Bike in style
Ottawa’s Cycle Chic captures bikers at their best
Liisa Tuominen, The Ottawa Citizen
OTTAWA — With the Rideau Canal Festival’s Bicycle Chic fashion show on this weekend, Ottawa blogger Chris Traynor is rolling with the times. Since May, he has been catching area riders looking good on bikes and taking their photos. His blog, ottawa-cycle-chic.blogspot.com, is a companion to his other cycling blog, ottawabikeguy.blogspot.com, and his day job in real estate.
Traynor noticed the number of European-style bikes and cruisers skyrocketing in the past few years. Garage sale rides and old Raleighs, which might have been shunned by cyclists in the past were suddenly cool. He started documenting people, mostly women, going about their daily lives on a bike, and looking fabulous doing it. Many of Traynor’s shots are taken along the Rideau Canal, near his home, and the subjects are normally not aware that they’re being photographed. He acknowledges that the people he snaps are biking in normal clothes because they can. They’re just hopping short distances, one imagines, to meet friends at an outdoor cafe or to pick up a baguette and perhaps some cheese on the way home from work. (There might not be so much chic-ness happening on, say, Merivale Road.)
Rideau Canal Festival announces lineup
Tony Lofaro, Ottawa Citizen
OTTAWA — The Rideau Canal Festival is rolling toward its fourth year, adding some new wrinkles to a midsummer festival that celebrates the canal as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Borrowing a page from other local festivals, the Rideau Canal festival is this year introducing a passport offering discounts valued at $100 at all festival sites and activities, including canal bikes, walking and bicycle heritage tours, as well the adopt-a-metre-of the canal program. The passport is $20 for adults, children under 12 are admitted free to festival sites.
The festival will also have a World Heritage Stage Concert Series featuring several Ottawa-area bands at Confederation Park, one of the official festival sties. Some highlights include Fresh Beat, a house music show marking UNESCO’s International Youth Year, and Puffin Productions’ environmental storytelling and music for children, and also music honouring some of the builders of the canal.
Read more on the Ottawa Citizen website: Rideau Canal Festival announces line-up
World Heritage Day: Rideau Canal Festival Recognizes Jo MacFadden and Parks Canada
It was with great honour that today the Rideau Canal Festival awarded to Ms. Jo MacFadden, film and television producer, the Annual World Heritage Rideau Canal Festival Award, during an event which saw the raising of the UNESCO flag, in celebration of World Heritage Day at City Hall.
Every year the Festival recognizes an organization or an individual that has contributed to the preservation and promotion of the Rideau Canal in a remarkable way. In fact, this year the Rideau Canal Festival also chose to honour Alan Latourelle, CEO of Parks Canada on their 100th Anniversary and for their exemplary dedication to preserving the Canal for generations to come.
Clearly, Ontario benefits from the fact that the Rideau Canal is one of Canada’s 15 world heritage sites, the only one in the province. It was officially designated by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) in 2007 and with their collaboration, a symbolic award of a sculpted wooden metre, defending the Festival’s green mission of “Aim for Zero” is given to the chosen recipient. See http://www.rideaucanalfestival.ca/adopt.html. This year marks the 4th anniversary of the Rideau Canal World Heritage Award ceremony.
“We are once again pleased to present the Rideau Canal World Heritage Award. Several individuals and organizations are dedicated to the preservation and general promotion of the Canal as we cherish its place within our city and recognize the impact it has for citizens and visitors along with the economic impact it has on the business community. It is therefore, befitting that we recognize and thank those individuals and organizations, today “, indicated Blair Patacairk, Chair of the Rideau Canal Festival.
Joining Mr. Patacairk, were Mayor Jim Watson, David A. Walden, Secretary-General, Arts Council of Canada, Canadian Commission for UNESCO, and Alan Latourelle, CEO of Parks Canada.
For more information, please contact:
Suzanne Valiquet
613-222-7839
Ottawa’s festival industry members honoured by Festivals & Events Ontario
OTTAWA — Each year as winter draws to a close, the festival community across the province eagerly awaits the announcement of the Top 100 Festivals and Events in Ontario list compiled by Festivals & Events Ontario (FEO) at their annual Awards Gala. This year five Ottawa area festivals were honoured — The Rideau Canal Festival, Canadian Tulip Festival, Cisco Ottawa Bluesfest, Ottawa International Chamber Music Festival, TD Ottawa International Jazz Festival and Winterlude. The Top 100 Festivals and Events in Ontario designation is presented to a select few of more than 2,000 events that occur annually within the province.
Mark Monahan, Founder and Executive Director of the Cisco Ottawa Bluesfest, was inducted into the association’s Hall of Fame, an annual award which has been created to recognize and honour leaders in the Ontario festivals and events industry.
“This is a well-deserved honour,” says Barbara Stacey, Exectutive Director of Ottawa Festivals, a not-for-profit organization that represents festivals, special events and fairs that take place in Canada’s Capital Region, “Besides the incredible growth and success Mark has seen at Bluesfest, he is also a community champion and has been involved in a number of initiatives on behalf of the industry and the tourism sector, as well as programs such as Blues in the Schools and the She’s the One Emerging Female Artist Competition.”
Mosaika, the Sound and Light Show on Parliament Hill that is presented by the National Capital Commission (NCC) was singled out in the category for Best Poster and Best Promotional Campaign in FEO’s Achievement Awards which acknowledge individual festival and event excellence and best practices.
“We are very proud of the calibre of festivals and events presented in Canada’s Capital Region,” says Stacey, who was in attendance at the FEO Conference, “Ottawa is being recognized by more and more people as, Canada’s Festival Capital. It is because we are home to a number of world-class events such as the ones honoured by FEO; and having hundreds of festivals and events taking place through the year, there always seems to be something happening.”
Province provides more than $2.1-million in funding to Ottawa festivals
OTTAWA—The recipients of 2011 Celebrate Ontario funding have been announced, and this year the provincial government’s commitment to several Ottawa area festivals is over $2.1-million, marking an increase of over half a million dollars from last year’s investment.
The twelve festivals benefiting from this year’s funding are the Canadian Tulip Festival, Cisco Ottawa Bluesfest, Festival franco-ontarien, Music and Beyond, Tim Horton’s Ottawa Dragon Boat Race Festival, Ottawa Folk Festival, Ottawa International Chamber Music Festival, Ottawa International Children’s Festival, Ottawa International Writers Festival, Rideau Canal Festival, Summer Solstice Aboriginal Arts Festival, and the TD Ottawa International Jazz Festival.
“It is very encouraging to see an increased commitment from the province,” says Barb Stacey, Executive Director of Ottawa Festivals, a not-for-profit organization that represents more than 50 not-for-profit festivals, special events and fairs that take place in Canada’s Capital Region, “There is no question that these events have tremendous socio-economic impact on the community by providing affordable access to cultural and community-based activities while also attracting more visitors. These events help showcase Ottawa’s identity while also creating significant economic impact that supports increased prosperity, jobs and opportunities for our community.”
Created to help festivals and events improve their programming and services to attract new audiences, increase visitor spending and create jobs; Celebrate Ontario is investing a total of $20-million in 230 events across the province.
By built it … and everyone came
Tracey Tong, Ottawa Metro
Rideau Canal Festival founder Michel Gauthier stands by the statue of Lt.-Col. John By in Major’s Hill Park. Visitors can also see the foundation of By’s house in the park.
Without this man, Ottawa would not have existed.
Over the long weekend, thousands of people celebrated the greatest accomplishment of an English military engineer who is now known as the city’s founding father.
A statue of Lt.-Col. John By looks over his canal from its place in Major’s Hill Park. And yesterday marked the first permanent annual Colonel By Day in Ottawa.
Yet, By died disgraced in 1836, having been accused of overspending his budget on the building of the canal, said the founder of the Rideau Canal Festival.
Read more: By built it … and everyone came
‘A feat of human genius’
By Amira Elghawaby, The Ottawa Citizen
The Rideau Canal was a marvel of engineering, but Lt.-Col. John By never received the accolades due to him and died ‘heartbroken,’ writes Amira Elghawaby.
The statue of Lt.-Col. John By in Major’s Hill Park overlooks the canal he designed and engineered in 1826 and finished in 1832. Lt.-Col. John By never received the accolades due to him and died ‘heartbroken,’ writes Amira Elghawaby. Ottawans celebrate Colonel By Day Aug. 2, 2010.
Photograph by: John Major, The Ottawa Citizen
OTTAWA — Lt.-Col. John By’s statue stands triumphant in Major’s Hill Park, overlooking the canal he designed and engineered in 1826 and which would lead to the founding of a settlement called Bytown and later, Ottawa.
But the royal engineer was anything but triumphant when he was called back to England upon completion of the canal in 1832, disgraced because he’d gone over-budget without authorization. Though By did report regularly to those holding the purse strings in England, costs climbed as he overcame spring floods, hard-rock excavation work, and the scourge of malaria in constructing a canal through a 202-kilometre tract of forested wilderness, explains historian Robert Passfield, author of Building the Rideau Canal: A Pictorial History.
It also happened to be one of the most ambitious canal projects in the world.
Read more: ‘A feat of human genius’
Eco-themed Rideau Canal Festival wraps-up
Festival promotes public interaction with Rideau Canal
Patrons can reflect in love affair with city landmark
By Jennifer Pagliaro, The Ottawa Citizen
OTTAWA-For the third annual Rideau Canal Festival, it’s all about the love.
“This is the time to take a moment and express why they love the Rideau Canal,” says Michel Gauthier, executive director of the festival, which starts Friday.
A four-foot-tall steel heart art installation — “Love Locks,” created by Saskatoon artist Monique Martin — has been stationed just outside the Bytown Museum at the Ottawa locks at the north end of the canal.
Gauthier says organizers are inviting visitors to the scenic location to express their affection for the UNESCO World Heritage site by securing a metal padlock onto the heart.
Read more: Festival promotes public interaction with Rideau Canal
Appreciate Rideau, says festival director
Tracey Tong, Metro Ottawa
Michel Gauthier adds a padlock to artist Monique Martin’s interactive Love Locks art installation outside the Bytown Museum, which allows festival goers to express their love for the canal. (Photgraph by Tracey Tong)
In the summer, we run, cycle and walk alongside it. In the winter, we bring out the skates and go for a spin on its frozen surface.
But for the most part, people take the Rideau Canal for granted, said the executive director and founder of the Rideau Canal Festival.
While there is “a lot of love out there for the canal,” said Michel Gauthier, “People don’t understand that the Rideau Canal is in the same club as the Great Wall of China and the Pyramids of Egypt. It’s a UNESCO World Heritage Site.”
Read more: Appreciate Rideau, says festival director
