Got a bike lane or sidewalk you dream about? Committee endorses list of planned active transportation projects
If approved by council, the projects would take more than two decades to implement at existing funding levels, with an estimated price tag of $350 million
Taylor Blewett, Ottawa Citizen
Published Apr 18, 2023 • Last updated 5 hours ago • 5 minute read
From new sidewalks to additional bike lanes, a list of nearly 250 projects that could bulk up Ottawa’s active transportation network has been endorsed by a city hall committee.
If approved by council, the projects would take more than two decades to implement at existing funding levels, with an estimated price tag of $350 million. Staff aren’t asking for any more money at this point, but say they’ll be looking for additional funding to speed up the progress through the list, including from other levels of government.
It’s just one element of a massive strategic undertaking at city hall called the transportation master plan (TMP), which is being updated in two parts from the version approved back in 2013.
Over the past decade, the city has seen massive changes to the ways residents move around – from the introduction of light rail, then the shift to working from home amid the pandemic – as well as a new policy focus at city hall on climate change and active transportation. The city’s development-focused official plan, which the TMP supports, is now aiming for half of all trips by 2046 to be made by walking, cycling, transit or via carpool, bundled together as “sustainable” transportation modes.
“I think it’s hard to say whether or not we’ll reach that, but I think the policies that in front of us set us certainly in the right direction,” Stittsville Coun. Glen Gower remarked at transportation committee Monday. “And if we want it to happen faster, then it’s up to us to fund it.”
The active transportation projects on the committee-backed list are misfits, of sorts, that aren’t planned for delivery through other mechanisms, like larger road-building or resurfacing projects. On the biking side, those other delivery avenues account for the bulk of the city’s planned cycling facilities through to 2046, adding 420 kilometres on top of the 1,080 kms that exist today. This list of standalone active transportation projects would add another 130 kms, mostly through small-scale projects with budgets between $500,000 and $3 million.
They came together through public engagement on “missing links” in the active transportation network – more than 1,000 residents dropped virtual pins on a map to indicate these – as well as through councillor input on highest-priority projects in their wards, and a city-wide review with consultants of walking and cycling networks. Connectivity to key destinations was a guiding factor as staff compiled the list, published in final form five weeks ago, but they also considered the potential to improve safety and comfort from what exists today, the availability of alternative routes, and project cost.
A draft project list was shared with the public for a final consultation round in late 2021 and early 2022, generating roughly 3,500 individual responses to a survey. The most participation came from postal codes K2H (Nepean neighbourhoods west of Greenbank Road, including Bells Corners and Crystal Bay), K2S (Stittsville) and K1S (the Glebe/Old Ottawa South and East).
Asked to indicate the proposed projects most important to them, the top choices on the pedestrian side were a pathway along Slidell Street (at Bayview Yards) from the Ottawa River Pathway to Bayview Station, and a pedestrian crossing on the Queen Elizabeth Driveway at Argyle Avenue. On the cycling side, the big winner was a separated cycling facilities project along Wellington Street from Sussex Drive to the Portage Bridge, followed by improvements along Moodie Drive in Bells Corners. All remained on the list presented to committee Monday.
Many of the 244 projects that made the cut are ready to move to planning and design, but roughly 50 are just feasibility studies described by staff as having “a high degree of risk or unknown.” Funding and implementation are by no means guaranteed, but this category of project “will assess solutions to important but challenging missing links,” staff wrote in their report to the committee. The most popular of these, for the 2022 survey participants, was a study of adding cycling facilities on Gladstone Avenue from the O-Train Pathway to Percy Street.
Some councillors were pleased with what’s in the long-term works for their respective constituencies. Knoxdale-Merivale’s Sean Devine said the listed projects are “word-for-word what I’m hearing from residents today,” about needed improvements in his ward.
But others saw gaps. Matthew Luloff (Orléans East – Cumberland) and Catherine Kitts (Orléans South-Navan) reported just six and five of the 244 listed projects in their own wards, respectively. Both dissented during the final committee vote on the TMP.
“You’re not going to see the kind of walking activity that you see anywhere else if we don’t provide the facilities for them to walk,” said Luloff. “You’re not going to see that kind of demand for active transportation in an area where infrastructure doesn’t exist.”
An update to the TMP, once finalized, is expected within 10 years. That will present a formal opportunity to add new active transportation projects to the list that council will be asked to sign off on, later this month, but won’t be the only chance for councillors or staff to do so.
“It’s dynamic. It’s a living document,” director of transportation planning Vivi Chi told reporters after the committee meeting. “This is kind of the framework that we’re working around. And if something flares up that we hadn’t seen or something comes up that’s really, really needed, of course, we will be flexible and react to that and add it.”
The city’s GeoOttawa tool offers an interactive map, for those equipped to navigate its layers, showing the 244 projects on the TMP list. It also has a layer showing “in-process active transportation facilities,” which are projects in the planning phase that are expected to be delivered through other city programs by 2031.
As for when the projects on the TMP list actually roll out, staff explained that they’ll bring forward those for implementation in 2024 and 2025 through the annual budget process.
A five-year project list will then come forward with the second half of the Transportation Master Plan – a process that will include a review of the entire capital budget for transportation. Zlatko Krstulic, program manager of active transportation planning, described it as an opportunity “to consider how much of that bigger pie should be spent on our active transportation.”
The second phase of the TMP work, scheduled for completion in 2025, will involve looking at the projects and investments needed to hit the city’s own targets for greenhouse gas reductions, and for seeing half of all trips involve sustainable modes of transportation with 25 years.
The projects list and the remainder of the Phase 1 TMP work will proceed to city council for a final vote on April 26.
The latest draft of the list is available here, though some ward numbers associated with projects will be corrected before arriving at council.
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