March Road

March Road facing north

March Road is an arterial boulevard in the Kanata area of Ottawa, Ontario, Canada.

The road begins at the point where Eagleson Road crosses The Queensway and turns to the west at the Dunrobin turnoff. The road continues past Carp, crosses The Queensway a second time and continues all the way to Almonte, Ontario. Drivers are sometimes thrown off by the appearance of two exits for March Road. March Road is also known as Ottawa Road #49. The section between Almonte and then-Highway 17 (now Donald B. Munro Drive) used to be Ontario Highway 44 prior to the highway being downloaded in 1997.

March Road is sometimes referred to as Downtown Kanata, due to its hi-tech industry.

The section near Carling Avenue is sometimes referred to as the Canadian version of Silicon Valley, hence the nickname, Silicon Valley North. Mitel's world headquarters is located in the Kanata Research Park at the intersection of March Road and Carling Avenue. It is a main thoroughfare with a skyline of office buildings for a city of 85 000. Startup Businesses like silicon chip innovators, IP companies, technology parks and microchip design operations occupy the side of the boulevard. This area was hit hard by the dot-com meltdown of post-2000. The departure of failed start-up IP companies resulted in 600,000 square feet (56,000 m2) of cheap real estate in the high tech city of Kanata, which is slowly filling up, to the point where new office buildings are again being constructed.

Major Intersections

The following is a list of major intersections along March Road proceeding north from Eagleson Road:

The alignment continues west into Almonte as Ottawa Street.

Communities Served

Route map: Bing / Google

This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the Friday, May 15, 2015. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.