Civic staff do not want the City to buy the red pine plantation threatened with clearcutting by the Ottawa Airport. Staff argue that it would be too expensive to buy the property, survey it, and make the necessary changes for recreation trails. They argue that years of unattended management of the trees make a risk for falling trees and for a die out due to lack of biodiversity. The four hectares were originally planted for use as telephone poles. (Ottawa Bulldog)
🚊 OC Transpo
The 12.5 km of track for O-Train Line 1 east extension has been completed. The next step for the line, which runs from Blair Station through Orléans, Blackburn Hamlet, and Beacon Hill, is to install the overhead catenary system. (William Eltherington at CTV)
➕ Related All OC Transpo buses, the O-Train, and Para Transpo buses will be free on New Year’s Eve, starting at 6:00 pm.
📺 Elegy
Longtime CJOH reporter Norman Fetterley had died, aged 74. In his 45 years on air, Fetterley was also a parliamentary correspondent for CJOH and CTV News and host of Gallery Talk, the political panel show. (CTV)
🏗️ Ottawa Official Plan
City Council has approved keeping the Province’s taller building rules and asking staff to investigate fourplexes. The Province had increased the allowable height of apartment buildings when it unilaterly changed the Official Plan to extend into the greenbelt. Now that the Province has made a reverse ferret, building heights would have shrunk. City Council voted to keep the taller buildings on minor corridors.
The Federal government has made it clear to municipalities that housing funds will be connected to density, so Council has also asked staff to investigate creating a new bylaw to allow fourplexes on single family lots. (Elyse Skura at CBC)
🚨 Ottawa Police Service
The Ottawa Police Service is again collecting items for its annual Purse Project. Each year the Service collects purses and bags full of pads, tampons, soap, shampoo, toothbrushes, new underwear, socks, hats, and mittens for women who cannot afford it.
Donations for the Project can be made starting tomorrow and until Dec 10 at:
Police stations on 211 Huntmar Drive, 3343 St. Joseph Boulevard and 474 Elgin Street during hours of operation
Shoppers Drug Mart locations at 174 Bank Street, 702 Bank Street, 1080 Bank Street/Sunnyside, 181 Greenbank Road, and 3781 Stranherd Drive
The Citron Hygiene warehouse located at 150-2855 Swansea Crescent between 8:30 am and 4:30 pm from Monday to Friday
Collected items will be distributed to women’s organizations across Ottawa, including Youville Centre, St Joe’s Women’s Centre, Emily Murphy Non-Profit Housing Corporation, and la Maison d’amitié.
Besides women’s hygiene items, shaving products for men are also accepted.