{"id":339,"date":"2022-11-18T17:47:14","date_gmt":"2022-11-18T22:47:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cusjc.ca\/reloading\/?p=339"},"modified":"2022-11-25T18:54:52","modified_gmt":"2022-11-25T23:54:52","slug":"what-is-the-future-of-ottawas-downtown","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cusjc.ca\/reloading\/2022\/11\/18\/what-is-the-future-of-ottawas-downtown\/","title":{"rendered":"What is the future of Ottawa’s downtown?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By: Nathan Fung<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cafe Deluxe on Laurier Street is surrounded on all sides by towering office complexes. The coffee shop is on the ground floor of Centennial Towers, a 15-storey office building covered with mirror-like glass.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The restaurant has been at its current location for a year, but it\u2019s been serving the downtown area for 21 years. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Brendan Mears, the business\u2019s co-owner, says he estimates around half of the businesses in downtown Ottawa have permanently closed shop. These businesses include dry cleaners, tailors, shoe repair shops, cafes and restaurants.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s been devastating for the area,\u201d he said. \u201cWe\u2019re very fortunate that we\u2019re still in business. Many of our neighbours sadly are not. We\u2019re just grateful we were able to survive.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Data from Statistics Canada in April shows that 45.8 per cent of Ottawa workers work from home compared to the national average of 26.1 per cent. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Some blame this high rate of remote work for the slow-down in the core\u2019s economy. Others are advocating rethinking how the government city\u2019s downtown works.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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According to Statistics Canada, the Ottawa area has one of the highest percentages of people working remotely compared to other Canadian cities. (Nathan Fung\/Reloading News)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Stakeholders and politicians in Ottawa are grappling with ways to revitalize the downtown area because the nine-to-five commuters that many local businesses depend on continue to work remotely. Some of the ideas on the table include converting office spaces to housing and pivoting businesses to serve residents instead of commuters. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In July, Ottawa Centre MP Yasir Naqvi unveiled the Downtown Ottawa Revitalization Task Force. The 13-member task force includes Christine Leadman, executive director of the Bank Street Business Improvement Area, as well as Ariel Troster, the newly-elected councillor for Somerset ward. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cOur focus as a task force is to look at ideas, look at solutions, that will bring people to the downtown to work, to live and to visit,\u201d Naqvi said Friday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Naqvi said the task force isn\u2019t working with a deadline in mind but has been meeting regularly. He said he hopes to be able to come up with ideas that could feed into the City of Ottawa\u2019s budget next year, and for the federal government\u2019s budget process should additional funding be needed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cDowntown is for everyone,\u201d Naqvi said. \u201cWe\u2019re a capital city of a G7 country. Anyone who comes to Ottawa will come to our downtown core. The seat of our democracy is located in the downtown core.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Returning to the office<\/h3>\n\n\n\n
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Stakeholders are concerned about less foot traffic in the city’s core. (Nathan Fung\/Reloading News)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The Canadian Board of Commerce, along with 31 other business associations, including the Ottawa Board of Trade, signed a letter<\/a> in October urging the federal government to bring their employees back to the office as rapidly as possible.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The letter said the federal government should lead the way in getting workers to return to offices so that others would do the same.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe federal government is not only a major employer in cities and communities across Canada, but in many places it is the anchor employer,\u201d the letter said. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAs businesses in these communities assess their long-term viability given the pandemic\u2019s damaging effects on downtown centres, restoring normal economic activity requires the federal government to act now.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But Leadman said they don’t see the return of office workers to the downtown core as a viable solution.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe can\u2019t be looking over our shoulder expecting the past to reappear again,\u201d Leadman said. \u201cYou can\u2019t move forward if you\u2019re always looking back.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

 In a separate interview, Troster echoed Leadman.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI don\u2019t believe we should force people to come downtown,\u201d she said. \u201cWe should have them want to come downtown because there’s great places to eat, fabulous spaces to hang out in, a great cycling network, and their friends and family live there.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Cafe Deluxe on Laurier Street remains open, but co-owner Brendan Mears says all around him, \u201cyou\u2019ll see vacancies at the bottom of every building.\u201d (Nathan Fung\/Reloading News)
<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Pivoting to residents <\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Cafe Deluxe\u2019s clientele used to largely consist of corporate clients downtown. But when the streets were emptied of workers, the coffee shop had to pivot the business to cater to residents instead, he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe definitely had to shift that focus because there was absolutely nobody downtown,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Troster said many of the businesses that stayed open through the pandemic had to learn to pivot to serve residents instead of commuters. An example of this, she said, is City Goose, a newer restaurant that opened on Bank Street by Flora Street a month after the pandemic started. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The restaurant created a new brand for its Uber Eats persona to appeal to Ottawans during the pandemic. Rather than using the name City Goose, the restaurant goes by Pizza Nerds on the mobile food delivery app. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s confusing. It\u2019s a little odd. It\u2019s probably not the smartest. But neither are we!\u201d the restaurant\u2019s website said. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Troster said she hopes more businesses learn to pivot in the same way City Goose did with Pizza Nerds. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Quality of life in the core<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Another thing Troster said she wants to see moving forward is a focus on building more affordable housing in the area. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Some ideas for increasing the accessibility of affordable housing are to convert unused office space into residential space and tap into the federal government\u2019s rapid housing initiative for funding.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While these ideas present opportunities for the downtown core, Troster and Leadman said they recognize the challenges that come with converting spaces from commercial to residential. One challenge, for example, is the difference in building standards between the two. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In addition to increasing the number of affordable housing units, Troster said improvements to public spaces in the area would make the city core more dynamic. She said Somerset Ward has the least amount of tree coverage compared to the rest of the city, which is another factor that contributes to the quality of life for residents in the core.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

No silver bullet<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

While Mears, the co-owner of Cafe Deluxe, said the pandemic has been devastating for downtown Ottawa, he\u2019s seen a surge in business in the last three to four months. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

He attributed this to the smaller number of cafes and restaurants that serve the community, and the partial return of workers to the office, even if it\u2019s just a few days a week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Mears said he doesn\u2019t know if forcing people back into the office is the answer, or if converting office space into residential space offers a solution. But he said he would like to see more people return to the core.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI don’t know if there’s a silver bullet answer to that,\u201d he said. \u201cIf we\u2019d like to be a more vibrant downtown city or even a city as a whole, I think it\u2019s important to have a lively core.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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