By Michelle Normandeau
The debate over duplicate street names in the amalgamated City of Ottawa has begun to wind down, leaving residents and businesses of Centretown walking away from this battle almost unscathed.
City councillors on the planning and development committee have approved 138 new street names in an effort to eliminate duplication. However, all main streets in the Centretown area such as Albert, Sparks, Bay, James, Kent and Queen streets will retain their names.
Don Brousseau, the project leader for the duplicate street names initiative, says the majority of changes will be made in smaller more residential areas.
“First and foremost, the transition board wanted to try and impose minimum disruption,” Brousseau says.
City Coun. Elisabeth Arnold says that while the dense population in Centretown was an important factor in maintaining the street names, the historical significance of the area was also very important.
“Often the streets in Centretown are the older streets, given the development pattern of the city,” Arnold says.
When deciding which streets would be changed numerous criteria were examined, such as the number of residents and businesses. But when this information was similar for two streets, the historical significance of the name and its importance to the street was also considered.
The initiative to eliminate duplicate street names was undertaken in an effort to ensure effective emergency services in the new city.
“People are often not aware of where they are or in what jurisdiction they reside,” Insp. Charles Bordeleau said to the committee.
Currently, it can be difficult for emergency services to determine which jurisdiction a person is in if the address provided is a duplicate name.
“From the point of view of the security and safety of the population of the new city, it was an important project to get done early on,” Arnold says.
While the larger streets in Centretown will keep their names, there are some smaller streets that will be changed.
Elizabeth Street will become Orangeville Street, Duke Street will be known as Tardif Street, and Hill Street will be changed to Brickhill Street. These changes, along with others in the amalgamated city, come into effect in March 2002.
There are some changes city councillors have yet to approve. Three month extensions have been granted to certain streets such as Sunset Boulevard and Lilac Lane, where emotions still run high over which streets should be changed.
Brousseau says that Ottawa is one of the first amalgamated cities to undertake such an initiative and that many other cities such as Toronto are looking to Ottawa as an example.