Raw 60's

Raw Sugar coffee and tea house on Somerset at Cambridge is totally decorated in chrome tables and chairs, 60's fake leather, there are the appropriate figurines and a Hammond organ.

Yesterday, it was in my aunt's house, today it's a museum display. But the brownies still taste good.

The race is won ...

A little while ago I posted this picture of the "loop" wires that were to be installed at the Preston intersection with Somerset. The street was also scheduled to be dug up ... would the street diggers remove the street before the wires got burried, or would the wire people install the wires only to see them dug up the next week ...

The diggers won. Bell and Enbridge are busy doing their infrastructure stuff before the sewer work is done later this month. So the traffic people won't find a street there to put their loop into.

Unless ... Bell patches the street and the traffic folks install it between the Bell work and the sewer work ....

No 2 resumes passage, further blockage expected

On July 29 Somerset Street was reopened under the new Chinatown Royal Arch, after a two month closure to vehicles. The No 2 bus route resumed passage through Chinatown.

The sidewalks have been relaid and provide a more comfortable and direct route for pedestrians again.

The scaffolding remains around the Arch for the use of the painters coming from China who will apply 17 coats of paint to the make the arch more colourful.

Meanwhile, just a few blocks further west on Somerset, construction has started for the new utilities and streetscaping. Major work will be completed this fall, but landscaping won't be completed until fall 2011. We can expect some further blockage of the street both this year and for about two months in 2011.

Milky rain, milky rain

It was raining the other day, and there was this curious milky substance running down the curbside gutter. I followed it back to the source: the road construction sign.

The back of the sign is painted white, and in the rain the paint just washes off.

I wondered if maybe the sign had anti-graffiti treatment on the back, so the paint would not stick.

In the meantime, what does all this while paint do to our sewers?

The race is on ...

Preston reconstruction is almost complete. Final details are going in ... like the traffic loops.

The loop shown above is going to be installed right outside May's Chinese Restaurant at the corner of Somerset and Preston.

Except ... on August 3rd Somerset is going to be dug up big time for the same treatment as Preston got for the last few years: new pipes, utilities, and protected parking bays. Guess what -- the spot shown above will be getting a six foot or so wider sidewalk. And four trees.

Will the city get the wiring installed in enough time to get it torn out in August? Or will they be so slow the installation crews will arrive to find the road already gone??  Stay tuned for the great race...

Chinatown life

Chinatown arch takes shape

The Ottawa Chinatown Royal Arch has taken a huge step towards its final form with the addition of ceramic roof tiles imported from China.

Suddenly, instead of a scaffolding-hidden pile of concrete and forms, the beauty of the future arch is emerging.

While crews work on the roofs, other crew members are preparing to lay curbs and new paving for the sidewalk and road under the arch. The arch is significantly ahead of schedule. No 2 bus users may get their Somerset route back before the end of July!

There are more details at http://www.ottawachinatownroyalarch.blogspot.com/.

Square Boston

The squares above are just two of dozens embedded in the sidewalk piazza near the Chinatown Arch in Boston. Are they fossils? Rock carvings? Chinese characters?

The Boston sidewalk squares shown below are definitely Chinese. They were located on the sidewalk leading up to the Chinese arch. The centre portion was scribed granite block, surrounded by ordinary concrete pavers, set in the join of regular poured concrete sidewalk.

The Ottawa Chinatown BIA is considering something similar for the reconstruction of part of the Chinatown sidewalks in 2011.

Signs of the times

A few posts ago, the lighting store on Richmond in the heart of Westboro was featured. It is moving to Spruce Street. The Signman is also moving from its location opposite Loblaw's Real Cdn Superstore to Laurel Street.

There are few vacant storefronts on the western portion of the Somerset-West Wellie-Richmond Road strip, and more storefronts being constructed. The further east one goes, the more vacancies appear, for longer periods. As Westboro prices continue to climb, there will be adjustments in the retail market and eventually the condo market too.

Festival Dalhousie

This past weekend was a busy one in our west side neighborhoods. There were a number of festivals, parades, and cultural events.

It was Budda's birthday. Shown below is the float that was the key piece in the parade from the Buddist temple on Somerset Street (beside the Plant recreation centre):

The Vietnamese community held a fundraiser at the site of their proposed museum and cultural centre at the corner of Somerset and Preston, diagonally opposite the refugee memorial. I was particularly interested to note the proud wearing of the South Vietnam military uniforms by veterans of that war.

Cycling Progress

The Public Advisory Group for the proposed downtown-area segregated cycling track meet last night. It's a diverse group including 3 BIA's (Chinatown BIA, Somerset Village BIA, Bank St BIA), two community associations (DCA, CCA), cycling advocacy groups (Cycle Vision Ottawa, Citizens for Safe Cycling), politicians former and current, etc.

City planners unveiled the route choices and the criteria they used to narrow the list down to a smaller set of five leading options. They applied a numerical rating scheme to winnow the choices, which came in for a lot of discussion. The selection remains somewhat arbitrary and contestable.

The most remarkable thing about the two and half hour session was the dialogue between the various parties. Unlike some recent public meetings I have attended where the focus is on loud sound bites establishing positions, the discussion last night revealled that the cyclists understood business owners' concerns, the attendees could see the political minefield, there were some admissions from the BIA's that segregated cycling tracks might actually have some benefits for the downtown community and businesses.

Councillor Holmes emphasized that rather than the top scoring project being selected, it had to also satisfy all 3 key stakeholder groups (business, residents, cyclists), but her preference for putting the track on quiet residential streets parallel to the main streets like Somerset, met with determined opposition from cyclists who felt the track had to be where cyclists want to go. And cyclists want to go to the same places as motorists -- the main street.

A couple of key observations:

• the city's technical criteria were very tough, as it sought to minimize car displacement. But the downtown isn't exactly overflowing with spaces not already dedicated to some current use, especially the car. Something's gotta give.
• the city's criteria considered cyclists' desires only within the designated study area, and while they were aware that cyclists connect with adjacent areas, this was not measured. Obviously the Corktown Bridge over the canal and future Somerset bridge over the Rideau River to Overbrook were big on cyclists' minds.
• the criteria evaluation form was too complex to present at a public meeting, yet on closer examination by the PAC was found to be too simple and too easily contestable. In short, it would satisfy no one.
• all the top five route options use Somerset west of Bronson. This is a major problem for the Chinatown BIA as the street is the major parking supply and delivery area, and there are no nearby alternative parallel streets and residential streets are already overrun with cars. Suggested solution: limit the segregated track, from Percy/Bay to the Canal.
• the business of business is business, regardless of what mode the customer used to get to the business. Business owners have to move beyond car parking focus. I was surprised to hear a BIA rep complain that off street parking lots were being "lost" to condos. Does anyone contest that the condo delivers more customers than the parking lot ever could? Question: will a bike lane here deliver more customers than on-street parking does?
• I cannot imagine that the Merivale strip (or similar suburban strips) would be made atttractive to pedestrian shoppers or cyclist shoppers by improving the landscaping along Merivale. Face it: it is a car-oriented form of development. Downtown BIA's have to stop trying to provide more parking than the suburban big box lots -- it just cannot be done without destroying the very urban features of the downtown neighborhoods that attract residents in the first place. Downtown businesses have to get over thinking of themselves as "regional attractions" for suburbanites and focus on their real market. This includes tourists visiting the core, local residents, local businesses, etc. Merivale strip will never be a tourist destination; downtown shouldn't cater to cars.

I found myself wonder, where do business owners live? Too many that I know live in the suburbs while having their businesses in the central city. Thus they commute by business-expensed car. They live their evenings and weekends in a suburban lifestyle. It's not surprising then that they want convenient parking (preferably provided free, by the taxpayer) for their business, as that is how they structure their own lives. I wonder if business owners who live in the core, who walk to work, have the same mind-set that favours car shoppers and car parkers, or if they are more open to the benefits of wider sidewalks and improved cycling facilties as being the cheapest way to get more customers coming by their place of business?

If there was a consensus last night, it was that dialogue was good, the groups understood each other, that a rushed choice might well be a bad choice, and maybe it would be better to talk more and select the route mid-winter for install in spring 2011 rather than late fall 2010.

Note: for 20-some years I ran a storefront business. Only a tiny portion of my customers came by car. But 99% of comments about location came from car drivers. I think in many ways its like the weather: people seek safe topics for small talk, chit chat, and "isn't parking awful" is a safe, seldom-contested tongue flapper. Downtown businesses need accurate data about who shops and what the future can be. They have to ignore the "noise" about parking and focus on improving business. Businesses fail all the time, for a variety of reasons. During construction, it is easy to blame the road work. Post bike track, it will be easy to blame the cyclists.But mostly businesses fail because the owner misjudges the market. Correlation to road work, or cycling tracks, is not causation.

Flower Power

The Dalhousie Community Assoc. installed and maintains the garden in front of the Dalhousie Community Centre (shown in the background) on Somerset street (thanks to Ida the gardener!)

There is a constant stream of people passing the garden who pause to admire it. It brings a smile to so many people. Flower power builds communities.

When the photographer turned around, she saw me taking a picture of her taking a picture. When I turned, I saw her friends taking a picture of me taking a picture of her. This is what we saw:

The tulip festival in Ottawa starts today.

The friendly streets of west side Ottawa

Outside this never-quite-finished rona-vating house, an impromtu living room has appeared on the city boulevard. Your seating choice: floral sofa ... or mod leather armchair? Or mid-century modern plastic chairs set out especially for Robert? The pink carpet marks the residents as breast-cancer savy. There are even coffee tables for your ... coffee, sometimes served in unique stubby brown glass cups.

I love it, if only because it would never work in Orleans or Barrhaven. Now, to wander down one block . . .

In contrast to the informal sidewalk enhancement on Cambridge, is this corner lot at Somerset/Bell. The manufactured stone blends in reasonably well with the limestone foundation of the old building. Lots of materials here: limestone, fake stone, tile doorstep, mod brick commercial front on an old painted and unpainted brick house.  The garden plants are very new and I hope they will fill in. Perennials or shrubs would have been better though, as they provide four season planting. Still, its a good step toward making Somerset Street sidewalks nicer.

Reclaiming the corner

Do you recognize the above corner? If you are a west side pedestrian or cyclist, or maybe a No 2 bus user, the likely answer is yes (motorists should not recognize it -- your eyes are supposed to be on the road!). It's at the corner of Bayswater and Somerset, northwest side, where Bayswater starts to suddenly go downhill (elevation speaking, not quality wise).

Behind the green picket fence is an amazing ever-changing collection of . . . stuff. Gnomes, flower pots, a yapping dog that escorts pedestrians past the fence, a patio ... all seem to me to made from recycled materials. People after my own heart. I think the garden is a loveable element of spontaneous urban form, the diversity that keeps neighborhoods interesting.

All the garden is apparently on city property.

Somerset, and the section of Bayswater abutting this property, is being rebuilt this summer. Wider sidewalks, landscaping, decorative lighting, all those good things that make neighborhood main streets much better for residents and businesses.

At corners, the style of streetscaping being employed along Somerset extends the sidewalks and paved areas w-a-y back to the property line, and sometimes beyond. The result is roomy corners for pedestrians, improved sight lines for motorists (opening up the corner triangle, in traffic engineer speak), and changed landscaping at the corners. A typical corner might look more like this:

The city's policy for the Bayswater / Somerset corner was stated to me as "In regards to the corner, the City’s policy and practice is to reclaim public space within the right-of-way for public purposes, and eliminate unlawful encroachments". The drawing for this corner is shown below (the house and corner in question is toward the top right of the intersection):

I find myself somewhat torn about this corner. While interesting now, it could become a parking space or other unattractive use with another resident. In which case, I favour reclaiming it and landscaping it as a public space that will somewhat permanently set its format and use in concrete and official plantings. On the other hand, some of the corners already installed along Somerset/West Wellie seem to me to be rather too large, and this dynamic patio/garden is much more interesting.

It is a trade-off of the spontaneous vs the planned, the resident vs the corporate city, public space vs private space. Where do other west side readers stand on this?

Candelabra lighting for Somerset?

Noticed these candelabra in storage at the government warehouse at 1010 Somerset Street, the putative parole office now used as a stone cemetery and for architectural salvage.

While they are likely hiding out during stone work renovations on parliament hill, I thought they might make interesting pedestrian light fixtures on the soon-to-be streetscaped Somerset Street out front of this warehouse.

Chinatown Arch gets own blog

Last week saw the official groundbreaking ceremony for the new Chinatown royal arch. In the photo above, Grace Xin of the Chinatown BIA puts incense into a holder. From left to right, Senator Vivian Po, John Baird, Bob Chiarelli, Yasir Naqvi, Chinese Ambassador, Councilors Holmes and Wilkinson.

Shown below are two of the first concrete castings made for the arch. The casting yard is on Cambridge, behind the Yangtze.

Stone lions, to guard the base of the arch, from China.

As a lot will be happening at this gateway site, I have set up a separate blog site to follow the Arch: http://www.ottawachinatownroyalarch.blogspot.com/. It has a RSS button at the top of its page, so you can elect to have the new posts sent directly to you.

I anticipate there will be only one or two posts per week. At quiet times, there will be picture posts of arches in other world cities. I have found about 20 such pictures thus far.

You are unlikely to ever experience another royal arch construction in your lifetime, so be sure to pop over to Chinatown to inspect the progress, and follow the blog postings when you cannot be there. If you send me photos, I will try to use them: mailto:EricDarwin1@gmail%20(dot)%20com.

Chinatown arch

Preparatory work is well underway for the Chinatown Arch. The Ottawa Hydro trucks shown here have been working all week to relocate the wiring on the south side of Somerset between Cambridge and Bronson. The Chinatown arch groundbreaking will be in two weeks and the unaesthetic wiring needs to be out of the way. The cost of removing the wiring ... not cheap!... is being borne by the Chinatown BIA.

Public Gardening

These crocuses are blooming in the garden in front of the Plant Recreation Centre at the corner of Somerset and Preston Streets.

The lovely garden at the corner was built, planted, and is maintained by community volunteers. It is on city-owned land. It illustrates the power of volunteer community action.

Personally, I feel the City tries to do too much -- too much of what I don't want, and not enough of what I do want. And too much of what it shouldn't be doing could be done perfectly well by others. Can you image the tax load if the city had to plan, implement, maintain (inventory each plant on a database??) the three public gardens along these few blocks of Somerset? Instead, some cooperation (letting gardeners garden), a few resources (some grant money to get some of the gardens started), and ongoing support limited to the occasional linking up to a city tap ... yields great results.

Somerset, old and new

This photo is from the 1950's, looking west along Somerset. The road rises up on the viaduct to cross the CPR tracks. Lots of industrial land uses are visible in the distance. The residences in the foreground have abundant tree shade and shelter from the "busy" street. The Plant Pool is out of sight on the immediate left of the picture.

Somerset reconstruction zone expanded

The City and consultants held a well-attended (approx 125 persons) open house for the Somerset reconstruction project last week. The zone of reconstruction was from Bayswater (in the west)(which is where reconstruction left off last summer) up and over the viaduct over the Otrain, to Preston street.

 The above section of street was scheduled for this year, 2010. Then next year, the reconstruction process would move up Somerset, from Preston to Booth. These two long blocks will be finished in a new Chinatown look in 2011.

However, the Chinatown Arch (artists impression shown) is being constructed a few blocks further east in 2010, and some roadworks are required to accomodate that. So this week the city added in the block from Cambridge to Bronson to the 2010 streetscaping project. So residents will get one additional block of widened sidewalks, new streetlighting including ped lights, and trees. Great stuff! 

If you missed the Somerset streetscaping unveiling, you have an additional opportunity to see the plans, and those of other neighborhood projects, at the Dalhousie AGM being held at the Dal Centre (corner of Empress and Somerset) at 7pm April 13th. Please mark your calendars and drop in.