Why not build a medical centre on the Plains of Abraham?

 "The hospital, which has been coveting the Experimental Farm across the street for years, insists it was the only site that would do, even though it's nowhere near the LRT and will probably add to the city's congestion problems...If a hospital wants to build a new facility in Banff National Park, how could Ottawa turn it down?...And then there's Quebec City. Plans are afoot for a new hospital there. Why not cede a chunk of the Plains of Abraham, a federally-owned park, for a dollar a year. After all, it's historic, it's green and it's empty. Perfect for a mega-hospital." ("When heritage space meets pork-barrel politics"-IPolitics.)

Experimental Farm.

1950 - The north west section was suggested as a location for a new Ottawa City Hall. "Farm site rejected-cannot build City Hall there". (Evening Citizen, February 2, 1950.)

June 1, 1953 - The National Capital Commission tries to move the Farm away from it's urban area, but relents under pressure. (Ottawa Citizen 2007-12-31/150 years of memories-PressReader.)

1954 - The City of Ottawa tries to build a new City Hall on the CEF, Prime Minister of Canada Louis St-Laurent and the Agriculture Minister reject that idea.

1974 - The National Capital Commission wants to sell 700 acres of the property to housing developers. Prime Minister of Canada Pierre Trudeau and Agriculture Minister Eugene Whelan refuse to consider the idea. Federal Minister Eldon Eades tells Public Works to give Queen Juliana Park on 870 Carling Avenue to the people of Canada.

An Ottawa Journal front page article.

1988 - 91 acres of the Central Experimental Farm are sold to the Municipality of Ottawa. Despite the objections of Federal Minister of Agriculture John Wise:

House of Commons Debates  Ottawa May 13, 1988. Hon. John Wise - "Agriculture Canada, my Department, has no plans or thoughts whatsoever of disposing of that property at any time."

 Prime Minister of Canada Brian Mulroney designated the Farm; Greenbelt; Lebreton Flats...etc. as "National Interest Land Mass"properties--- to prevent them from being sold to housing developers in the future. The Experimental Farm on Carling; Lebreton Flats; Greenbelt...etc. are designated as NILM.

The Clyde/Merivale lands in central Ottawa, Ontario.

1998- The National Capital Commission pays $1 for the decommissioned Greenbelt Research Facility, over 2,000 acres in Nepean, Ontario. The land was an expansion of the original CEF:

A 1958 Cabinet document.

2008 - Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz refuses to give any of the CEF to the Ottawa Civic Hospital.

2017 - The National Capital Commission and Public Works donate the $4 million dollar Dow's Lake parking lot, Queen Juliana Park and the Sir John Carling site to the Civic.