Bank Street parking
Bank Street parking continues to be a contested issue.
Photo: Liz McKeen
Bank Street parking
Bank Street parking is proving to be a contested issue. CBC reported that 50 members of the public had signed up to speak at the March 30 meeting of the city’s Public Works and Infrastructure Committee on the city’s Bank Street proposals, which include reducing the number of parking spaces by 17.
The opinion piece in the March Glebe Report, “On-street parking and main street vitality: finding the right balance for Bank Street,” by Darrell Cox of the Glebe BIA, put forward arguments for keeping parking spaces on Bank. The peicegenerated responses from readers. Here are two of them.
Good public transit is good for business
By Tristano Iafelice
The fundamental issue is the assumption that improving transit, by removing just 7 per cent of parking spaces in the Glebe, is bad for business. This is a complete misunderstanding of the value of that space on Bank Street as well as the role of public transit in a healthy local economy.
Cox puts forth two issues with dedicated transit lanes instead of parking: deliveries and customer access. Dedicated bus lanes would not create these perceived issues. The piece claims transit improvements will be detrimental to businesses, but without any data supporting these claims, we can’t know for sure. We at Strong Towns Ottawa want to create real world data in the form of a year-long pilot project of dedicated transit lanes on Bank in the Glebe. We can collect data on sales, traffic flow, foot traffic and ridership. Afterwards, the City can review the data and make adjustments. Nothing needs to be permanent.
No one can deny that deliveries are essential. The piece puts forth the idea that the on-street parking spaces are frequently and easily used as loading zones, but this isn’t true. If the space in front of a business isn’t available because an empty car is there, deliveries need to go to a side street, where there is often a designated loading zone for them off Bank Street.
The solution to this “problem” is to allow for deliveries for a few hours in the middle of the day in the transit lanes. It’s not an issue for a few buses to change lanes in the middle of the day for a block or two. It is the constant lane changing we need to solve. As long as private vehicles can’t park, the bus lanes will function. This also makes it easier for bylaw officers to enforce these loading zones – they only need to check on the few places with loading zones. It also makes the rules clearer to everyone.
“Access for customers” is an understandable concern; however, the Glebe BIA greatly overestimates how many customers drive and park on Bank itself. The BIA also has no data on how much that type of customer spends. In a November 2025 report “Retail Market & Gap Analysis,” research done for the BIA indicates that “customers…favour walking to the BIA (62%), and the top two identified customer barriers are the ‘Lack of motor vehicle parking’ (370 respondents) and ‘Too many motor vehicles’ (254 respondents).”
Later in that same report, we can see that “lack” of parking is not an issue, it’s only an issue of perception. “Analysis concluded that even if on-street parking were removed along Bank St, there would still be parking available on side streets and in the parkades,” the report says. “However, the businesses who participated in the study perceived there to be an inadequate supply of parking. The study posited that the perceived lack of parking is likely due to the underutilization and lack of awareness about the existing parking garages.” (Emphases are mine.) The data the Glebe BIA commissioned and released does not support the claim that there isn’t enough parking in the area, just that the off-street garage is underutilized.
The “problems” put forth in the piece by Darrell Cox and the “barriers” listed in the BIA’s own data are all solved by the same thing: make transit more viable with dedicated bus lanes. Riding the bus means not needing to find and pay for parking. It also means fewer people taking spaces from those who need them more. Keeping the outermost lanes free of private cars means we can allocate a few hours of the day for loading without rendering the bus lanes useless. This is not even going into the environmental positives, the operational savings for OC Transpo or the improved experience for pedestrians with fewer cars on the road.
Lastly, there is a lack of understanding that improving transit enables more potential customers to come to Bank Street. We hear an outcry from those who perceive they have the most to “lose,” but we don’t get to hear from those who have the most to gain. There is unrealized potential we can’t even measure until we try.
It is time to prioritize people on Bank Street, not empty cars.
Tristano Iafelice is a Centretown resident and member of Strong Towns Ottawa, a local non-profit that advocates for better use of our streets, a financially solvent city, and safer streets through design.
Objective studies are needed
By Anthony Abato
Mr. Cox argues for more on-street parking in part for these reasons:
- On-street parking provides more foot traffic because “customers with mobility challenges, families with young children, and seniors…may find longer walks from off-street lots difficult.”
- It “contributes to the overall feel and safety…[as] research…has shown that parked cars act as a buffer between moving traffic and sidewalks, helping to create a more comfortable pedestrian environment.”
- It provides “visible signs of activity and turnover, reinforcing the perception of a safe community and that businesses are accessible and open for quick visits.”
I’m no scientist, but I don’t think Cox did research to support these claims. I would challenge him to walk Bank Street and talk to people about their experience. My two young kids love to walk and ride their bikes through the Glebe’s residential streets, and they would do it on Bank Street too if it had less car traffic. I’m sure people with mobility challenges would say that replacing parking spots with wider, less congested sidewalks could better accommodate strollers and wheelchairs. And I doubt anyone would say that they wished for more parked cars because it would make them feel more “comfortable” or “safe.”
No, I have not done my own independent research (though I did read with interest the research about Saint-Denis in Montreal, which improved foot traffic by 65 per cent after making it more pedestrian friendly (see the 2023 Active Transportation Study in the Glebe on the GCA website)). I would welcome more objective studies on how to improve foot traffic for the benefit of local businesses. My suspicion is that foot traffic increases with better public transit and a more pedestrian-friendly environment. But of course, I would wait to read reliable case studies and opinion polls.
One thing is for sure. The next time I see a parked car on Bank Street, I will not feel safe or comfortable.
Anthony Abato is a public interest lawyer and a father of two. He and his wife moved to the Glebe from The Netherlands in 2025.