The City of Ottawa has released its Transportation Master Plan, laying extensive groundwork for what transportation in Ottawa will look like for the next two decades.
The Master Plan (TMP) is the city’s long-range strategy that is meant to guide Ottawa’s transportation system up until 2046, and council has officially approved Part 2 of the plan, which focuses on capital infrastructure.
While Part 1 was approved in April 2023 and outlines policies and priorities for transportation in Ottawa, Part 2 is based on travel demand forecasting and includes approximately $3.4 billion in city-led transportation projects.
The plan outlines $2.3 billion in transit projects and $1.6 billion in road projects, with active transportation projects like pedestrian and cycling networks accounting for $350 million.
According to the city’s Official Plan, Ottawa is projected to increase by over 400,000 residents over the next 20 years, with 47 per cent of new dwellings built with intensification, mostly inside the city’s Greenbelt. According to the staff report, the TMP identifies the transportation policies and investments that will be required to support the projected growth.
The forecasts for transportation in Ottawa also take into account post-pandemic shifts to working from home, leading to “evolving and diverse transportation needs”, the report says.
The plan allocates $8 million annually to implement “the most critical isolated measures”.
During the mayoral election, Mayor Mark Sutcliffe campaigned largely on road-centred infrastructure and shared priorities among drivers, especially those living in suburban neighbourhoods. But according to the TMP, road investments were only considered “where transit would not be sufficient to meet demand.”
Some of the projects among “highest-priority” are the Baseline-Heron, Cumberland and Kanata North Transitways and bus lanes on Carling Avenue, Blair Road, St-Laurent Boulevard and Montreal Road, as are the O-Train extensions.
The rapid bus projects will be injected with $2.3 billion from the city, city staff said, and the rest will be funded by other levels of government.
The O-Train Line 1 extension from Algonquin Station to Barrhaven Town Centre and the Line 3 extension from Moodie Station to Hazeldean Station are also included among the highest of the priorities, accounting for an additional $8.3 billion in investment.
The report notes that the implementation of these extensions “remains fully reliant on funding from other levels of government.”
“However, even with 100 per cent capital funding, the operating costs of these projects are very significant,” the report continues, “and are not expected to be substantially offset by increased fare revenue from these extensions.
These projects are all part of the “Priority Transit Network” and are meant to be implemented in the next 20 years.
City administration recommended the entire network be submitted for funding from the Canada Public Transit Fund.
The plan also includes committed road projects, like the Bank Street widening project and Robert Grant Avenue extension.
Notably, the TMP refers to the Official Plan’s target of having the majority of trips in Ottawa made by walking, cycling transit or carpooling. The latest data from the a 2022 city survey said sustainable moves currently account for 43.4 per cent of trips.
Once implemented, the TMP will add approximately 43 kilometres of O-Train tracks, 111 kilometres of Transitway and continuous bus lanes, 68 kilometres of road widenings and new roads, 48 kilometres of sidewalks, 18 kilometres of pathways and 151 kilometres of cycling facilities.
