East Ottawa Star
Published: Friday, May 29, 2009 New development creates vibrancy As I drove home in pain from last Sunday’s half-marathon – yes the Kenyans and Ethiopians kicked my butt – I took a bit of a detour along Jeanne d’Arc north of the 174 to scout out a few locations. While we are still a bedroom community that mostly commutes westward to the downtown core each morning, there are encouraging signs of life that show that mixed use and commercial development is getting a better foothold in our area. Especially along the 174 and St. Joseph corridor, which is a welcome counterbalance – or complement, depending on your perspective – to the just-add-concrete-and-pour proliferation of big-box retail along Innes Road. To start, we have the “lonely” Minto site on the southwest corner of Jeanne d’Arc and Champlain. This land is already zoned and perfectly suited for our new health hub/polyclinic. It could serve our entire community given its proximity to Place d’Orléans and ease of access by highway, road and public transit. Indeed the community spoke clearly a few years back to this site as a preferred location for the health hub. And the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care, Montfort Hospital and other stakeholders must be close to making a site decision given former Health Minister Smitherman’s site study announcement in our community one year ago. My post-race journey then took me to the old Cumberland City Hall, (aka the Orléans Client Service Centre). The Shenkman Arts Centre is up and landscaping and debris removal around the site is proceeding with a first opening slated for next month. It will serve as a vibrant hub not only for our rich arts community, but for corporate and community functions as well. More importantly it is a testament to what our community can do when we all put a little water in or wine and focus on a clear and single goal. Back in October 2002, 58 community organizations, including the arts, business, language and faith groups, sports organizations, and environmental activists, all came together to lobby for the inclusion of an east-end arts facility as the anchor to spur local economic development under the Equality East banner. Through dogged efforts in less than 100 days, we succeeded in getting this facility as a Top 5 priority project in the 2005 tranche of the city’s capital budget. Four years later, the building nears completion. And it is the first of several projects such as new office space, retail shops and condominium housing. Then we have the construction of the Best Western hotel a little further east beside the police station, which will no doubt be used by local businesses and visiting sports and arts groups alike. It’s not the Ritz, but it’s a start. This detour I took speaks to the growing vibrancy of Orléans and what we can achieve – warning, cliché alert – when we work together and travail ensemble. Now where did I leave those Epsom salts and the number for my massage therapist? = = = = = Comments can be sent to Walter Robinson at orleansouttakes@transcontinental.ca. |