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Ottawa’s ties with Gatineau have grown stronger in recent years, which is why Mayor Jim Watson is curious to see how the municipal election will shake out on the other side of the Ottawa River.
“I follow the mayor’s race because they are our next-door neighbours and it’s important that we have a good relationship, but I’ll let the voters decide. We’ll work with whoever is elected,” Watson said.
The two cities have worked together on transit and tourism initiatives. The two mayors sit beside each other as non-voting members during meetings of the National Capital Commission board of directors. The mayors’ offices are in regular communication.
There are five candidates for mayor in the Gatineau election on Nov. 5. Incumbent Maxime Pedneaud-Jobin is being challenged by Clément Bélanger, Rémi Bergeron, Sylvie Goneau and Denis Tassé.
Watson, who will seek re-election in Ottawa during the city’s next municipal election in October 2018, seems to be a fan of the incumbent.
“For the last number of years I’ve personally had a very positive relationship with Mr. Pedneaud-Jobin and I think we’ve accomplished a lot together,” Watson said.
“I think we’ve worked well together on economic development, Ottawa 2017, tourism, transportation, transit issues with the working group we established (and) the relationship we developed to minimize the number of buses coming onto Ottawa streets after LRT is introduced.”
They even worked together to promote local issues during the last federal election.
Municipally operated interprovincial transit is the most significant day-to-day issue for residents in the border cities. There are thousands of individual trips each day over the Ottawa-Gatineau bridges, mainly for employment. A 2013 interprovincial transit study indicated 70 per cent of trips were in a vehicle and 26 per cent were on public transit. The remainder of the trips were “non-motorized,” such as cycling or walking.
Ideally, more people will leave their cars at home to travel between the two cities. Gatineau has its Rapibus system and Ottawa is transitioning from a Transitway bus system to an electric rail system in the core.
The cities struck a deal earlier this year to minimize STO bus traffic in Ottawa’s core, especially on Wellington and Rideau streets, when the Confederation Line LRT opens in 2018.
The obvious link between the two transit systems, besides the roads over the interprovincial bridges, is the Prince of Wales rail bridge, which could connect Ottawa’s Trillium Line to Gatineau’s Rapibus system. The City of Ottawa owns the bridge but doesn’t have the money to repair it. The necessary funds will need to come from the federal government one day.
Watson said the City of Ottawa is “very interested” in extending train service to the Taché Rapibus station.
“Transit is vitally important on a daily basis for the simple reason that we have so many residents living in Ottawa and working in Gatineau and vice versa, so we want to try and make that even more seamless than it is now,” Watson said.
Transit is a huge factor in another regional priority: economic development.
Ottawa and Gatineau have worked together on Canada 150 initiatives and the cities have experts assembling a joint bid in the Amazon HQ2 competition. The retail giant wants to build a second headquarters somewhere in North America.
Decisions made by the municipal governments also impact the Ottawa River.
The City of Ottawa, with help from the upper levels of government, has spent millions on upgrades to minimize the sewage overflow running into the historic waterway. The City of Gatineau is under pressure to improve its infrastructure and sometimes it finds itself defending against criticisms from the Ontario side of the river.
jwilling@postmedia.com
twitter.com/JonathanWilling
查看原文...
“I follow the mayor’s race because they are our next-door neighbours and it’s important that we have a good relationship, but I’ll let the voters decide. We’ll work with whoever is elected,” Watson said.
The two cities have worked together on transit and tourism initiatives. The two mayors sit beside each other as non-voting members during meetings of the National Capital Commission board of directors. The mayors’ offices are in regular communication.
There are five candidates for mayor in the Gatineau election on Nov. 5. Incumbent Maxime Pedneaud-Jobin is being challenged by Clément Bélanger, Rémi Bergeron, Sylvie Goneau and Denis Tassé.
Watson, who will seek re-election in Ottawa during the city’s next municipal election in October 2018, seems to be a fan of the incumbent.
“For the last number of years I’ve personally had a very positive relationship with Mr. Pedneaud-Jobin and I think we’ve accomplished a lot together,” Watson said.
“I think we’ve worked well together on economic development, Ottawa 2017, tourism, transportation, transit issues with the working group we established (and) the relationship we developed to minimize the number of buses coming onto Ottawa streets after LRT is introduced.”
They even worked together to promote local issues during the last federal election.
Municipally operated interprovincial transit is the most significant day-to-day issue for residents in the border cities. There are thousands of individual trips each day over the Ottawa-Gatineau bridges, mainly for employment. A 2013 interprovincial transit study indicated 70 per cent of trips were in a vehicle and 26 per cent were on public transit. The remainder of the trips were “non-motorized,” such as cycling or walking.
Ideally, more people will leave their cars at home to travel between the two cities. Gatineau has its Rapibus system and Ottawa is transitioning from a Transitway bus system to an electric rail system in the core.
The cities struck a deal earlier this year to minimize STO bus traffic in Ottawa’s core, especially on Wellington and Rideau streets, when the Confederation Line LRT opens in 2018.
The obvious link between the two transit systems, besides the roads over the interprovincial bridges, is the Prince of Wales rail bridge, which could connect Ottawa’s Trillium Line to Gatineau’s Rapibus system. The City of Ottawa owns the bridge but doesn’t have the money to repair it. The necessary funds will need to come from the federal government one day.
Watson said the City of Ottawa is “very interested” in extending train service to the Taché Rapibus station.
“Transit is vitally important on a daily basis for the simple reason that we have so many residents living in Ottawa and working in Gatineau and vice versa, so we want to try and make that even more seamless than it is now,” Watson said.
Transit is a huge factor in another regional priority: economic development.
Ottawa and Gatineau have worked together on Canada 150 initiatives and the cities have experts assembling a joint bid in the Amazon HQ2 competition. The retail giant wants to build a second headquarters somewhere in North America.
Decisions made by the municipal governments also impact the Ottawa River.
The City of Ottawa, with help from the upper levels of government, has spent millions on upgrades to minimize the sewage overflow running into the historic waterway. The City of Gatineau is under pressure to improve its infrastructure and sometimes it finds itself defending against criticisms from the Ontario side of the river.
jwilling@postmedia.com
twitter.com/JonathanWilling
查看原文...
