Comments about the Civic Hospital relocating to the Farm.

Neighbourhood Concerns  - Site Location

DesignMy biggest concern is every time I see pictures of the new hospital I feel like I see Mississauga, Barrhaven, suburban London. I don't see something that fits in the neighbourhood....I hope the design will take into consideration that the Canal is a UNESCO site. I hate seeing giant swaths of land at Carling, Champagne, Beech and Rochester taken up for hospital parking.

Transit

Queensway Access

Traffic - Cut Through Traffic.

 Sherwood Avenue.

 Parkdale Avenue.

 Holland Avenue.

 Bayswater Avenue.

 Fairmont Avenue:

• Drivers are turning up and down Fairmont, Bayswater because you can go underneath the 417 to get where you want and now that's like the perfect route to hit Queen Juliana Park.

• Verbally accosted by hospital residents. It has been emotionally traumatic for my kids. (Parked cars) project into driveways, (they) yell at us. (We have) concerns about what is going to happen in the future. My kids have witnessed people yell at us. This happens from the Royal too. We have to talk about the parking and the safety on the streets.

Parking -site parking:

• Every new hospital will look at ways they can actually make money from a site they are developing. Parking is a major component of making money at a hospital. If you ask the people why they are parking on your front lawn its $90+ every month to pay.

Pedestrian issues

• Four schools in our neighbourhood - hundreds of kids walk every day. We need to factor that in.
• I think our seniors need quick access walking - maybe addressed in a different way.

Greenspace - Queen Juliana Park

• It's our greenspace. Please keep it green. If not, give us a decent border of trees so we don't have to look at a parking lot.

• I bought specifically because I can see green while I'm sitting in my living room so your idea sort of blows me away, but the idea of using the park for cultural things like the powwow and fundraisers is very important. It's important for the community and for those organizations. I watch them play frisbee at 7 am and I know they all come from NRCAN. So it's being used. If you start putting a parking lot there, you are destroying a lot of people's pleasures.I don't want to look at a parking lot....Please, don't touch the park.

• It's heartbreaking that we may lose Queen Juliana Park - what will make up for that. What will be the mitigation for that? Will we be looking for other green space in the neighbourhood?

The Arboretum - Arboretum could be in danger. There's a chunk of that that is part of the Arboretum, a lot of rare old trees. It is a national treasure. Will there be some kind of reassurance given that when they go in there, are they just going to clear-cut or will there be some kind of protection for these beautiful old trees? Old exotic trees, hedges by the tennis courts. (Note: More than 700 trees on the site will be clear-cut, the Historic Hedges by the tennis courts are being removed, and the DARA tennis club is being relocated to the roof of a parking garage on Queen Juliana Park.)

 (I am including a lot more information from this meeting.) (Google: "Kitchissippi Ward-Jeff Leiper - Civic Hospital As We Heard it Report Pdf", February 6, 2017.)

People in attendance at the meeting were Ottawa City Councillor Jeff Leiper; Yasir Naqvi, Ottawa Centre MPP, and now the Liberal Member of Parliament for Ottawa Centre; Kate Eggins, Director of Communications and Engagement for the Ottawa Hospital; and about 50 members of the Civic Hospital Neighbourhood Association. City Councillor Jeff Leiper voted NO to the construction of a parking garage on QJP, so did Councillors Catherine McKenney, Rawlson King and Shawn Menard.