The future of Ottawa   (Page 4 of 5)

Wanted: a bold plan to reinvent Canada’s capital

Canada’s capital is about to rechart its future. This fall, the National Capital Commission (NCC) — the steward of federal lands and buildings in the National Capital Region, which includes Ottawa, Gatineau and 11 other municipalities in eastern Ontario and western Quebec — is consulting Canadians across the country about the future of Canada’s capital. The Royal Canadian Geographical Society is collaborating with the NCC on this ambitious public consultation, called Horizon 2067 (in anticipation of Canada’s bicentennial), and all Canadians are being invited to offer their opinions about how Canada’s capital should look in years to come. To get this conversation started, we’ve asked four writers who live in the capital for personal essays offering their own ideas on directions the capital is or could be taking. We hope they inspire you to join the conversation and let your voice be heard.

Green and blue assets

What the Capital Region needs to shine
By Moira Farr

Canada’s capital is a wild place, and I am not referring to question period in the House of Commons or the packed pubs of the ByWard Market on St. Patrick’s Day.

The postcard vision of Ottawa-Gatineau — the Peace Tower flanked by immaculate parliamentary lawns, scarletclad Mounties, the Canadian Museum of Civilization, a very long skating rink — is what most tourists come to see. Tulips! Swans! BeaverTails! Yes, Ottawa’s got ’em. But visitors who experience only the official postcard are missing so much of what makes we who live here so value the place: its wild spaces.

Ottawa has been my home for the past 13 years. As a hybrid kind of human, an urbanite and someone who appreciates — no, needs — what nature has to offer, I like how little time it takes to get out of the cityscape. In an hour’s walk from my front door, I can buy a pound of fair-trade coffee, rent a DVD, wander into a gallery showcasing local artists and carry on to Mud Lake, in a conservation area beside the Ottawa River, which is much more beautiful than its name suggests. Here, I’ve witnessed a screech owl on a nest, a black-backed woodpecker demolishing a decaying trunk, a cluster of painted turtles basking on a log and a gorgeous wood duck drake preening.

A little farther west is a park where it’s possible to see, at dusk in the fall, one of the great ancient migrations of the continent — the sight and sound of endless skeins of Canada geese, soaring in for a landing on the river, on flights from the Low Arctic that can cover 1,000 kilometres in a day. It’s a shiver-down-the-back thrill.

At the edges of this city, in every direction, are more wilderness gems. To the east is the Mer Bleue Conservation Area, an internationally renowned northern wetland managed by the National Capital Commission (NCC). With 3,500 hectares of bog to explore, Mer Bleue is home to many rare species, such as the rose pogonia, a hardy orchid. Stony Swamp, in the western section of the National Capital Greenbelt (a 200-square-kilometre crescent of agricultural and wild space surrounding the region on the Ontario side), has many trails and a wild-bird care centre that has rescued, nursed and released thousands of avians back into their habitats. To the south are hectares of farmland, where you might spot snowy owls on fence posts, or sandhill cranes foraging in the fields. Across the Ottawa River in Quebec is the incomparable 361-square-kilometre Gatineau Park, another NCC responsibility. Yes, you can actually swim in Meech Lake; those with a strong constitution, right across it.

When Casino du Lac-Leamy in Gatineau proposed fireworks as part of its year-round agenda, the NCC dispatched a naturalist to patrol the neighbouring woods and report on how disruptive loud explosions would be to breeding birds. Yes, we are capable of simple due diligence, knowing that what makes the region so special is that it is home to many beings other than ourselves which deserve our consideration; our reward is their continued presence around us. (Fireworks displays do take place at the casino, but for just five days each August.)

I’ve never needed anyone to tell me that spending time in nature brings serious benefits for the body, mind and spirit; it doesn’t surprise me to learn that some doctors are now prescribing “nature therapy” to stress-battered patients. Fortunately for anyone living in or visiting Ottawa, this simple remedy is abundant.

A Canadian city might get an inferiority complex for not being “world class” enough and tighten its greenbelt in an effort to become more urbane. There’s nothing wrong with urbanity, at its best, or striving to foster it. But trying to be something a city is not (Paris, New York, London or even, dare I say, Montréal or the big-leagues-striving Toronto) can also be unbecoming and, sadly, may give short shrift to the very things that make a city special. What makes Ottawa special, and what is worth celebrating and preserving in the future, is its unique hybridity. Watch a blue heron fly over the Ottawa River through a window at the stunning National Gallery of Canada, having just savoured a fine collection of modernist art, and you will get what I mean. Sometimes, the best reason for just leaving a green space green is because it’s there.

Avid birdwatcher Moira Farr is a writer, an editor and an instructor at Carleton University’s School of Journalism.