Feds to rebuild Afghan war memorial in Ottawa

The Canadian government is moving ahead with rebuilding an Afghan war memorial to fallen soldiers and locating it in the west end of Ottawa.

The memorial, known as the Kandahar Airfield Cenotaph, will be rebuilt on the former Nortel Campus in Ottawa’s west end, the new site for the National Defence headquarters.

The cenotaph, originally located on the Canadian military’s base in Kandahar, is currently in storage at an Ottawa warehouse.

Public Services and Procurement Canada will issue a notice to companies, requesting proposals to construct a shelter over the memorial to shield it from the weather and harsh Ottawa winters.

Canadian Forces spokeswoman Lt.- Cmdr Diane Grover said the design phase for the $ 2- million project will take place in the coming months. Construction is expected to begin at the end of this year.

“Right now the plan for the unveiling (of the cenotaph) is sometime late in 2017,” Grover said Wednesday.

The cenotaph at Kandahar Air Field became a symbol for many Canadians of the losses endured in the Afghan war.

Canadian Forces personnel and Afghan employees built it in 2006 and added to the monument over time. On the cenotaph are 190 plaques t hat honour Canadian Forces members who died as well as Foreign Affairs official Glyn Berry, Calgary Herald journalist Michelle Lang, and Marc Cyr, a civilian from a company under contract to the Department of National Defence.

Other plaques honour U. S. military personnel and a civilian member who died while serving under Canadian command.

The granite plaques are etched with the photographs of those who died.

The military has the original drawings for the cenotaph as well as photos and video to help in reconstructing the monument in Canada.

Department of National Defence documents produced last year and obtained by the Ottawa Citizen envision a 12- by-25- metre pavilion.

The cenotaph weights about 225,000 kilograms, the documents noted. An artist’s concept prepared for the DND shows a glass enclosure around the cenotaph.

“We really want to include glass to provide ample natural light,” Grover explained. “This will also help to create a serene and solemn setting for visitors to what is essentially a war memorial.”

Over t he next several years, the DND will transfer around 8,500 military and civilian employees to the former Nortel Campus.

“This i s an i mportant commemorative structure,” Grover said of the cenotaph. “I think this will play a prominent role in the future home of National Defence headquarters.”

The former Nortel Campus, however, wasn’t the first choice for the memorial.

In 2011, a military working group recommended that the cenotaph instead be located on DND property at Dow’s Lake in central Ottawa.

At the time, three Ottawa venues were considered the most serious options as a home for the cenotaph; Beechwood Cemetery, just east of downtown; the former Nortel site, and the Dow’s Lake property, according to a July 2011 briefing note prepared for then army commander Lt.- Gen. Peter Devlin.

The Dow’s Lake option came out on top, followed very closely by Beechwood Cemetery, according to the briefing.