Ottawa
ON
Canada
Heritage Ottawa’s 2014 Walking Tours: Join Heritage Ottawa’s experienced tour guides for walks highlighting some of Ottawa’s finest architecture. The tours last one hour and a half, rain or shine. No reservations required.
Rideau Canal
August 3, 2:00 PM – MEET: Bytown Museum (under Parliament Hill)
From the Bytown Museum to the Corktown Bridge, a look at the nearly 200-year old canal and the architecture and engineering of buildings and bridges from many historic periods and architectural styles, along the first mile of this UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Guide: David Jeanes, urban activist and author of five downtown heritage tours.
Colonel By Day
Mon. August 4
http://www.journeecolonelbyday.ca
Parliament Hill: An Archaeological Tour
August 10, 2:00 pm – MEET: Queen Elizabeth statue on the east side of the Centre Block
This tour, held in conjunction with Archeology Month, will highlight some of the many archaeological investigations that have been undertaken over the past 20 years on Parliament and West Parliament Hill, documenting its continued use over the past 175 years. It is anticipated that the tour will take about two hours.
GUIDE: Hugh Daechsel, Senior Archaeologist, Golder Inc.
Park and Parkway: Rambling through a “Design” District
August 17, 2 pm – MEET: LCBO parking lot on Bank Street near Clemow
A little over a century ago, the Ottawa Improvement Commission built a landscaped scenic parkway that extended through the north end of the Glebe from the Rideau Canal to Bronson Avenue. Leading Canadian architects were commissioned to design grand-looking homes, detailed house and landscape design rules were formalized, and street design features were implemented. The area advertised as Clemora Park immediately became one of Ottawa’s most scenic and desirable residential areas, home to leading local and national politicians, businessmen, doctors, and civil servants.
GUIDE: Andrew Elliott, webmaster for Heritage Ottawa, archivist at Library and Archives Canada; additional interpretation from Lynn Armstrong, landscape architecture historian, heritage activist. Both are Glebe residents.
New Edinburgh
August 24, 2:00 pm – MEET: Fraser Schoolhouse, 62 John Street, near Sussex
New Edinburgh, a mill-town founded in 1832, is one of Canada’s earliest planned communities and still presents a largely 19th-century face to the world. The tour will look at the industrial roots of the town, will introduce some early inhabitants and show how the community evolved over time.
GUIDE: Janet Uren will lead the tour, but she worked with Katherine Arkay to develop the content. Both are owners of designated heritage houses in New Edinburgh.
Village of Hintonburg
September 7, 2:00 PM – MEET: St-François d’Assise Church, 20 Fairmont Avenue.
Named for Joseph Hinton, a shopkeeper and civic official, the village of Hintonburg was incorporated in 1893. The tour will take you through the heart of this interesting, eclectic and socially varied neighbourhood, rich in heritage.
GUIDES: Linda Hoad and Paulette Dozois, community leaders.
Old Ottawa South
September 14, 2:00 pm. – MEET: Southminster United Church, 15 Aylmer Avenue
In 1907, Nepean Township villages such as Ottawa South were annexed to the City of Ottawa. Improved city services soon followed, such as a new high level Bank Street Bridge over the canal. It allowed the privately-owned Ottawa Electric Railway to extend streetcar services, stimulating housing and development of one of Ottawa’s first streetcar suburbs.
GUIDES: Julie Harris and Kathy Krywicki, who wrote the book Exploring the Built Heritage of Old Ottawa South.”
Sandy Hill
September 21, 2:00 pm – MEET: Laurier House, 335 Laurier Avenue East at Chapel Street
The tour looks at late nineteenth – early twentieth-century buildings of historical or architectural importance in the northeast quadrant of Sandy Hill, an area favoured by lumber barons, mining magnates and politicians in Ottawa’s early years. Sandy Hill was home to four Canadian Prime Ministers.
GUIDE: Judy Deegan, Sandy Hill resident and heritage activist.
Lindenlea
September 28, 2:00 pm– MEET: Outside the Lindenlea Community Centre, 15 Rockcliffe Way at Ridgeway
A fascinating stroll through a post-World War I planned community – a marvel of social engineering that was featured on the Governor General’s Christmas card. Pocket-sized Lindenlea promised returning veterans subsidized housing in a community designed by one of the mega-stars of European urban planning. Learn about the struggles over style, designing to suit liberated women, efforts at ecological soundness, and more than one scandal. Threats today face this historic gem.
GUIDE: Jennifer Rosebrugh, former Heritage Ottawa president and Lindenlea resident.
Briarcliffe
October 5, 2:00 pm – MEET: Combermere Park, 11 Combermere Lane in Rothwell Heights (parking area adjacent to tennis courts)
Briarcliffe is Ottawa’s newest Heritage Conservation District, and the first in Canada to recognize mid-20th Century modern architecture. This enclave of 23 unique homes began in 1959, when partners sharing modernist ideals of living in harmony with nature purchased 20 acres of rocky, topographically challenging land near the Ottawa River. Progressive architects of the day designed experimental homes in keeping with design covenants established to ensure visual cohesion of the neighbourhood and preservation of its spectacular natural landscape.
Steep roads; flat walking shoes recommended.
GUIDE: Danielle Jones is an artist and designer, modernist architecture buff and Briarcliffe resident.
