Moving the Grounds

City Involvement

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Moving the Grounds

    The exhibition was proudly established in Lansdowne Park 109 years ago, but there was talk of moving the grounds as early as 1921. The Board of Control, an executive panel on city council that no longer exists, had considered moving the exhibition from its original grounds because it needed more space. On November 11, 1921, the Ottawa Journal wrote that the controllers had not yet asked the CCEA Board of Governors what they thought of the idea.

    In any event, the exhibition has never moved from its original home at Lansdowne Park. Commissioner of Works Macallum had an interesting opinion quoted in the above article: "It will always be a small exhibition if it remains where it is now."

    In 1974, the Exhibition Association began officially looking for a new site. Between 1978 and 1988, it considered the Rideau Carleton Raceway, Carlsbad Springs, Goulbourn Township, and near Conroy Road; in 1988, it considered West Carleton; in 1989, it considered Gloucester; and, in 1992, it considered land near where the Corel Centre now sits in Kanata.

    In 1983, City Council decided that Lansdowne Park was too small for the exhibition, and moved that reserve funds be set up for the purpose of financing the moving of the grounds in 1988; but in 1992, the city gave up on the move and let the Central Canada Exhibition remain at the park due to lack of anywhere else to go. They also decided that the reserve fund set up to finance such a move was to go towards beautifying the grounds, including restoring the Aberdeen Pavilion in 1994.
[The Politics of the CCEA] [The Early Years of the Lease]
[The Lease Fiasco] [Lawn Parking] [Moving the Grounds]




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