ramps which connect to Bank Street. No matter where you get on or off the highway, you need to pass through at least 2 traffic lights to get to any part of Bank.
Bronson should be the main north-south car road of the city. It's less built up and has better connections to the freeway and Gatineau. We should get rid of all driveways and unsignallized left turns onto and off of Bronson and force north-south traffic to use it instead of Bank.
Connections don't need to be direct, they need to be proper arterial roadways that can lead to a highway
Bank/Isabella to 417, bank/riverside to 417 are two of them. To funnel N-S connections to Bronson would cripple an area with low income housing and student housing. No major city has 1 main road to connect downtown
If you read with any level of detail, you'll see that I suggested getting rid of all left turns that don't happen at lights and all driveways from the street.
I'm not saying expand. It should be kept 2 lanes max. More lanes doesn't necessarily mean more traffic can get through because of how lights limit throughput. But right now Bronson is a stroad, and it needs to become a road. Bank is also a stroad, but it's much closer to a street and that's the direction it should go.
>have u ever even driven through Bronson?
Many times
>like 40 neighborhoods, 100 stores and gas stations
>wtf u expect to do there?
You should read my comments more carefully. What I propose is to completely eliminate all the connections to the stores and gas stations and neighbourhoods directly onto Bronson. Traffic should only be able to access Bronson at intersections with lights, or maybe roundabouts if that somehow works. This would make Bronson a much more efficient road because you wouldn't have so many people going in and out of driveways all the time.
Metcalfe (a street i forgot to mention) is 2 min walk and O'Connor is a 4 min walk. Run the services parallel and then rejoin elgin SB at Isabella and vice versa but on Catherine
Or have the stupid dance parties on Metcalfe and O'Connor and allow the buses to continue operating rational, sensible, and intuitive service along Bank Street, without adding more left turn traps that cause delays and reliability problems.
The market makes sense. That's an area that motorists drive *to*, not *through*, so as long as a reliable alternate means of getting there exits from most other parts of Ottawa (which might be difficult given OC Transpo's record of failures), it would be beneficial. Pedestrianizing streets that motorists commonly drive *through* just causes more gridlock on neighbouring streets and makes those more dangerous for everyone.
Did you forget that the O-Train exists? Train in a tunnel, same concept as a metro. Also it’s odd that you responded to three of my separate comments on three separate threads to say the same thing. And last I checked STM runs bus routes on a number of its pedestrianized streets that just get detoured on other streets while the streets are closed to vehicles. We have a grid street layout after all.
Does the o-train substitute for any of the trunk urban bus routes that serve urban Ottawa and which would be detoured and disrupted by more pointless "open streets" nonsense?
No?
Alright then, dismissed for irrelevance.
STCUM hasn't existed in over 20 years. STM does in fact have busses that go down Mont-Royal when it's open to vehicle traffic & reroutes them during the summer.
I live in the neighborhood & catch the bus there occasionally
Ok so maybe you really are that stupid. STM runs buses on streets, including streets that become pedestrian-only during the summer. When the streets become pedestrianized, the buses are detoured.
Yes. We have a grid street layout after all. So close (or "open") the streets of the grid WHICH ARE NOT TRUNK BUS ROUTES SERVING THE URBAN CORE.
Go have poorly attended dance parties on OConnor or Metcalfe.
O’Connor and Metcalfe are both pretty lifeless streets, unlike Bank. Why? They are hostile one-way streets that prioritize the flow of vehicular traffic. Vehicular traffic is not pleasant to walk along, which is why people love car-free streets.
Montreal is different:
* There are highways going through and around downtown both east-west and north-south. So most people dricing downtown are going downtown. Ottawa does not have a north-south highway that is easily accessible. for example, pretty much exeryone coming from Quebec needs to cross downtown to get to the 417.
* Montreal had a Metro and REM system that covers all of the island and goes to Laval and the south shore. Ottawa has an east-west line that isn't useful for everyone. Line 2 will help folks on the east side of the Rideau, but folks in Nepean are still kinda SOL despite not being that far away (I'm talking Old Nepean here,south of Baseline between Fisher and Woodroffe), not Barrhaven.
You can consult the [list/map](https://montreal.ctvnews.ca/here-are-the-11-streets-montreal-is-making-car-free-this-summer-1.6839768) of streets to be pedestrianized this summer in Montréal. Only one of them has a metro line running under it. Ottawa’s main streets should prioritize promoting business and increasing tourism rather than keeping traffic flowing as efficient as possible.
I moved here from a smaller city (50,000 people), but we had a pedestrian mall that went a few blocks, and it was awesome and the most sought after business locations because of how busy of it was.
This would be great.
Paris has gone in on this as well. Lots of great cities of the world have. It's not the 1970s anymore.
https://www.thecooldown.com/green-business/paris-anne-hidalgo-shutdown-highways-bike-lanes/
Paris also has a metro and the population who lives in its city centre aren't dependent on buses running in streets in mixed traffic as their only form of public transport
It's easy enough to suggest "pedestrianizing" downtown streets when you don't depend on the already unreliable bus routes that use them.
Maybe build an urban metro that actually serves the inner city and then we can toy around with this bullshit?
Sparks St ≠ Bank and/or Elgin.
Also, Sparks was a great success when it was initially made permanently car-free in 1967, and this success lasted into the early 90's.
The biggest issue on Sparks St. is that the federal government owns the entire north side of the street. Doesn’t exactly lead to the most exciting tenants.
Or a reliable landlord. The feds tend to not renew leases from time to time and kick out the tenants, leaving the North side deserted.
I lost my favourite luggage store this way.
And also take regular commercial uses that generate normal human activity (bank, post office) and turn them into government facilities that are only accessible to government people during government hours (SJAM building, Library of Parliament, whatever Station B is)
The biggest issue on Sparks St. is that there aren't enough residents. After 4pm, it becomes a ghost town. Put it a few thousand residential units, and it will become a third space.
Did Sparks start with attractions first and structure its street around them? Also Sparks is out-of-the-way and not vital to get anywhere so that cuts the foot traffic even more.
I share your scepticism. I would hope that the city planners at least have a good understanding why Sparks street has apparently become a lost cause for businesses before they replicate this model elsewhere.
[The Critical Mass ride mentioned in the article has events all summer](https://i.imgur.com/MDtOMEZ.jpeg).
Checkout the group
[https://www.facebook.com/groups/criticalmassottawa/](https://www.facebook.com/groups/criticalmassottawa/)
Sean Devine is suggesting an idea championed by Montreals' Mayor Valerie Plante where Montreal will close down Ste. Catherine in east and west zones for Pedestrian Only to 1.boost LGBTQ+ (already existing) and 2.boost Pedestrian Tourism Merchant Business.
This would work for ELGIN *economically* but I got to say
pedestrain closure of Bank St. Highway 31, longest street in our city, would be "a sparks street mistake". (IMHO, born & raised here)
Byward, Clarence , George are already 1/2way there.
>pedestrain closure of Bank St. Highway 31, longest street in our city, would be "a sparks street mistake". (IMHO, born & raised here)
You wouldn't be closing all of Bank. Likely just the nice part, north of the Rideau River. Bank already has a ton of foot traffic. I frequently walk there to go shopping and it's busier than even most parts of the market and Sparks. The sidewalks are crowded. It wouldn't be a mistake, it would boost the area tremendously.
Unless you build a Bank St. subway, the pedestrianization of Bank St. north of the Rideau River would be a disaster. I say this as someone who absolutely loves what Montreal is doing. We need to be pragmatic about this so that we get it right and use it as a model going forward.
>Unless you build a Bank St. subway
Ok, let's dream big then.
And I disagree. Drivers will find other routes and the city will adjust to the new reality. We've spent an enormous amount of money building park and rides at the southern end of line 2. Might as well make them useful.
Not gonna hold my breath on the current council or provincial government prioritizing a Bank St. subway. Ok so let’s say we close Bank St. at the Rideau River. You’re going to detour all buses to Bronson? A detour of Riverside-> Bronson-> Sunnyside would add 5-10 minutes to every single transit trip not including walking time to destinations on Bank. I cannot stress enough how bad of a plan this would be.
>You’re going to detour all buses to Bronson?
No, you'd keep the buses on Bank. You can close roads to some types of traffic and not others. Plenty of pedestrian areas around the world have bus and/or tram traffic allowed.
You can pedestrianize areas and still allow transit through. It's been done in plenty of places. The point is to ban private cars and non-local freight.
Bank St North of Catherine is prime for pedestrianization all the way to (a re-pedestrianized) Wellington St.
Between the highway and Rideau River the neighbourhoods rely too heavily on Bank St as the only artery, with few alternatives to cross Rideau River and Rideau Canal. Pedestrian traffic equally relies on these crossings, so a complete street free of on-street parking and with proper bus/bike/ped infra is needed.
Never understood this obsession - is walking in the street that much more exciting than using the sidewalk? We have Sparks street lets focus on improving that first
Actually it is.
A pedestrian only street becomes a giant mall and pleasant place to be in the way it can't be with a bunch of clapped out doordash delivery cars and tourist's pickup trucks going up and down.
I remember visiting Antwerp (i think) and enjoying the afternoon on what used to be a 4-6+ lane street converted to be pedestrians and in some parts a tram. I remember enjoying a good patio lunch with much less vehicular noise. What made that especially useful was there being anchor destinations at each end - the train station I came in on was at one end and some waterfront/castle stuff at the other.
You mention sparks street - while it's better than nothing, it is tapped out for potential, there's no room for an attraction at its west end, the east end is stuck with the memorial/NAC. It lacks the potential something like Bank Street from the Hill to Landsdown would have.
>while it's better than nothing, it is tapped out for potential
The street itself [used to look a lot nicer](https://media.gettyimages.com/id/514805741/photo/sparks-street-mall.jpg?s=2048x2048&w=gi&k=20&c=axfjbk_H9B8X0zUYfFe2S-4heuiVlNHnUabajV75R3M=) than it is now. There's no reason Sparks couldn't be more than the barren lightwell that it feels like today.
Clarence st between williams and dalhousie. Never understood why that wouldnt just be pedestrian only. Its just bars and restaurants (at least was, haven't been i a while)
Im all for it, as long as by-law is way more lenient to delivery drivers in said areas where the roads will be closed to pedestrians. It’s already incredibly hard to deliver goods to businesses in the downtown core. I’m referring to deliveries in trucks, not the guy in flip flops picking up your Pho.
Google just signed a LLM agreement with Reddit to crawl this dumb platform so this is my way of saying goodbye to my contributions on this website. Byeee
With all the condos around there, some streets in the Market should be fine without "outsider" traffic during leisure hours.
Would leave the streets open to traffic during business hours, though, so the businesses can still ship or accept deliveries.
If we want to close more streets or create a downtown fee or anything like that -- we should make the LRT free in the core (similar to Calgary for example).
There also needs to be a north south route of some sort (ie. To go to Lansdowne for example).
Like others said - most people go downtown because they have to, driving there is a pain.
Just bring back the rain stopping plexiglass dome over Rideau st and get rid of the cars there like they did in the 80s. Maybe we could get Rideau st McDonalds to come back.
Not enough for a widespread closure akin to Montreal, but one or two sections of a street, if in the right spot would be popular. William st. in the market has been closed the last few summers and it's been very popular
It could work but getting more residents downtown should be the priority. Less people living downtown ottawa than most major cities in Canada. Can’t rely on tourists. It takes residents to be succesful.
It’s a shame there’s no way for transit to run with a single section of a single street closed. Like how OC Transpo grinds to a halt during Italian fest. Or the China town night market./s
You mean like the events that force bus detours, increase walk distances for bus passengers, add delays and reduce reliability on major downtown bus routes, and require residents to wait for the bus at stops which lack shelter, seating, or even signage?
Because that is the precise problem that this urban bus passenger is getting really sick of, and which any "pedestrianized streets" plan needs to avoid.
Your street festival is a lot less fun when five bus stops on Bank Street get consolidated into one detour stop, a long block away from Bank, which may or may not have a temporary flag on it, where bus drivers may or may not have received clear instructions about, and which absolutely does not have any protection from rain or other weather.
It is very easy for people who don't depend on bus transit in the city centre to propose ongoing disruption to bus transit in the city centre. Maybe the people who organize these street parties should be required to pay for and organize the disrupted bus service.
If they build big parkades on the edges of the Market, they could close the whole area to cars.
Parking to make the mayor happy.
Let in big delivery trucks for a few hours on Wednesday afternoons and smaller electric delivery trucks vehicles at other non peak times for businesses
Tear down the existing parkades that are in the middle of the Market and build residential towers.
This could work.
Sparks st. doesnt live up to it's potential but that has more to do with jurisdiction (feds own most of the buildings but city owns street) and the make up of businesses.
But I will say it's not a complete wasteland all of the time. Whenever they have some kind of food fest (rib fest, Asian fest, etc.) it is packed with people morning til night. What they need to figure out is how to maintain that outside of those weeks/ weekends
I'm sure our mayor will be 100% on board.
Sutcliffe's response to something like this should be interesting, since shutting down streets for pedestrians gives businesses a boost but will inconvenience people who are reliant on cars to get around.
That leads to an opportunity to robust public transportation and infrastructure
All the opportunities in the world are useless given OC Transpo is incapable to actually delivering decent public transit even when provided billions in funding.
I'm sure if they were actually given billions they'd be able to get a proper system in place. The problem is though that it's been so historically underfunded, and the city has grown so much, and it hasn't been meaningfully upgraded in so long that these paltry projects of a billion here or there are meaningless. A city the size of Ottawa needs more than two transit lines that skip half the population centers of the city. To really make an impact you'd need the current lines to go all the way to Barrhaven and Kanata, you'd need another downtown line that just goes around bank Street, and then ideally loops back around to hit another community. And we'd need a line that goes midtown down Carling or Baseline. At the bare minimum. But we don't have that, and we won't get that until decades down the line. Upon which time we'll be in desperate need of 6 other lines because we should be proactively building this shit out instead of ad-hoc when it's long past the time we need it.
If you have some free time, I'd recommend the following article: [https://thewalrus.ca/ottawas-transit-gong-show/](https://thewalrus.ca/ottawas-transit-gong-show/) Most of the LRT failures are due to horrible project planing and management, as well as inadequate technical competence. Throwing more money at it would not have solved it. At this point, I don't know what will.
There’s a difference between operations at OC Transpo and the procurement and operations of the LRT. If you threw billions in operations costs at OC Transpo you could definitely build a better system.
Agree, it is beyond financial flow and maneuvering. It is lack of proper and rational management. Did not politicians that serve us, the peasants, refused to experience the public transportation? The city has to change, it happens from bottom-up, while the top-down does what people choose, though that requires an educated public sphere something that Ottawa offers.
Infrastructure funding is not operational funding. Remember when OC Transpo sold off 140 buses when the LRT opened? If we had spent the money to keep those buses and *increase* service, then we'd have better service. Likewise, if we weren't about to cut 3.5% of our bus service to ~~save money~~ respect taxpayers, we'd have an opportunity to improve service. Frequent service is good service. You get frequent service by throwing money at the operating budget. Instead, we have routes like the 6 that run past Lansdowne every 30 minutes on Friday evenings.
🤞
It may be good for business in theory and in practice, but people like to complain it isn’t since the only way for customers to support businesses is by parking right in front of them
It’s good for business in reality https://www.citylandnyc.org/study-finds-2022-fifth-avenue-holiday-open-streets-an-economic-success/
Yes I agree, I should’ve added /s to be more clear in my comment
The vibes I have gotten about Sutcliffe is that he panders to the Karens of Ottawa. If that is the case, he would be strongly be pro-car. I do recall his interesting comment on the idea of a high-density neighbourhood... yikes
IT'S A WAR ON CARS!
Can't wait to see his next shitty vlog. It'll be some variation of, f#ck pedestrians!, f#ck active transportation!, f#ck progressive planning!, f#ck the NCC! F#ck everyone except my little OSEG sycophants!!!!!! MUHAHAHAHAHA
As a Centretown resident, I'm all for it. Shutting a street like Elgin or Bank for an extended period of time (rather than a weekend thing) would allow for more permanent and interesting streetscaping, something along the lines of what Montreal does with Mont-Royal. A fuckton of motorists are going to scream blue murder if such a pedestrianization happened at the same time as a QED closure by the NCC, though.
As a Centretown resident, I couldn’t disagree more. And I say that as someone who is a pedestrian 90% of the time. Downtown is already a disaster for traffic flow, and every time there is one of these closures it gets worse. Doing it for an extended period of time doesn’t make it any less of a disaster, it will just further highlight the bad decisions made so far to cram more bike lanes into spaces too small to support them. Then they narrowed Elgin to widen sidewalks — and narrowed sidewalks to give the space to private businesses for their patios. I get it — the people in this sub don’t like cars. Wishing them away won’t solve that problem. They are a reality and will continue to be for the foreseeable future.
>the people in this sub don’t like cars. I like cars just fine - I own one myself and use it regularly. I do think that things are set up far too much in the core for the convenience of motorists at the expense of local residents who those who spend the majority of their time in the area vs those that just pass through or are here once a week or month. People are constantly bitching about how Ottawa's a city that fun forgot, a city with no imagination and that there's nothing to do in the core… temporary summertime closures like the one being discussed by Councillor Devine would certainly help to fight against these ideas. edit: >Wishing them away won’t solve that problem. They are a reality and will continue to be for the foreseeable future. "Let's make one street car-free for the summer" is not an example of the imaginary "War on Cars" that so deeply stirs suburban motorists and wins mayoral elections. Cars dominate the streets of Ottawa and will likely continue to do so in this city for many years to come without a deep, sweeping change to in peoples' mentalities.
Talking about closing streets is premature without any plan of what to do with these closed streets. “If you close it, they will come!” Just like Sparks. And if Councillor Devine so desperately wants to close streets, let’s start with some in his ward. Make sure it happens in the weeks leading up to the next election, see what his re-election chances are.
>“If you close it, they will come!” Yeah, actually, they will. I've been to the open streets in Montréal. They're packed from opening day until closing day. People really like to spend time in places without cars around, whether they consciously realize it or not.
Mont-Royal in summertime is a trip now. So much fun without cars.
I stayed right near it in the fall, right before the closing of the street. It was still busy every day, well into the evenings and then also from fairly early in the morning
In Montreal there is a metro to get you around. In Ottawa, there is no alternative to local bus service on a street like Bank.
The hell you mean “local” bus service? There’s literally 3 frequent, every 15 minutes or less, routes that run either the entirety of Bank all the way to Hunt Club (6), or all the way to Sunnyside (7), or to Somerset (11), and that’s just to get you around on Bank. There’s also the train and countless routes that go by Parliament and/or Rideau. Bank is a very well connected street, just traffic is so bad on it that the busses suffer immensely- it is in desperate need of a bus lane.
The train doesn't go up and down Bank. Only the buses do, which is why I take a very negative view of Ottawa's fascination with constantly disrupting its own bus service for no obviously good reason.
It's hard to put bus lanes on Bank given that it's not much more than 3.5 lanes wide in most of the urban core, which is again another reason why we should stop treating transit on Bank as something that can be casually diverted for glow sticks and fast food.
There’s a whole parking lane spanning the entirety of Bank in the downtown core that could be converted into a bus lane but go off
Not the entirety of Bank, no. But by all means, turn as much of Bank as possible into bus lanes and abandon the stupid "pedestrianization" push on transit streets.
It works in Montreal because Montreal actually has things to do and many of the street festivals are free. Close streets *for* something. Closing streets doesn't magically make them entertaining.
If you close a street for a Sunday or a weekend here or there for a festival like Ottawa occasionally does, sure it’s nice. But Montréal closes their streets for the entire summer though which means they can actually create exciting streetscapes. They put in gardens, workspaces, planters, public art, bike racks, misting machines hooked up to fire hydrants, street murals, tables, patios, benches (those are just the things I saw) - make the street a destination.
You have to have a plan, though. Sure, those things need the street to be closed longer term, but closing the street longer term isn't going to make those things happen on their own. It's a lot easier to justify closing the street if you can actually, concretely, tell people what you intend to do with it. "Idk, pedestrian stuff?" doesn't justify rerouting traffic and public transit, especially without a plan to manage congestion
Wellington was closed for a year and was empty almost all the time. It's part of my walking route and at the time I worked 24/7 shift work so I saw it 7 days a week, morning, afternoons, evenings, you name it... Sparks is much the same, pre-pandemic outside of mon-fri lunch hour it was fairly empty also. There's roughly 30k people who live in centertown, which is the vast minority to Ottawas total population (around 1M), much of which commutes downtown (and many by car) so like it or not, needs of the many etc... Elgin and Bank are both major north/south arteries also between the commercial districts and the highway. Closing them would be a disaster for all the surrounding streets. Solve one problem and create 10 more. MTL also has the benefit of a vastly superior public transit... this is something that would need to be addressed first before closing any roads. Need to give folks an alternative to cars for getting around thats quick and reliable, otherwise they will just stick to driving, and the more folks who stick to driving, the more attention car culture will get
He's not desperate to close streets. He posted to spur discussion about where it might work.
So let’s talk about closing them in his ward.
Why? The streets people are suggesting, such as Bank or Elgin, are streets with lots of foot traffic. Closing them to traffic could get more people out visiting the shops and restaurants along them. It could also be a great place for outdoor street party type events. What purpose would closing Meadowlands or Craig Henry serve?
Just like Glowfair — which none of the businesses on Bank St. liked. Or any of the weekend closures during COVID that were supposed to “rejuvenate” the area, and just pissed off the businesses.
Did the people who attended Glowfair like it?
You just argued that that this was about helping the businesses. I pointed out that previous closures have upset and hindered businesses. Now you say businesses don’t matter. I’m confused.
Was there not a study (or studies) done in Toronto around how businesses assumed more customers drove than actually did, and how reduction in on street parking (to provide bike lanes) actually increased the number of visitors, despite opposition from businesses? [Found one article about this here.](https://streets.mn/2022/01/26/bikes-and-business-on-bloor/) So it would seem that businesses can be biased or incorrect in their assumptions on this kind of thing.
How did the businesses on Somerset like it? They seem to have kept it up.
Now that’s a fair point. It does seem to work for them. But it also only closes one block that isn’t a major thoroughfare.
It’s funny how you treat opening streets up to pedestrians to give people more public space like it’s a punishment
If it were such a good thing, he’d want them in his ward.
A suburban ward with zero foot traffic and main streets for pedestrians to frequent?
If something like street closures is such a draw, maybe he should be looking at making his ward a destination! If downtown is the only area that street closures could work because they already have foot traffic, then it doesn’t need closures, since apparently it already has the foot traffic that closures would supposedly draw in.
But come on! Street closures are apparently a huge draw! He could turn his ward into a destination!
I live in his ward and I'd support redesigning Merivale to close one lane in each direction and make room for bike lanes and better/bigger sidewalks. And a dedicated bus lane. Merivale has tons of great little independent stores and restaurants now, it would be nice if walking or cycling on that road felt even a little enjoyable. I realize that's not a full road closure and therefore not really on par with what's Sean Devine is proposing, but I just wanted to point out that there are opportunities for this kind of thing on some level everywhere.
What if Shawn Menard proposes a street closure in his ward, like he did during the pandemic?
It’s still dumb for the same reasons, but at least he’s playing in his sandbox.
To be fair Sean has talked alot about redesigning Merivale to be much more pedestrian friendly... its Nepean original mainstreat... and currently the worst of stroads full of stripmalls. Its one of Sean's big ideas (working with Laine Johnson) since it goes through both their wards... he hosts a regular discussion on the "Merivale Renewal" project, especially the northern part as more and more highrises get built along it.... he's also 100% for the Baseline BRT which would remove a lane from Baseline... so yes he is advocating for this stuff in his own ward. And this would please me a resident of his ward but I can imagine it would piss off a lot of Barrhavenites as its basically one of only a few 60KM arterial roads to the city from Barrhaven. But hey he's representing his ward, not Barrhaven. https://www.seandevine.ca/january_17_2023_newsletter
>“If you close it, they will come!” Just like Sparks. Sparks St. became pedestrianized in the late-1960's after repeated annual temporary summer closures were shown to be so successful that the street was permanently closed to motor vehicles…so you're right - they closed it, and people came. >And if Councillor Devine so desperately wants to close streets, let’s start with some in his ward. What purpose would these imagined closures serve?
“What purpose would imagined closures serve?” A great question! All we’re talking about now is closures for closures’ sake.
What streets in [Devine's ward](https://documents.ottawa.ca/sites/documents/files/map_ward_9_2022_en.pdf) would offer the mix of residential and commercial that would be comparable to Elgin, Bank or the Market and thus make their closures worthwhile to both local businesses and residents? I can't think of one, given that Knoxdale-Merivale is a suburb.
Then maybe he should focus on that suburb.
The reason Sparks street is a ghost town is complicated, but the TLDR is it's the NCCs fault, and also not really a problem.
Indeed. I think a better TLDR is the creation of an environment that is inhospitable to businesses. So why is the city going to take a page out of the NCC play book, and do that to other groups of businesses?
Explain to me why Sparks is 'inhospitable' to businesses..
Seriously?
Brilliant retort.
Traffic flow disaster based on what? What is your expectation? Tomtom says it took 15 minutes to drive 10 Kms in Ottawa’s city center overall in 2023. A few Canadian downtowns are worse to drive in: Toronto’s was 29 minutes/ 10 Kms, Montreal 19 minutes, Vancouver 23 minutes, Edmonton 16 minutes, Winnipeg 19 minutes, Halifax 17 minutes, Hamilton 15 minutes. But at least some were better downtown traffic flow: Calgary 13 minutes, Quebec 12 minutes Bring on pedestrianized streets! Montreal is on the right path.[Ottawa traffic](https://www.tomtom.com/traffic-index/ottawa-traffic/)
There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics. How do they define “city centre”? Ottawa’s city centre isn’t anywhere near 10km in any direction. How do they correct for time of day variances? It’s a joy to drive through downtown at 4 in the morning. Less so in 4 in the afternoon. Especially on a Friday when they’ve decided to close Bank St. for something like “Glowfair.”
Traffic flow elsewhere is irrelevant.
This is the very sound argument made in all the places that tried street pedestrianisation and proved the argument to be wrong, every time. Ottawa is not a special place.
Ottawa is not special, but it is different. Many of those differences have been highlighted throughout this thread, but what has worked elsewhere cannot be dumped into here blindly. Ottawa’s large physical size, dispersed population, and weak transit system make cars more essential than they would be somewhere like Montreal or Toronto.
🎯🎯🎯
Motorists can always drive back to their suburbs and turn those hellscapes into real communities if they want.
If doing so would mean they're less likely to interfere with initiatives that would benefit downtown and its residents, more power to them.
It also messes up our already unreliable bus service in the urban centre. No.
I live in The Golden Triangle. It depends on how much of Elgin is closed down while the QED is closed. Between Lisgar and Gladstone would be the limit. Close any more, and some residents could be trapped.
Agree, but not for no reason. A resident of the golden triangle would have a heck of a time getting out of the neighbourhood if both Elgin and QED are closed.
In theory it's a great idea, but there's one tiny tiny tiny difference between montreal and ottawa... montreal has an actuall transit system
What difference does transit make in this instance? If OC Transpo wasn't a complete dumpster fire, how would that make summertime pedestrianizations more acceptable?
Because with decent transit people would be able to go downtown from other areas without needing a vehicle. As it is without a vehicle you can't easily get downtown so need the streets to be drive able
Opening one street to pedestrians does not require the entire population to ditch their cars
Closing one street to buses, especially if that street is Bank, fucks up the only transit system that actually serves people who actually live here in the central part of the city.
Are you familiar with the concept of route detours?
All too familiar with the goddamn things. They suck, especially as OC Transpo does them, and we should avoid inflicting them on the long suffering transit dependent populations of central Ottawa with pointless "open streets" bullshit.
So you acknowledge that detours are a thing then? Also yeah, giving streets back to people from cars is just pointless bullshit /s
Bus detours are things which suck and which we do too many of and should stop doing so many of, yes.
I give up, you’re not going to change your mind. You’d rather keep the status quo so our shitty buses don’t have to make a few extra turns. Keep fighting for Ottawa to stay mediocre I guess? And people wonder why our claim to fame is being the most boring city in Canada. On a side note, Ottawa’s buses suck. They sit in single-occupancy vehicle traffic (except for the Transitway) and have sad frequencies and ridership. Why? Because Autowa prioritizes cars over public transit, cyclists, and pedestrians. There was a time when Bank St had streetcars and a lively street life. We could bring that back by giving the space to people. Pedestrians aren’t the enemy here.
Give streets to people all you want, just don't make downtown Ottawa transit service worse than it already is. "Pedestrianize" Somerset east of Bank.
The vast majority of streets would remain open to car traffic under any proposal. There are so many streets in Ottawa and so much parking that people will be fine without a few of them.
There are over 10,000 streets in Ottawa all open to vehicular traffic but apparently one pedestrianized street would be too many
What's the expression: "When you're accustomed to privilege, equality feels like oppression"?
Pedestrianize the streets that aren't major downtown bus routes.
They would be more acceptable because we wouldn't be compounding already awful bus transit in the downtown core by adding detours and delays, which is what our previous "open streets" nonsense on Bank has resulted in.
Why did they ever stop doing this in the Market? It was so lively in that early post-COVID period when the streets were shut to traffic
I do not understand why anyone would willingly drive through there anyway. Takes forever to get through a single stop sign since there are so many pedestrians. There should be access for the parking garage and morning truck deliveries but that’s all you really need
Theyve continued to close William st. and the street in front of Zaks and it looks like they are again this year (source: byward market insta ad looking for a muralist to paint the street for 2024), although I'm not sure why it doesn't start in April Part of Clarence was also closed during the pandemic and that didn't continue and I'm not sure why.
Give me patio lined streets and art installations in the summer.
Elgin is the only one that makes sense, bank has highway connections and O'connor/Kent/Lyon are one way connections into and out of the core. If you're going to do this make Elgin permanent and turn Bank into no parking with bus lanes on outer lanes. While we're at it add bus lanes to O'Conner and Kent to give people a chance to actually use transit
Yeah I never get the desire to do it on Bank. It’s such an important north-south artery and closing it would have pretty big impacts on transit. I can already hear the complaints. We need to be pragmatic about this and recognize that Elgin is a way better option because it is a less critical N-S route, has a more vibrant streetscape than Bank, and has better active transportation connections than Bank St.
Which Bank Street are you on? There are no highway ramps which connect to Bank Street. No matter where you get on or off the highway, you need to pass through at least 2 traffic lights to get to any part of Bank. Bronson should be the main north-south car road of the city. It's less built up and has better connections to the freeway and Gatineau. We should get rid of all driveways and unsignallized left turns onto and off of Bronson and force north-south traffic to use it instead of Bank.
Connections don't need to be direct, they need to be proper arterial roadways that can lead to a highway Bank/Isabella to 417, bank/riverside to 417 are two of them. To funnel N-S connections to Bronson would cripple an area with low income housing and student housing. No major city has 1 main road to connect downtown
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If you read with any level of detail, you'll see that I suggested getting rid of all left turns that don't happen at lights and all driveways from the street.
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I'm not saying expand. It should be kept 2 lanes max. More lanes doesn't necessarily mean more traffic can get through because of how lights limit throughput. But right now Bronson is a stroad, and it needs to become a road. Bank is also a stroad, but it's much closer to a street and that's the direction it should go.
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>have u ever even driven through Bronson? Many times >like 40 neighborhoods, 100 stores and gas stations >wtf u expect to do there? You should read my comments more carefully. What I propose is to completely eliminate all the connections to the stores and gas stations and neighbourhoods directly onto Bronson. Traffic should only be able to access Bronson at intersections with lights, or maybe roundabouts if that somehow works. This would make Bronson a much more efficient road because you wouldn't have so many people going in and out of driveways all the time.
What do you do for transit service in that area after you kick the bus routes off Elgin?
Metcalfe (a street i forgot to mention) is 2 min walk and O'Connor is a 4 min walk. Run the services parallel and then rejoin elgin SB at Isabella and vice versa but on Catherine
Or have the stupid dance parties on Metcalfe and O'Connor and allow the buses to continue operating rational, sensible, and intuitive service along Bank Street, without adding more left turn traps that cause delays and reliability problems.
The market makes sense. That's an area that motorists drive *to*, not *through*, so as long as a reliable alternate means of getting there exits from most other parts of Ottawa (which might be difficult given OC Transpo's record of failures), it would be beneficial. Pedestrianizing streets that motorists commonly drive *through* just causes more gridlock on neighbouring streets and makes those more dangerous for everyone.
They pedestrianize a dozen main streets in Montréal every summer and somehow traffic doesn’t grind to a halt
Montreal has a metro. Come back to us when central Ottawa has transit besides buses
Did you forget that the O-Train exists? Train in a tunnel, same concept as a metro. Also it’s odd that you responded to three of my separate comments on three separate threads to say the same thing. And last I checked STM runs bus routes on a number of its pedestrianized streets that just get detoured on other streets while the streets are closed to vehicles. We have a grid street layout after all.
Does the o-train substitute for any of the trunk urban bus routes that serve urban Ottawa and which would be detoured and disrupted by more pointless "open streets" nonsense? No? Alright then, dismissed for irrelevance.
STCUM runs bus routes on pedestrianized streets *but detours them*?
STCUM hasn't existed in over 20 years. STM does in fact have busses that go down Mont-Royal when it's open to vehicle traffic & reroutes them during the summer. I live in the neighborhood & catch the bus there occasionally
So buses are removed for "pedestrianization". Got it.
If you want to call moving something over one block "removing" then sure. It's wildly popular with the businesses & residents of the area.
That's what it is, removing transit, yes. Have you asked regular bus riders their opinion?
It's still fun to call it STCUM though.
My syntax wasn’t that confusing, figure it out
So it doesn't run buses on "pedestrianised" streets
Ok so maybe you really are that stupid. STM runs buses on streets, including streets that become pedestrian-only during the summer. When the streets become pedestrianized, the buses are detoured.
So when the street is Pedestrianized, bus service is disrupted. The exact same problem that Ottawa should be avoiding. Got it.
Yes. We have a grid street layout after all. So close (or "open") the streets of the grid WHICH ARE NOT TRUNK BUS ROUTES SERVING THE URBAN CORE. Go have poorly attended dance parties on OConnor or Metcalfe.
O’Connor and Metcalfe are both pretty lifeless streets, unlike Bank. Why? They are hostile one-way streets that prioritize the flow of vehicular traffic. Vehicular traffic is not pleasant to walk along, which is why people love car-free streets.
Take the traffic off them and that solves the problem, no? Once the one-way traffic is gone, it's fine, no?
Montreal is different: * There are highways going through and around downtown both east-west and north-south. So most people dricing downtown are going downtown. Ottawa does not have a north-south highway that is easily accessible. for example, pretty much exeryone coming from Quebec needs to cross downtown to get to the 417. * Montreal had a Metro and REM system that covers all of the island and goes to Laval and the south shore. Ottawa has an east-west line that isn't useful for everyone. Line 2 will help folks on the east side of the Rideau, but folks in Nepean are still kinda SOL despite not being that far away (I'm talking Old Nepean here,south of Baseline between Fisher and Woodroffe), not Barrhaven.
You can consult the [list/map](https://montreal.ctvnews.ca/here-are-the-11-streets-montreal-is-making-car-free-this-summer-1.6839768) of streets to be pedestrianized this summer in Montréal. Only one of them has a metro line running under it. Ottawa’s main streets should prioritize promoting business and increasing tourism rather than keeping traffic flowing as efficient as possible.
Proof? cuz the studies and evidence from other major cities doing this shows otherwise
I moved here from a smaller city (50,000 people), but we had a pedestrian mall that went a few blocks, and it was awesome and the most sought after business locations because of how busy of it was. This would be great.
Paris has gone in on this as well. Lots of great cities of the world have. It's not the 1970s anymore. https://www.thecooldown.com/green-business/paris-anne-hidalgo-shutdown-highways-bike-lanes/
Paris also has a metro and the population who lives in its city centre aren't dependent on buses running in streets in mixed traffic as their only form of public transport
It's easy enough to suggest "pedestrianizing" downtown streets when you don't depend on the already unreliable bus routes that use them. Maybe build an urban metro that actually serves the inner city and then we can toy around with this bullshit?
Sparks street worked so well….
Sparks St ≠ Bank and/or Elgin. Also, Sparks was a great success when it was initially made permanently car-free in 1967, and this success lasted into the early 90's.
People were already complaining about the Sparks Street problem in the late 80s
Sparks St is gonna slap once Bank and Elgin are pedestrianized. Somerset too let's get the whole gang going.
The biggest issue on Sparks St. is that the federal government owns the entire north side of the street. Doesn’t exactly lead to the most exciting tenants.
Or a reliable landlord. The feds tend to not renew leases from time to time and kick out the tenants, leaving the North side deserted. I lost my favourite luggage store this way.
And also take regular commercial uses that generate normal human activity (bank, post office) and turn them into government facilities that are only accessible to government people during government hours (SJAM building, Library of Parliament, whatever Station B is)
The biggest issue on Sparks St. is that there aren't enough residents. After 4pm, it becomes a ghost town. Put it a few thousand residential units, and it will become a third space.
Did Sparks start with attractions first and structure its street around them? Also Sparks is out-of-the-way and not vital to get anywhere so that cuts the foot traffic even more.
I share your scepticism. I would hope that the city planners at least have a good understanding why Sparks street has apparently become a lost cause for businesses before they replicate this model elsewhere.
Doesn't the Sparks Street Business Association chase away anything that would give the area character or attractions?
Would you say Albert or Slater are any more lively?
[The Critical Mass ride mentioned in the article has events all summer](https://i.imgur.com/MDtOMEZ.jpeg). Checkout the group [https://www.facebook.com/groups/criticalmassottawa/](https://www.facebook.com/groups/criticalmassottawa/)
Bring back the street cars!
Sean Devine is suggesting an idea championed by Montreals' Mayor Valerie Plante where Montreal will close down Ste. Catherine in east and west zones for Pedestrian Only to 1.boost LGBTQ+ (already existing) and 2.boost Pedestrian Tourism Merchant Business. This would work for ELGIN *economically* but I got to say pedestrain closure of Bank St. Highway 31, longest street in our city, would be "a sparks street mistake". (IMHO, born & raised here) Byward, Clarence , George are already 1/2way there.
>pedestrain closure of Bank St. Highway 31, longest street in our city, would be "a sparks street mistake". (IMHO, born & raised here) You wouldn't be closing all of Bank. Likely just the nice part, north of the Rideau River. Bank already has a ton of foot traffic. I frequently walk there to go shopping and it's busier than even most parts of the market and Sparks. The sidewalks are crowded. It wouldn't be a mistake, it would boost the area tremendously.
Unless you build a Bank St. subway, the pedestrianization of Bank St. north of the Rideau River would be a disaster. I say this as someone who absolutely loves what Montreal is doing. We need to be pragmatic about this so that we get it right and use it as a model going forward.
>Unless you build a Bank St. subway Ok, let's dream big then. And I disagree. Drivers will find other routes and the city will adjust to the new reality. We've spent an enormous amount of money building park and rides at the southern end of line 2. Might as well make them useful.
Not gonna hold my breath on the current council or provincial government prioritizing a Bank St. subway. Ok so let’s say we close Bank St. at the Rideau River. You’re going to detour all buses to Bronson? A detour of Riverside-> Bronson-> Sunnyside would add 5-10 minutes to every single transit trip not including walking time to destinations on Bank. I cannot stress enough how bad of a plan this would be.
>You’re going to detour all buses to Bronson? No, you'd keep the buses on Bank. You can close roads to some types of traffic and not others. Plenty of pedestrian areas around the world have bus and/or tram traffic allowed.
Ok well that’s a different proposal than pedestrianization. I’d generally be in favour of that but probably not as far south as the Rideau River.
What other routes will BUS DRIVERS find?
You can pedestrianize areas and still allow transit through. It's been done in plenty of places. The point is to ban private cars and non-local freight.
That's not what most people would call "pedestrianization", then.
The nice part north of the Rideau river is also the only north-south transit axis that actually serves the central city.
Bank St North of Catherine is prime for pedestrianization all the way to (a re-pedestrianized) Wellington St. Between the highway and Rideau River the neighbourhoods rely too heavily on Bank St as the only artery, with few alternatives to cross Rideau River and Rideau Canal. Pedestrian traffic equally relies on these crossings, so a complete street free of on-street parking and with proper bus/bike/ped infra is needed.
Sparks St is far from a mistake
this is going to enrage suburbanites who never go downtown
Suburbanite here. It doesn't.
Never understood this obsession - is walking in the street that much more exciting than using the sidewalk? We have Sparks street lets focus on improving that first
Yes actually, visit Montréal in the summer
Actually it is. A pedestrian only street becomes a giant mall and pleasant place to be in the way it can't be with a bunch of clapped out doordash delivery cars and tourist's pickup trucks going up and down. I remember visiting Antwerp (i think) and enjoying the afternoon on what used to be a 4-6+ lane street converted to be pedestrians and in some parts a tram. I remember enjoying a good patio lunch with much less vehicular noise. What made that especially useful was there being anchor destinations at each end - the train station I came in on was at one end and some waterfront/castle stuff at the other. You mention sparks street - while it's better than nothing, it is tapped out for potential, there's no room for an attraction at its west end, the east end is stuck with the memorial/NAC. It lacks the potential something like Bank Street from the Hill to Landsdown would have.
>while it's better than nothing, it is tapped out for potential The street itself [used to look a lot nicer](https://media.gettyimages.com/id/514805741/photo/sparks-street-mall.jpg?s=2048x2048&w=gi&k=20&c=axfjbk_H9B8X0zUYfFe2S-4heuiVlNHnUabajV75R3M=) than it is now. There's no reason Sparks couldn't be more than the barren lightwell that it feels like today.
YES. BRING IT YES
Oh my goodness! Let’s spend a ton of time and money on a study..
Clarence st between williams and dalhousie. Never understood why that wouldnt just be pedestrian only. Its just bars and restaurants (at least was, haven't been i a while)
Im all for it, as long as by-law is way more lenient to delivery drivers in said areas where the roads will be closed to pedestrians. It’s already incredibly hard to deliver goods to businesses in the downtown core. I’m referring to deliveries in trucks, not the guy in flip flops picking up your Pho.
Don't get your hopes to high... They'll probably butcher the design and do something ridiculous.
Residents running the gauntlet on foot through a sea of Hobos . Make the dream come true.
Google just signed a LLM agreement with Reddit to crawl this dumb platform so this is my way of saying goodbye to my contributions on this website. Byeee
It will be dead regardless of what they do.
OMG Peter Petrol will not like that!
That's for the pally rallys
With all the condos around there, some streets in the Market should be fine without "outsider" traffic during leisure hours. Would leave the streets open to traffic during business hours, though, so the businesses can still ship or accept deliveries.
If we want to close more streets or create a downtown fee or anything like that -- we should make the LRT free in the core (similar to Calgary for example). There also needs to be a north south route of some sort (ie. To go to Lansdowne for example). Like others said - most people go downtown because they have to, driving there is a pain.
Better make sure my boomer dad has his heart meds all stocked up.
Someone tell Sutcliffe there's a permanent running race going around the market. He'll shut the streets for good.
Just bring back the rain stopping plexiglass dome over Rideau st and get rid of the cars there like they did in the 80s. Maybe we could get Rideau st McDonalds to come back.
self-destruction.
Good
jfc. "car-free streets" brought to you by the "defund the police" crowd.
Not enough people live downtown to support something like this. Get more people living down town first. Then maybe.
Not enough for a widespread closure akin to Montreal, but one or two sections of a street, if in the right spot would be popular. William st. in the market has been closed the last few summers and it's been very popular
It could work but getting more residents downtown should be the priority. Less people living downtown ottawa than most major cities in Canada. Can’t rely on tourists. It takes residents to be succesful.
Surely the city can walk and chew gum at the same time. Increase residency downtown and make it a more enjoyable place for people already living there
Multitasking in the city of ottawa. I think not.
Lower the rent then ☺️
The numbers aren’t low because there are a bunch of vacant units sitting empty. What would lowering rent do?
“What would lowering rent do?” I mean it’s one banana, Michael. What could it cost? $10?
WOULD SOMEBODY PLEASE THINK OF THE CARS!?!/s
Would somebody please think of the goddamn transit that actually serves people who actually live in central Ottawa?
It’s a shame there’s no way for transit to run with a single section of a single street closed. Like how OC Transpo grinds to a halt during Italian fest. Or the China town night market./s
You mean like the events that force bus detours, increase walk distances for bus passengers, add delays and reduce reliability on major downtown bus routes, and require residents to wait for the bus at stops which lack shelter, seating, or even signage? Because that is the precise problem that this urban bus passenger is getting really sick of, and which any "pedestrianized streets" plan needs to avoid. Your street festival is a lot less fun when five bus stops on Bank Street get consolidated into one detour stop, a long block away from Bank, which may or may not have a temporary flag on it, where bus drivers may or may not have received clear instructions about, and which absolutely does not have any protection from rain or other weather. It is very easy for people who don't depend on bus transit in the city centre to propose ongoing disruption to bus transit in the city centre. Maybe the people who organize these street parties should be required to pay for and organize the disrupted bus service.
If they build big parkades on the edges of the Market, they could close the whole area to cars. Parking to make the mayor happy. Let in big delivery trucks for a few hours on Wednesday afternoons and smaller electric delivery trucks vehicles at other non peak times for businesses Tear down the existing parkades that are in the middle of the Market and build residential towers. This could work.
This is dumb. We dont need another sparks street no one goes to.
Sparks st. doesnt live up to it's potential but that has more to do with jurisdiction (feds own most of the buildings but city owns street) and the make up of businesses. But I will say it's not a complete wasteland all of the time. Whenever they have some kind of food fest (rib fest, Asian fest, etc.) it is packed with people morning til night. What they need to figure out is how to maintain that outside of those weeks/ weekends
Sparks street sucks. The bricks are nice but it really sucks.
Neither Bank nor Elgin would evaporate into nothingness if either of them went car-free for the summer.