By Mary Gordon
The movement to bring a streetcar back to Sparks Street may have gained some ground now that OC Transpo plans to restore a historic Ottawa streetcar.
Catherine Caron, who is co-ordinating the restoration of Streetcar 696, said the rejuvenated streetcar might become a display, although she isn’t sure where it would be featured.
“There are a lot of different options that we’re considering,” she said.
But the ultimate hope is to get the streetcar running again, so that it somehow plays a part in Ottawa’s transportation system, she said.
Many Sparks Street merchants believe the streetcar could help promote tourism, since the street is in prime heritage territory with proximity to several key tourist sites, such as Parliament Hill and the National War Memorial.
Caron said she has met with Holly Layte, owner of the Marvellous Mustard Shop on Sparks Street, who has collected more than 30 signatures from mall merchants in favour of ushering in the streetcar’s rebirth.
She said most merchants think a streetcar would help regenerate business.
Sharon McKenna, manager of the Sparks Street Mall management board, said Layte’s petition has been forwarded to the asset management committee for consideration. The committee is responsible for anything to do with the mall’s physical structures.
Michael Wright, who has owned the Snow Goose on Sparks Street for 40 years, said a streetcar “would be terrific in a low-key, tasteful kind of way.”
Sparks Street, which used to have its own streetcar, became a pedestrian mall in 1967.
Wright says he fondly remembers delighting in streetcars as a young boy, “especially if you got on one of the really old ones, the double-enders.”
Streetcar 696 sat outside the Canadian Railway Museum in Montreal for 30 years. It was brought back to Ottawa in 1989.
Currently, Streetcar 696 is housed in a warehouse and is in pretty sad shape, Caron says.
The restoration project hopes to raise $250,000 toward its refurbishment.
“We’re looking to members of the Ottawa community who we hope will come forward,” Caron says.
The volunteer committee, which includes OC Transpo employees and retirees, has received visits from streetcar experts, some visiting from streetcar museums in the United States.
Rebuilding the streetcar will take at least five years, Caron said.
Bert Titcomb, secretary for the advocacy group Transport 2000, said other cities, such as New Orleans and Vancouver, have successfully reintroduced streetcars.
In its heyday during the late 1920s, the Ottawa Electric Railway Company carried more than 30 million riders on 90.5 km of track.
Streetcar 696, which once ran along the Britannia line, carried thousands of people from as far as Rockcliffe Park to Britannia Park.
The restoration project has also captured the imagination of the Old Forge — an association with a special interest in protecting and celebrating the history of the Britannia neighbourhood.
In 1989, The Old Forge spearheaded a campaign to bring the streetcar back to life, as part of its plan to open an interpretive centre that would highlight the history of the area, but the project fell through.
Streetcars began running in Ottawa in 1891.
About 25,000 people lined the route as streetcars took their final pass through the city in 1959.