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Nepean Point Park—A Park for Our Nation in Progress
The competition to redesign Nepean Point offers a transformational opportunity to create a park for all Canadians; a Capital landscape that is able to express the fullness of our nation’s history and also reflect the contemporary panorama of Canada— home to Indigenous peoples, settlers, and new citizens, arriving at a rate of nearly 250,000 each year.
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Location
Ottawa, ON
Scope of Work
International Design Competition
Project Size
6.5ac (26,500m2)
Role
Design Team Lead, Landscape Architecture
Client
Government of Canada, National Capital Commission
Collaborators
John Beaucage (Indigenous Advisor), KPMB Architects (Bridge Design), Blackwell (Engineering), Mulvey & Banani (Lighting), Savira (Cultural Planning)
PUBLIC WORK Design Team
Marc Ryan, Adam Nicklin, Laura Ettedgui, Chester Rennie, Asuka Kono, Guangyu Zhao, Ben Watt-Meyer
Awards
Finalist

12,000 years after glacial retreat carved out the rocky promontory at Nepean Point, more than 8,000 years after the Algonquin First Nations first inhabited the Ottawa Valley and its rivers, and 150 years after Canada’s Confederation, we find our country in unsettled times. The findings of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission have profoundly shaken our understanding of the foundations of Canadian society. We urgently need new public settings for national dialogue, and inclusive venues where the process of rebuilding relationships can unfold over time.

To imagine a park on this unparalleled site overlooking the Ottawa River, amidst such powerful national symbols and institutions, requires a purposefully different approach and perspective. At a time when many Canadians find the idea of the nation elusive, Nepean Point Park will be a tangible work-in-progress space capable of gradually becoming the grounds for the Capital’s most quintessentially Canadian park.

The introduction of pedestrian crossings and a textured streetscape negates the competition’s request for a pedestrian bridge to leap over the road. Our proposal offers an alternate location for the footbridge: Rising along the limestone escarpment, it creates a new approach to Nepean Point from the river trail, completing the recreational circuit and re-centering the Capital Region around its founding landscape - the Ottawa River.

Scraping back the shallow contaminated soils atop the point reveals the underlying raw limestone bedrock, creating a literal and figurative ‘clean start’ for the Point and initiating the cultivation of a process-based landscape. This evocative surface reminds us that today we stand on ancient ground, upon which an open-ended park-making process will unfold over time. An important layer of flexible event/programming infrastructure and equipment for engagement allows the park to support dynamic individual and collective participation at a number of scales. A green arc — a terraced lawn featuring a formal amphitheatre as well as a flexible sweeping lawn — supports the park-in-progress by offering a gathering space and performance venue that is ready to host the nation.