Britannia (Ottawa)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Britannia is a neighborhood and also a street in the west end of Ottawa, on the Ottawa River across from Aylmer.
It was once a small cottage town to the west of Ottawa, but rapid growth in all directions during the 20th century meant that it was soon surrounded by the western suburb of Nepean. Larger, modern houses were built in between cottages. Nowadays it is simply an out-of-the-way part of west end of Ottawa, featuring among other things a dog-washing business, an elementary school, a movie theatre complex, a nature trail (Mud Lake), a beach, and a water filtration plant.
The neighborhood has a mix of low and high income housing. The lower income areas of the neighbourhood are closer to Richmond Road and the more affluent areas are located near the yacht club at the north end of Britannia Road.
Britannia retains some of its early cottage flavour, with a yacht club at the end of the road, and many older cottages living on as bungalows. The way it is surrounded by water, forest, and steep hills means that, with a bit of wildlife-conservation, Britannia will probably keep its reclusive appeal for many more years.
The neighbourhood has a perhaps one of its kind 1967 EXPO style dome covering a local children's hockey rink that made it to the top 500 architecturally significant buildings in Canada in 2002 as voted by CIRA, and, is home of the annual Ottawa Folk festival at Britannia Park. Its history includes a very large and popular canoe club from the turn of the century, which became the Britannia Yacht Club. Canada's only Gold medal winner from the 1936 Summer Olympics, Frank Amyot, paddled these waters in the 1920's and 1930's.
The area became popular at the turn of the century because the Ottawa Gas and Electric company extended the trolley line and created an amusement park at Britannia beach to encourage users of the trolley system to use the system on weekends. A cottage and beach community resulted.
Winding its way through the river front area is a bike path, which extends from Britannia some 12 kilometers to the Parliament buildings downtown. Today, there is probably no neighbourhood in Ottawa more mixed than Britannia forming a contrast with many of the homogenized satellite communities that have become Ottawa.
