CHÂTEAU ADDITION GETS NOD
Fourth time A charm for developer?
City heritage planners support the Château Laurier’s proposed design for its glassy seven-storey addition, despite hearing strong opposition from the volunteer advocacy group concerned with preserving the integrity of Ottawa’s historic sites.
In one of Ottawa’s most controversial development files in the past two years, the city’s experts have decided they can get behind the proposed design for an addition to a capital landmark.
City staff published their recommendations in a report Monday evening ahead of a built-heritage subcommittee meeting, which is scheduled for next Monday. Ultimately, it’s a political decision, since city council will have the final say on the design in potentially one if its final major votes before the summer legislative break and the fall municipal election.
“The proposed addition respects and is deferential to the historic Château Laurier hotel, allowing it, as one of Canada’s most important Château style railway hotels, to continue to be viewed and appreciated as a landmark building within the cultural heritage landscape,” staff say in the report.
Larco Investments wants to expand the hotel with more long-stay rooms and meeting spaces. The addition will be built at the back of the hotel where there was a parking structure, but it needs approval from city hall because the property is protected by provincial heritage law.
Heritage Ottawa called the latest concept “the most disgraceful act of heritage vandalism of our generation.”
It was Larco’s fourth crack at a design after the company’s previous concepts received heavy criticism, which largely focused on the compatibility of the boxy addition, the historic hotel and the neighbouring Major’s Hill Park.
What’s become clear is Larco wants an addition that pops in its setting rather than simply copying the castle-like hotel. The company has also attempted to respond to claims that the addition is too big by shrinking it in height since the first 11-storey and 12-storey concept in 2016. It went to eight storeys in a February 2018 version, then seven storeys in the current design.
The latest iteration lops 54 guest rooms from the first concept, making the grand total 164 long-stay rooms in the proposed addition. The underground parking garage would have 349 spaces, a reduction of 36 from the first design. The existing 426-room hotel wouldn’t change.
The Grand Trunk Railway Company built the Château Laurier between 1908 and 1912. A wing along Mackenzie Street was added in 1929.
In recommending council approve the contemporary addition, city heritage staff say the new building would let the hotel’s iconic roofline continue to have dominance on Ottawa’s skyline. The stone, bronze and glass in the addition will complement the materials in the hotel and the views to the historic building won’t be sullied, the report says.
City staff also point out that the latest design was subject to analysis by city hall’s urban design review panel of outside architecture experts. Larco implemented the suggestions from the panel, the report says.
Rideau-Vanier Coun. Mathieu Fleury still isn’t thrilled about the design approach.
“We have heard from the community that the proposed addition does not adequately complement the architectural language of the historic Château Laurier,” Fleury says in his written comments included in the report. “Improvements aside, the shape and structure of the modern building clashes with the original vision for this iconic landmark.”
There was no word Monday on where the National Capital Commission stands, but Parks Canada, whose interest is the protection of the vistas around the Rideau Canal, seems content with the latest design changes.
“The profile and silhouette of the Château Laurier will remain prominent and distinctive in the landscape as experienced from the canal,” Parks Canada wrote in a letter to the city last week.
The controversy over the Château Laurier addition has dragged on for about a year and a half, but there’s no more delaying. It’s time for council to make a decision.
The application must go through three levels of political scrutiny. The built-heritage subcommittee will send a recommendation to the planning committee, which will consider the application on June 26. Council has the final say on June 27.
When you have a medical condition and you’re discriminated against and lose your job because of that, that’s not right.
SHAUNTEL SNOWDEN, former Tim Hortons employee. STORY, A3