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New Edinburgh News
FEBRUARY 2006
Beechwood Community Design Plan – Last
Meeting
The Beechwood study is intended to guide planning and
transportation decisions over the next decade. Residents of New
Edinburgh have an interest in Beechwood as a transportation
corridor as well as a community-shopping destination. A final
public meeting was held at MacKay United Church on January 19th,
2006. The evening focussed on the transportation aspects of the
corridor and on issues of parking in adjacent residential areas,
both as they currently exist and what they could be, assuming the
growth that can be expected over the next ten years. The analysis
included estimates of additional traffic contributions over and
above the overall annual growth in the corridor resulting from
known redevelopments on the horizon - i.e. the Claridge/Landry
site (the former Dominion Bridge site in the Vanier area) and the
Canadian Forces Base Rockcliffe site east of Manor Park. The
evening included a computer-generated visualization of all traffic
modes in the corridor. Some 55 attended, largely from New
Edinburgh, the former Vanier, and surrounding communities as well
as representatives of businesses in the corridor. They received a
presentation by the transportation consultant hired by the City,
Mr. Henry Zygowski of National Capital Engineering, and by Mr. Don
Morse, from the City’s planning Department, who spoke about
parking issues related to future growth. These presentations were
followed by a Q&A session moderated by yours truly. After
collating all of the comments and concerns, City staff will now
prepare a draft report to be presented to the steering committee
for this project. It is expected that the final report will be
considered by Planning & Environment Committee sometime in April.
Anyone wishing to be notified of that date should contact
Françoise Jessop, the Program Manager in charge, at 580-2424 ext.
13862 or by e-mail at
Francoise.Jessop@ottawa.ca . A summary of the project as well
as comments received from the community during various public
consultations and ongoing updates can be found on the City’s web
site at
http://www.ottawa.ca/public_consult/beechwood/index_en.shtml .
C.F.B. Rockcliffe – Things Are Finally Moving Along
Many of you will have seen the extensive series of articles in the
Ottawa Citizen concerning this site. In November, following over
ten years of uncertainty, Treasury Board finally gave its approval
for the site to be sold. The Canada Lands Company (CLC) is the
crown agency that will be charged with proposing new uses for the
336 acres. The Minister, through whom CLC reported to parliament
at the time, had made it known that the government wished that
this redevelopment be a model of sustainability in the urban
milieu. The President of CLC, Mr. Jim Lynes, shares this view. CLC
has stated that they will be working closely with City planners
and the community as the vision, which will ultimately be codified
in zoning and design regulations, is evolved.
The City has a progressive new Official Plan (OP). It will be the
task of City planners, elected representatives and Ottawa’s
citizenry, especially the communities located closest to the site,
to use the guideposts provided by that OP to ensure that the CLC
is held to its stated intent.
I believe that this new community could be a model for urban
renewal and of sustainable development elsewhere in Ottawa and
across the country. As Ward Councillor, it is my intent to work
hard to ensure that the resulting development is one that will be
embraced by its future inhabitants and workers as well as being a
good fit for the surrounding existing communities and a healthy
additional chapter in Ottawa’s story.
Crime Prevention Ottawa – A Progress Report
Residents may remember that, during the 2005 budget, I managed to
persuade Council to fund the creation of a new agency focussed
entirely on preventing crime. A copy of the report, which Council
considered when it approved this approach, can be found at
www.rideau-rockcliffe.com . This agency would be expected to
focus existing community organizations, City departments and all
available resources on particular identified problems, develop a
concerted strategy with the stakeholders and ensure that progress
was monitored and results measured. Since that budget approval, a
Board of Directors has been named and 2 City staff members have
been seconded and are now working fulltime for the organization to
be named “Crime Prevention Ottawa”. A Board-level ’planning
retreat’ was held in mid-October as a result of which it was
decided that the organization would begin its work by actively
seeking the collaboration and advice of any and all community
partners that could possibly contribute ideas and resources to
making Ottawa a safer place by addressing the root causes of crime
in our society. The mechanism for this outreach will be a ‘forum’
currently scheduled for April 7th, 2006. Crime Prevention Ottawa
has already succeeded in obtaining financial assistance from the
federal government’s National Crime Prevention Centre towards this
goal. In December, Council approved Crime Prevention Ottawa’s
budget for the coming year.
Season's Greetings
I take this opportunity, on behalf of my family and myself, to
extend to all Best Wishes for Health, Prosperity and Personal
Serenity in 2006.
Meilleurs vœux
Je profite de cette occasion pour vous souhaiter mes meilleurs
vœux pour une année de santé, prospérité et sérénité.
Jacques Legendre
Councillor, Rideau-Rockcliffe
You can communicate with me at (please include a telephone
number):
City of Ottawa
110 Laurier Avenue West
Ottawa ON K1P 1J1
Tel: 580-2483, Fax: 580-2523
E-mail:
jacques.legendre@ottawa.ca
Web Site:
www.rideau-rockcliffe.com
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