Government Conference Centre, Ottawa, Canada


Architect
 Ross & MacFarlane
Date Built
 1909 - 1912
Location
 2 Rideau Street
Description
This building on Rideau Street in Ottawa has been the government's conference centre for 45 years and has been the venue for many important events in Canadian politics.  However, it didn't start out life as a conference centre.  It opened its doors in 1912 as the Grand Trunk Railway's Union Station located across the street from the company's hotel, the Chateau Laurier.

The 'Heritage Ottawa' website has a detailed history of the station building.  They say that it was described by newspapers at the time of its opening as "strikingly beautiful" and, I gather, a distinct improvement on the Gothic design by Bradford Lee Gilbert that was submitted in 1891 but rejected.  In the end the design of Ross and MacFarlane, who went on to design Toronto's Union Station, was adopted.



An article on the Heritage Ottawa site, written by David L. Jeanes, says that, "The building plan and great waiting room copied McKim, Mead & White's Pennsylvania Station, then under construction in New York. The barrel and groin vaulted ceiling, arched "thermal" windows, hollow Corinthian columns, and Roman travertine walls formed a half-scale replica of the New York waiting room. It was an enlarged re-creation of the "frigidarium" of the Roman baths of Diocletian, preserved as Michelangelo's church of Santa Maria degli Angeli.  Around the waiting room were separate rooms for men and women, restaurant, ticket office, and a finely appointed Government room with marble fireplace and mantelpiece. They were entered though the spacious foyer and grand staircase, a tunnel from the Chateau Laurier, and the platform concourse from Besserer Street. A 580 foot train shed, the latest design of American railroad engineer Lincoln Bush, sheltered platforms and tracks along the Canal."  Originally the building had a shallow dome but that was removed in 1956.



It has been designated a Federal Heritage Building in part for its arcitectural value.  The citation describes it as, "... an excellent example of the Beaux-Arts tradition, a design favoured for this building type. The ordering of both the exterior and the interior are related expressions of Beaux-Arts design principles. Exhibiting the full vocabulary of classical forms, the symmetrical composition, large colonnades and arches of the building’s formal entrance and linear facades express the progression of spaces on the interior. As well, the axial symmetry and the progression of the interior spaces, of varying heights and proportions, permit a large, open layout in main spaces. Excellent decorative treatments and materials complement the overall design of the building."



The building continued to operate as a railway station until 1966 after which there was actually talk about demolishing it.  It became the Government Conference Centre in 1968 - 69 which assured its future.  The Government of Canada, Public Works & Government Services website, says, in a piece written on November 21, 2013, that, "This 101-year-old heritage building is in great need of rejuvenation. The rehabilitation of the Government Conference Centre will ensure the preservation of this heritage building and will provide a temporary home for the Senate while the Centre Block undergoes much needed renovations. Once the rehabilitation of the Centre Block is completed, the Government Conference Centre will be made available for other government business and used for generations to come."