Lewis Street potholes fixed after 18 months

Do you remember back in March 2011 when I complained about the potholes on Lewis Street between O'Connor and Bank?

As a refresher, this is what the potholes looked like in March of the previous year after a cold patch was applied:

And this is what they looked like in March of 2011. The water had flushed the patches clean out of the holes, which were back and bigger than before.

Well, good news! I'd forwarded a link to that blog entry to some folks at City Hall, and though I didn't get any reply to those e-mails, we've finally gotten some results. As I had suggested, the City scraped off a chunk of asphalt and laid a good solid strip down where these potholes were.

This method worked at the Bank Street end of the block (as I had suggested they do when putting the final layer of asphalt on the Somerset to Arlington stretch of the Bank Street reconstruction in 2010), and has survived seamlessly through the winter since.

Now I don't have to worry so much when I lean my bike to turn onto Lewis from O'Connor! O'Connor-Lewis-Bank-James-Lyon is a very convenient bike route for going south-west through Centretown, because it has low traffic and few red lights.

Andrew S. Haydon Hall

City Council hasn't met for a couple of months, as City Hall for the most part goes on summer holidays. It'll be back in September, which is just around the corner!

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Kent Street Quadruplets

I generally avoid Kent Street, as it's not a very people-friendly place ever since they widened it and cut down the trees for the introduction of trolley-buses.

The downside of this is that I miss little gems like this foursome of old houses between Somerset and Cooper. It looks like they were all built as exact duplicates of each other, and many of the original features have survived, despite each house taking on its own unique identity.

The Centretown Traffic Calming Plan (an electronic copy of which apparently does not exist) has made Kent a bit more hospitable to use, the little bulbouts and dying trees aren't enough to make it actually look nice.

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Downstairs coupling

Seen back in April, under the Plaza Bridge, on the stairs connecting the canal level by the Union Station to the upper level by Major's Hill Park.

The channel running down the middle of the stairs is to make it easier for people to walk their bikes up and down stairs. Being in the middle of the stairs allows you to choose to push your bike from the right or left, acccording to your preference.

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A Percy Street pleasure for pedestrians

If you walk up or down Percy Street, you probably recognize this house at the corner of MacLaren. It has addresses at 607 MacLaren and 141A Percy. It's notable by the turret coming out of the corner of the second floor, which is one of those features that makes Centretown so interesting to walk and bike around in.

It was renovated in the last year or so. Between the photo above, from April 2010, and the one below, from July 2011, you can see that the turret has been renovated.

Ladder 11

Ladder 11 is a fire truck from Fire Station #11 on Preston at Eccles (one block south of Somerset West). It's in Little Italy and just around the corner from Chinatown. They've therefore decorated the ladder with an Italian flag design with a Chinese dragon.

Here, Ladder 11 and a number of other fire trucks were responding to an alley fire at Lyon and Cooper on Canada Day 2011. I don't think there was significant damage or injury, as the fire didn't make it to any of the papers. I also tweeted a couple of photos at the time from my Twitter account, @Centretowner

Some, but not all, other stations decorate their ladders as well. A couple more were on hand for the opening of the Ottawa Firefighters Memorial back in 2009.

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Fall Down Bike Jam

Here is 286-288 Bank Street, containing The Source (i.e. Radio Shack), Fall Down Gallery, and Tae E Lee Taekwondo. When I took the picture, there were an awful lot of people tyring to walk their bicycle along the sidewalk looking to park or unpark it. The two Bank Street decorative bike racks are not nearly enough to handle the capacity, it would seem.

For a few years, this space was occupied by the gallery of artist Daniel Richards. This closed in February:

Previously, it was an internet cafe that was shut down in 2007 by the police after it was revealed to be habitually used for illegal activities.

The building sits at one of the most active intersections in Centretown, just a few metres away from Bank and Somerset. The intersection has had a lot thrown at it in the last few years, including two seasons of road reconstruction (since the sections were divided at Somerset), two fires in the building across the street in 2008, and the collapse at Somerset House kitty-corner to it, which remains unresolved.

The bicycle congestion at 288 Bank, and at the much higher-capacity bike racks in front of Hartman's, is a good sign. It suggests businesses have a lot of customers who like to shop locally within Centretown.

Studio Argyle sidewalk repair

As I was walking around 255 Argyle earlier this summer to get a different view of the demolition of the Medical Building at 340 McLeod, I stumbled on this bad patch of sidewalk:

255 Argyle, by the way, is called "Studio Argyle". It's just east of Bank Street. The website (which refers to Centretown as "Center Town") says it was built in 2000 by Domicile and has 40 units.

I e-mailed 311 about the sidewalks (though looking at the first photo, the white arrows suggest it was already on the replacement list). Someone from the City called me to tell me it was on the list, and they just needed to coordinate with the condo so they can repair the sidewalk without disrupting the only parking entrance.

It was repaired by the end of July:

I'm glad they did. I'm pretty sure-footed, and even I tripped on that sidewalk!