Ottawa’s original grand downtown train station under consideration for city’s high speed rail hub
Ottawa’s historic former downtown train station, now the Senate’s temporary home, is under consideration to be an urban hub as officials plan for Canada’s first high-speed rail line.
Alto, the government body leading the proposed megaproject, launched consultations this week that include a map of the proposed route from Toronto through Ottawa and Montreal and ending in Quebec City.
Ottawa’s original downtown Union Station, which opened in 1912, and the current Via Rail station, located southeast of the downtown, are both included as possible locations for the capital’s high-speed terminus.
Alto CEO Martin Imbleau is on a speaking tour to promote the project, which, if it proceeds, would begin with construction of the Montreal-Ottawa link.
Lire la suite
After a Jan. 12 presentation at the Ottawa Board of Trade, he told The Globe and Mail that both buildings are under consideration, along with other downtown locations, and will be evaluated according to multiple criteria.
“It needs to be feasible, it needs to be fast,” he said. “Your journey time has to be reduced significantly. So, you don’t position your station because it’s a tourist attraction. The one key location factor is ensuring that your journey time is as short as possible to reach your destination.”
Many civic boosters have complained for years about the relative inconvenience of the current train station, which is four stops from downtown on the city’s light-rail public-transportation system. The prospect of intercity train service returning to downtown Ottawa is seen as a way to help revitalize a core that has been hard-hit by a slow return to the office by government workers after the height of the pandemic.
“We would love it to be downtown,” said Sueling Ching, chief executive officer of the Ottawa Board of Trade, in an interview. “It would create a whole new sense of vibrancy” and “catalyze the downtown.”
Ottawa Mayor Mark Sutcliffe called Alto an exciting project with potential to “make this part of the country smaller in a good way, and more connected.”
While he said in an interview that he was open to where the station could be located, he said a downtown location would be very appealing.
“Absolutely, the opportunity for that building, right in the heart of downtown Ottawa, to be a hub of some kind is huge,” he said, recalling how his own father arrived in Ottawa 60 years ago at Union Station, travelling from New York City after emigrating from England.
The columned Grand Beaux-Arts-style Union Station is located alongside the Rideau Canal and within easy walking distance to the National Arts Centre, the Parliament buildings and Byward Market. It’s across the street from the city’s Chateau Laurier hotel, the city’s main conference centre and the Rideau Centre shopping mall.
But 60 years have passed since the last train left the station. Passenger service was relocated to the present, open glass and steel station in 1966.
That move was part of a mid-century project from French urban planner and architect Jacques Gréber that transformed the city’s look and layout. The plan, commissioned by the government of then-prime minister Mackenzie King, was meant to beautify the Capital. It replaced rail lines with urban arteries, highways, parkways and green spaces.
While Ottawa lost its downtown train service it allowed for the transformation of the eastern flank of the Rideau Canal from a gritty railbed into the scenic Colonel By Drive and accompanying pathway.
For decades, the old station was underused but served as a government conference centre for key gatherings. It was the site of 1981 meetings that led to the repatriation of the Constitution and, in 1990, failed talks to save the Meech Lake Accord.
It played host to the first G20 conference after the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks on the U.S., and has recently been renovated to house the Senate Chamber while Parliament’s Centre Block is being renovated.
“The building is stunning and it has some architectural integrity that would give it an enormous amount of cachet,” said Ross Meredith, general manager of the Westin Ottawa hotel facing the station, adding that he doesn’t know if the building meets what would be required.
The prospect of intercity train service returning to downtown Ottawa could help revitalize a core that has been hard-hit in recent years.BLAIR GABLE
“But logically there is some history there that suggests it could be a stunningly beautiful place.”
Valérie Dufour, a spokesperson for the National Capital Commission, which manages the Rideau Canal and the areas around it, said in an e-mail that the agency is “excited by the ambition” of the project and is open to collaborating with Alto, but did not comment directly on the potential use of the downtown station.
The consultation and design process will lead to a final decision by the government, expected in 2029, on whether to fund the project. Ottawa has already approved billions in funding for planning work. If approved, construction could begin that year and the first segment would open around 2037.
Alto has said that the total project may cost $60-billion to $90-billion and could be partly funded by private investors.
The new map of the proposed line is similar to past versions, except for the Peterborough-to-Ottawa segment, which shows two options: one that follows a more northern route across the Canadian Shield, and another further south.
Alto spokesman Benoit Bourdeau said the northern option would cut through harder rock formations that could affect construction and cost. The southern option avoids some of that terrain but would be longer and add to travel times.
Mr. Imbleau has also declined to say whether the line would stop at Toronto’s Union Station. “The objective would be to have a station in the vicinity of Union Station,” he recently told a Senate committee.
The latest map suggests there will be stations in suburban Laval, north of the Island of Montreal, as well as downtown Montreal, but the precise locations are not indicated.
The Senate of Canada building, and former train station, in Ottawa on Friday. BLAIR GABLE/THE GLOBE AND MAIL
The prospect of intercity train service returning to downtown Ottawa could help revitalize a core that has been hard-hit in recent years. BLAIR GABLE
11 Likes
C’est où exactement?
Oh j’ai trouvé par contre il faudrait un autre tunnel…
2 Likes
Exact. Dans l’axe de la promenade Colonel By, le long du canal Rideau.
Pour ceux qui se demandent, on parle de ce batiment.
2 Likes
Ca peut pas être plus downtown Ottawa que cela c’est juste en face du chateau Laurier. C’était relier a Hull a l’époque par le pont Alexandra pour aller en direction de Montreal par la rive nord.
O-Train line 1 had a tunnel collapse not 500m from the Senate of Canada building. It’d be of the utmost foolishness to try to tunnel under Ottawa again for HSR when the VIA rail station is so well situated.
3 Likes
Les voies ferrées étaient elles souterraines ou c’est juste le tissu urbain qui a recouvert le tout avec le temps (comme à Montréal autour de la gare centrale)?
En même temps, ça serait magnifique. S’il y avait la possibilité de faire revivre la gare Windsor ou Viger à Montréal, cela serait formidable aussi. Je comprends que les sous-sols sont très encombrés et qu’il y a déjà un gros projet immobilier pour Viger aussi.
Le transfert de l’Eurostar de Waterloo à St. Pancras a complètement redonné un nouvel âge d’or à cette dernière. Pas mal certain, qu’elle n’était pas aussi prestigieuse à son inauguration en 1868.
Après tout, Ottawa est la capitale fédérale. Je ne serais pas choqué qu’elle se dote d’une gare prestigieuse qui deviendrait une vitrine pour l’international aussi.
2 Likes
Non, ça n’y serait pas. Le gare Viger est, à un moindre dégrée, Windsor sont les deux mal placés en termes de connexions aux autres transports par rapport aux alternatives (Gare Centrale et Berri-UQAM).
Le gare actuelle est un des meilleures exemples au Canada de l’architecture moderniste et sert facilement comme gare prestigieux, sans la risque de tuer les travailleurs en creusant dans les sols molles pour créer les platformes.
Ah super! Merci @Rotax
2 Likes
Je ne dirais pas que la gare Windsor est mal-placée, la station Bonaventure étant positionnée à mi-chemin entre les deux gares importantes de son époque. La connexion avec le métro est même plus directe qu’à la Gare Centrale, quoiqu’une correspondance vers le REM se ferait clairement mieux à la Gare Centrale. Berri-UQAM n’est pas une option, si on se fie aux informations publiées par Alto.
Complement d’accord. Je crois que c’est aussi le seul vestige intact de l’ère moderniste du réseau ferroviaire canadien.
10 Likes
La gare d’Ottawa serait tellement une meilleure option rapport qualité/prix comparativement à l’édifide du Sénat, il faudrait complétement refaire la bordure du canal et les configurations routières du secteur, en plus d’un tunnel
2 Likes
A l’époque de l’ancienne gare d’Ottawa les voies vers le nord pour aller rejoindre le pont alexandra passaient sous une section du Chateau Laurier.
Une situation similaire a Madrid avec l’autoroute M30 qui passait sous une section du Stade Vincente Calderon
1 Like
L’alignement des voies est visible sur cette photo de 1928 et le portail au nord du Château Laurier semble toujours être là, condamné.
8 Likes
Le chateau Laurier et l’ancienne gare Union ont été construit en même temps par le railway Grand Trunk en 1910 pour le chateau Laurier et 1912 pour la gare.
Le pont Alexandra a été inauguré avant en 1900.
2 Likes
Comme on peut voir sous la photo les rails passaient en bordure du Chateau Laurier et du canal Rideau. Sous un genre d’extension couverte. Et continuaient en passant sous le pont pour aller rejoindre la gare de l’autre côté.
Il y a même un tunnel piétonnier qui passe sous la rue pour relier les deux édifices.
7 Likes
Vu sur Reddit
https://www.reddit.com/r/AltoHSR_Canada/s/Ferq1K5p32
2 Likes
These are really, really high viaducts which are generally more expensive…
Thought with the current state of the O-train I don’t blame people.
1 Like