A Nod to the Flats

Heritage: Sitting just in front of the ultra-modernistic war museum, a set of placards on display which are the NCC's (not so kind) nod to the Lebreton flats. Today these are about the best we can do to get a feeling for the area that the museum is now built on, which is otherwise still a wasteland.  The tone of the messaging is one of rebirth and the unfortunate plight of the residents who were relieved of their misery when the NCC evicted them. The spin is unmistakable especially in light of more recent media that tells a different story.

Many shops, plants, and factories occupied the flats, this was the place where things were made in Ottawa.  There were major railyards and a roundhouse which todays government would be strung up for tearing down.  Interestingly, many businesses in Ottawa today trace their routes to the flats, and, some are still not that far away off Preston (e.g. Preston and Lief Glass).The Preston Street area is a thriving neighbourhood today.  Without question, some industrial areas in the flats would have been polluted. But there were also residential and businesses areas that could have been spared the axe.

Ralph Burton furiously painted a number of scenes from the flats, in an attempt to capture the built heritage of the area.  He captured some 19 portraits, in winter time, and the collection was fortunately (and finally) purchased at the urging of Marion Dewar.  The working capital of Ottawa had been partially preserved, if none of the buildings were.  The paintings sit today at the City of Ottawa where they can be viewed.  Oddly, none of these images are present on the curb side display near the war museum.  What we have instead is the story of contamination and working class brawls. I am sure there were a few, but Ottawa had it's roots as a lumber town, and the market area we know today was once just as rough.  Granville Island in Vancouver was also once an industrial park, but it has become a popular area for markets, artist studios, shops, theatre, restaurants and industry.

Below, an image of the lumberyards, train yards, workshops, and streets of Lebreton Flats, from an aerial view. I took this image of the street level poster I should go to the archives and scan a high resolution image -- see if you can identify the residential areas in the image.

According to the NCC, the locals took to boxing for recreation.  Fortunately they posed for pictures before doing so.  Oh and they drank.  A lot.  They threw many of their bottles out, possibly in behind the Duke Hotel so this conclusively proves that fighting and drinking were the mainstays.  The book "An Acre of Time" does recreate the flats with a more balanced view and considers the built heritage in a kinder light.

Really, did this really exist in the flats at one time (station image below).  Did fire get this one, I can't imagine knocking something like that down?

A community shaped by hardship is the title of the image below.  I imagine it was very hard for a lot of people regardless of where they lived around the 1900's or the great depression.  It's true, there were shanty towns in the flats.  But there was more ... and we seem to have thrown out the baby with the bathwater. And while we were at it, the washing tub as well, which, they may have found in a recent archaeological dig.

Devastation had already visited the flats, so perhaps they were used to it, but in the 1960s it wasn't fire that leveled it. It was the NCC.

Thankfully, one building has risen from the rubble close to 50 years later, but I am not quite sure what it is.  Is it an apartment building with an office tower skewered through the middle of it, or, is it a modern homage to 19th century tenemants with open horse and carriage passageways underneath?

Still a ways to go. I'll do less editorial in future posts, but, the Lebreton Flats of all the NCC mishaps bothers me most. In the meantime, we do have Bluesfest.