[Trolley stop #1]
The intense heat broke over the the weekend and Sunday turned out to be an ideal summer day, which I started with an early morning bike ride. My destination was the Rockcliffe Park airport, and my route followed the eastbound leg of the bike path along the Rideau River, then snaked through some streets to the governor-general’s residence at Rideau Hall, looped through the streets along its back border to meet up with the leg of the bike path running along the shore of the Ottawa River, and then followed the river to the yacht club which marked the intersection where a right turn, and a short climb up their service road, took me to the airport’s back field for some plane watching.
[All that's left of the trolley tracks.]
There’s a stretch of the bike path that parallels the Rockciffe parkway that used to be the right-of-way of a trolley line that ran from the mansions of Rockcliffe Park to downtown Ottawa in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. All that exists today are a few metres of track preserved in an approach to the bike path, and some of the private trolley stops that bordered the track. I’ve ridden by these odd pavilions many times over the years and wondered what they were. Well, it turns out they were shelters built by homeowners whose properties bordered the trolley line so they could be a little out of the elements while they waited for their ride into town.
[This is the view looking back towards that track remnant from trolley stop #1.]
[Trolley stop #2. This one's in much better shape than #1.]
[Trolley stop #3. The bike path is still being renovated here; hence, the orange construction fence.]
[And finally some planes.]
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