Lifting Centretown's Spirits

Yes, there are decorations on streetlamps, lights in store windows, and powdery white snow on the ground, but last week's opening of the new LCBO at Bank and McLeod has not just spirits, but also wine and beer.

(pre-Photoshop pic)

Ottawa Citizen columnist Joanne Chianello sparked a twitter conversation earlier this month about the location, and the relatively uncommon location of this LCBO at the base of a condo tower (certainly unprecedented in Ottawa).

A spin-off twitter conversation by Metroland's Laura Mueller sparked a discussion about the impact of this location on the other nearby LCBO locations. CBC's Giacomo Panico pointed out that this location was moving from 240 Sparks ... LCBO store locator [Edit: I got some stuff wrong here earlier. Fixed now, I think.]

Meanwhile, the LCBO 7 blocks down Bank Street in the Glebe, which would be visible from the Bank and McLeod location if not for the Queensway, isn't going anywhere anytime soon, apparently. (Sadly, all three of the large ash trees in front of that location succumbed last year to the Emerald Ash Borer beetle infestation).

Equidistant from those two locations, the LCBO next to the Loblaws on Pretoria is being rebuilt in the location of the former Beer Store (which, by contrast, is closed permanently) with nothing but air above it.

There is also supposed to be an LCBO at the new Lansdowne Park big box plaza/mall.


There's a lot I can't comment on by the mere fact that I don't drink alcoholic beverages, but it's still an interesting case study in terms of, "what do you put in a mid-size mainstreet commercial space when there's already a Shopper's Drug Mart only a block away?"

[Look for more one-photo posts under the label Singles]

Bixi's back for 2013

As of today, Capital Bixi is back in action! For subscribers like me, that means my key should work for the remainder of my one-year subscription (which I bought last June). And for you readers of my blog, that means I'm going to blog about it!

I never got around to blogging my Bixi photos last year (and the year before, my season-opener blog post used photos from the 2009 pilot), so I get to include some of those with this post. For example, the one above was taken last June at the Museum of Nature's east lawn, at Elgin and McLeod. On Saturday night, the bikes had been re-installed, though it was decidedly snowier:

Help @RescueBronson Avenue!

Everyone in the neighbourhood has been affected by the Bronson Avenue reconstruction project, which has been going on for just over a month now.

While most concerns go to the traffic department's project team, working on the Bronson file in the councillor's office (as well as being on the DCA and the CCCA and handling the @RescueBronson twitter account) means I get to hear from many people about the issues they're facing: shops along the street are suffering major drops in business, residents on and near Bronson have to put up with the very noisy construction work starting early in the morning, and people everywhere in the community have to deal with drivers treating their quiet side streets and school-zone main streets the same harsh way they treat Bronson: like a highway to be crammed tight at rush hour and sped through the rest of the day, all to get through the neighbourhood as quickly as possible with little regard to the people who live there. This is just a small sampling of the issues people are dealing with.

Luckily, it's not all bad news. The nighttime drilling, which was done on extremely short notice, is over for this year's construction. There has been lots of behind-the-scenes work to look at ways to address the speeding and other traffic issues on the side streets, including temporary and permanent measures (such as signs and speed humps, respectively). A digital speed board, which displays your speed as you approach it, has been installed on Booth Street next to the 40 km/h sign in front of St. Anthony's Church. The police have been doing lots of enforcement of persistent traffic problem areas. If all goes well, some new sharrows will be painted next week.

To connect all this to the above photo of workers installing a big sewer chamber at Bronson and McLeod, there has been a recurring theme: despite the other problems, people say that the construction crews on Bronson itself have been very accommodating.

If you get a chance, take a walk down Bronson Avenue at least once a week. It's easier now that there's no traffic. Discover the businesses on the street and visit them often. It's not the businesses' fault the road is under construction, and they need the support of their neighbourhood to make it through eight more months of construction.

(Also, don't forget to check out this weekend's Jane's Walks happening around town!)

[Look for more one-photo posts under the label Singles]

Centretown midnight sun

In the last few weeks, there has been a lot of filming going on in Centretown. This house at the corner of Elgin and McLeod was being used as a set back in December.

Unfortunately, when you work so close to the solstice at our latitude, you have to bring your own sunlight to shoot film for a full day!

Sorry for the lack of posts. Posting should be more regular when I'm done preparing a big series I've been working on for over a year!

[Look for more one-photo posts under the label Singles]

Central corridor

The Central condominiums, at the site of the now-demolished Metropolitan Bible Church, are nearly done the first phase. It looks like people have started to move in, and if they haven't, it sure won't be long. (Modern Ottawa has had a number of posts on the construction of Central)

Recently, work started on phase two, the first public inklings of which were two years ago, and the plans for which have been approved virtually unchanged from the early pre-application renderings.

They've had to remove the Bank and McLeod bike cutout, and have installed some scaffolding to protect the pedestrian passage, which gives the impression that it goes on and disappears into nothing.

[Look for more one-photo posts under the label Singles]

Give me a sign

In my September 2009 post about bike cutouts at traffic diverters, I finished the post with a description of the then-incomplete bike cutout on McLeod at Bank.

In February 2010 it was still incomplete because the space was needed for the cranes to temporarily remove the facade of the Metropolitan Bible Church:

CCOC Housing Pays Off

This 1975 issue of the Centretown News reported on the very first building purchased by what would grow to become the Centretown Citizens Ottawa Corporation, which owns nearly 50 properties worth over $80 Million, providing affordable housing to over 2000 people.

As their history page explains (though I think it's a bit out of date), the CCOC started as an offshoot of one of the two groups that later merged into the CCCA. Irving Greenberg (of Minto development fame and brother of former Ottawa mayor Lorry Greenberg) was president of the CCOC at the time that they got their first grant and loan to buy and repair the rowhouse at 530-540 McLeod (at Percy).

35 years later, that loan is now paid off and the CCOC can now use the rental income from this property to invest in more affordable housing for Ottawa. The CCOC celebrated their first "Mortgage Burning Party" yesterday:

340 McLeod demolition

We've known for a long time that the former "Medical Building" at 340 McLeod (near Bank) would likely be demolished for Phase 3 of the Central condos at Bank and McLeod (Phase 1 is currently under construction, with the Metropolitan Bible Church façade). This was recently confirmed at City Hall, where the rezoning application was approved with adjustments made based on CCCA feedback.

Most people see the building from Bank Street (like at Tommy & Lefebvre), but here's another view looking across the block from Argyle, here in late May...

And again just this past weekend, where they have begun demolition. While 340 McLeod goes down for Central Phase 3, Central Phase 1 is well on its way up behind it.

I haven't been by there since the weekend so I don't know how far along the progress is on demolition. If you know, please leave a comment.

Museum of Nature Re-Opening Day, part 3

Tonight is Heritage Ottawa's free lecture at the Canadian Museum of Nature by project manager Maria Somjen, who will be presenting on the process to rehabilitate and renovate the historic Victoria Memorial Museum Building in a six-year process. Accordingly, this is the third and final post in my series of photos from the museum's re-opening day last May.

In Part 1 I shared photos of the crowds on opening day and the restored atrium. In Part 2 I covered some of the new architectural elements.

Here, in Part 3, I'm sharing some photos of some of the exhibits in the museum, again from the opening day.

Since I'm typing this after a marathon CCCA board meeting, in which we reviewed current development applications with requests totalling 75 floors of increased zoning limit (see the 20-page agenda), I'll have to leave my comments brief.

In the basement there is a little wooden model of the museum. This one's oriented from the south, an angle you can't see easily in real life (certainly not from above). There are a number of new elements that were added at the rear of the building, including the loading dock and the heating plant. But since I didn't take any photos of it on opening day, I'll have to leave those for another time.

The first exhibit I'll talk about is the Water exhibit. When you walk in, the first room has a lot of little creatures mounted behind glass. Unfortunately, there isn't much description, aside from the organism's name, if that. You're expected to go to the computer panel to read up on the items, which is flawed because only one or two people can read the panel at once, and if I wanted to stare at a computer screen I'd have stayed home. While it is nice to have the extra detail available at your fingertips in the museum, they shouldn't have removed nearly all interpretation from the specimens.

Museum of Nature Re-Opening Day, part 2

In part one of this three-part set of photos from last year's reopening of the Canadian Museum of Nature, I mentioned that the series is timed to coincide with Heritage Ottawa's monthly lecture this Wednesday, March 16 at 7pm at the museum. The talk will feature Maria Somjen, project director for the museum's six-year long renovation project. Like the other monthly talks by Heritage Ottawa, admission is free of charge.

In the previous post, I showed some photos from the re-opening day of the museum's exterior, the opening ceremonies, and the main hall. I left you with a view looking up at the tracery screen that separates the original part of the museum with the new glass tower at the front of the museum, nicknamed "the Lantern". Here's a shot through the screen looking at the new set of stairs in the lantern.

You can see that the tracery screen, the stairs and the lantern are all lined up in this photo, and Metcalfe Street skews a bit to the left. When Ottawa Citizen contributor Julie Oliver took a similar photo (see photo #20), I think she was aiming to centre Metcalfe street.

Nevertheless, it's a very bright feature, especially on a sunny day. It's also functional. The museum was originally intended for only the first two floors to be open to the public as museum space (see historical photos in this Ottawa Citizen gallery of historical photos). When the upper two floors were opened for exhibits, visitors had to use the stairways at the corner towers to access the top two floors.

Museum of Nature Re-Opening Day, part 1

The Museum of Nature had its grand re-opening last year, appropriately, on Victoria Day weekend (May 22-24). That day, I posted an entry titled Museum of Nature reopens after there years of renovations--referring to the previous renovations, ending in 1972, as covered at the time in the community-owned newspaper, the Centretown News. The more recent renovations took twice as long.

I bring this up because next week there will be a free public lecture by Heritage Ottawa, Victoria Memorial Museum Renewal: Competing Stakeholders' Interests, being held next Wednesday, March 16, 2011 at 7pm in the museum's auditorium. Project director Maria Somjen will describe the process of extensive renovations to the building. This is part of Heritage Ottawa's lecture series, which is normally held at the Ottawa Public Library.

I visited the museum thrice on opening day, as admission was free. Throughout the day, I took about a hundred photos, which I'm posting in a three-part series on the Museum of Nature Re-Opening Day:

• Part 1: Front entrance and main hall
• Part 2: Spaces - new architecture meets old
• Part 3: Exhibits

Maybe one day I'll get around to posting my construction photos, too.

Part 1: Front entrance and main hall

The museum looked pretty sharp on opening day, and the grass was bright green. The meagre bicycle rack was full to the brim:

Museum of Nature reopens after three years of renovations

The Centretown News reports that the Museum of Nature is reopening this spring in the Victoria Memorial Museum building after three years of renovations. According to the report, it will reopen as two museums--the Museum of Man and the Museum of Natural Sciences.

"Gone are the days of the monumental exhibits that last for fifty years and look like it, [Mr. Bill Baldwin, assistant director of the museum] states emphatically."

Okay, that article is from 1972. (Click on it to view it in full size) There are a few obvious errors (it housed Parliament for a lot longer than one month), but there are nevertheless a few nuggets, like the Baldwin quote.

Regrettably, I didn't start taking photos of the museum renovations until April 2008, when they installed the columns for the lantern, and I didn't try to get access to the inside during construction. But here are a hanful of my photos from the renovations.

This shot from Metcalfe and Catherine shows the South side of the museum last June, when the Beaver Barracks building (site at left) was still in the early stages of construction:

This photo from last March shows the lantern more or less installed, with the leaded glass window still inside.

The original 1916 tower, which had been removed in 1919 becuase it was sinking in the leda clay, had an archway here. When the tower was removed, they had to fill in the archway with a window to protect it from the elements. With the current renovations and a new glass tower added, the windows can be removed and the archway restored to its original function.

Earlier this week, some finishing touches were added to the front entrance.

There is a parade today (should be on now) as part of the weekend celebration events.

Admission is free today as part of the reopening ceremonies, but that will mean it will be very busy so you should wait for another day. (Just kidding, I just want some space for when I visit today!)

The Ottawa Citizen has a lot of photos, articles, and historical views of the Museum of Nature on its special section at ottawacitizen.com/museum

Tommy & Lefebvre Reconstruction: Part 9

This is the last major post in the series on T&L's rise from the ashes. There are a few finishing touches to be done on the building, and I'll probably post a few photos once that's done.

In the previous post, the walls went up and a plastic bubble enshrouded the building while the brickwork was installed, as seen below in early February 2010:

In mid-February, the McLeod side was revealed. Double-tall black bricks surrounded the two ground-level display windows, and red brick covered the rest of the building. The corner remained unfinished.

One night in early March, the interior was lit, making it possible to see inside to the showroom, also unfinished.

The same night, you could see the progress on the front corner section.

A few days later, the plastic enclosure was removed from the Bank Street side, which has five display windows, plus office windows above. Already they're framing up behind the display, which unfortunately means that there won't be any natural light shining into the showroom.

Round the back of the building, two ladders lead to the top of the building. These have since been replaced with permanent emergency ladders. At the corner of the building is the rear public entrance, and at the right of the photo is the loading entrance. Some site services are located next to an emergency exit.

In early April, we can see the building flush up against the former wall of the old T&L building. Some flashing was added to connect the two. The grey band at the middle of the front of the building is steel I-beam sticking out at a shallow angle, flush with the building here, but sticking out as it gets to the corner of Bank and McLeod. There is also a recessed emergency exit, which as we saw in the previous post, has a reinforced ceiling leading to it.

In early April, the corner was more defined, with sliding doors installed at ground level and a decorative curved window frame above. The divider between the two display windows on McLeod was also more finished. At the roofline, one piece of metal cornice was installed near the corner, with the rest of the roofline awaiting more.

Above the front doors, the gap beneath the windows provided space for the door's electronics. This would later be covered up with more aluminum covering.

And the rest of the window display space was finishing construction.

In mid-April, new signs appeared in the black-brick sections next to the display windows. A sheathing was also installed on the first-storey cornice. It has factory-installed wrap covering it during installation to protect its surface treatment.

A week later, the sheathing installation was complete, at least at this end. The red-and-white Tommy & Lefebvre signs light up at night. We can also see two of the cross-members forming an "X" in the windows, which we saw during the earlier stages of construction.

The decorative band comes away from the wall as it approaches the corner, and is like a box around the support frame. It stops at the corner because a large grille--still being built at the time the store opened--will later be installed over the corner section.

It may or may not be related to this construction, or possibly the two large condo buildings going up across the way, but three penthouse units at the condo next door at 400 McLeod are for sale. There were also other real estate signs on other properties on McLeod.

This shot is from mid-April, at night. The "Open Winter 2009-10" sign was covered over with "Open April 2010", and the deadline was fast approaching.

But at noon on Wednesday, April 28, the new T&L store officially opened to the public. Let's take a look inside!

As you walk in, you immediately notice the vast two-storey showroom. There are many spacious displays of bike helmets, tennis rackets, and many other things. On the side wall is a projector showing live TV.

At the back is the stairway to access the offices, and also a mezzanine display level. Large posters wrap around the corner wall. The top of the stairs gives a good view of the ground floor showroom.

Obviously, the majority of the construction is complete. All that's left is to install the grille over the corner of the building, and the sign over top of it. Here's how it should look.

I hope you enjoyed this series. Make sure to check out the others by clicking on the Tours label. With it out of the way, I hope to get back to regular blogging very soon.

Tommy & Lefebvre Reconstruction: Part 8

This is the eighth, and nearly last, post in the series on T&L reconstruction. In the previous post, I covered the construction of the building's skeleton.

In this post, we'll be looking at the filling in of the walls and ceilings.

In mid-December, the snow started falling, so the roof installation and wall framing were timely.

A week later, the metal roof was finished and they had started to install the fibreglass wallboard, which comes in yellow packaging.

A few days later, this machine was pumping tar up to the roof for the finishing weather sealant. Much of the walls are still open, so we can see right into and through the building.

The artistic bike racks along Bank Street were wrapped in packing material to protect them during the ongoing construction. Behind, the windows along Bank Street have been installed.

On this shot from Christmas Eve, the fibreglass sheathing was formed around the front entrance at the corner, and the "Open Winter 09-10" sign was attached to it.

Meanwhile, scaffolding was beginning to go up around the building for the installation of the second-floor walls. The framing for the McLeod side windows was progressing since the photo above. In the background is the sales centre for the Central Phase II condos.

Around the back side of the building, a blue treatment was applied to the fibreglass sheathing, then some insulation on top of that. The scaffolding is being wrapped in plastic for weather protection.

The rear parking lot is normally full of construction workers' vehicles, but they're away on holidays today.

By mid-January, most of the blue banners advertising the reopening of Bank Street had started to fall down, as with this one bearing the words "Better than ever!" The plastic wrap on the T&L building had extended to the second floor, and some wooden makeshift doors had been installed at the corner.

A pallette of bricks was nearly empty and poking out from the foot of the tarp. Notice the double-high black bricks. Some large propane canisters were helping to provide heat to the bubble.

More bricks and propane tanks were on hand in the overflow parking lot across McLeod from T&L.

The two-storey scaffolding got to the corner of the building by the end of January 2010, and the plastic wrap was enshrouding the Bank Street side as well, including most of a recently-planted tree. A second set of modu-loc fencing created a protective sidewalk space for pedestrians.

In the next post, the bricks go on and the shroud comes off for the big reveal.