Why so many Ottawa heritage buildings sit empty and decaying

There could be a ray of hope for Somerset House, one of the city’s derelict heritage buildings that was labelled by Heritage Ottawa a “poster child for demolition by neglect” after a partial collapse 18 years ago.

Restoration work is finally underway at the distinctive three-storey red brick building at the southeast corner of Somerset and Bank Street, which has been sitting vacant and in a “deteriorated condition” since its partial collapse during short-lived renovations in 2007.

The Centretown landmark was among a number of heritage properties on the city’s “watchlist” of vacant buildings identified by city staff during a May 13 update to the city’s built heritage committee.

Staff told the committee they were “cautiously optimistic” about the Somerset House restoration moving forward and were in the “very final stages” of planning approvals before issuing a building permit for the work to begin.

A heritage permit has also been granted for the former Vittoria Trattoria restaurant on William Street, which was gutted by fire in 2019 and left with only its historic facade overlooking Byward Market Square.

Heritage planning staff identified six other properties that were deemed “at risk” of demolition — including the former school board administration building at 330 Gilmour St., the vacant Sisters of the Visitation monastery at 114 Richmond Rd., Magee House at 1119 Wellington St. W. and the St-Marc church at the corner of Lewis and Elgin Street.

Staff said the buildings were placed on the “at-risk” list due to “ongoing issues” with either the properties or the property owners. “We are having trouble getting them into compliance, or we have ongoing calls related to the properties,” staff told the committee.

Heritage Ottawa defines “demolition by neglect” as a building that is allowed to deteriorate despite the efforts of the city’s property standards staff and building bylaw staff to order corrective actions.

“These buildings are vulnerable to adverse weather, age and numerous other factors,” said Hunter McGill of Heritage Ottawa. “These buildings are over 100 years old, and they need attention.”

Here is an update on those six at-risk properties around the city, their history and their possible futures.

Somerset House — 352 Somerset St. W.

Council approved an application to alter Somerset House back in 2019 with a proposed “restoration and stabilization” project that would include a three-storey addition at the back of the building.

Plans called for restoration and rehabilitation of the heritage building that would conserve its cast iron columns on the ground floor, replace windows and restore the original commercial storefront on the facade facing Somerset Street.

Constructed in 1897, the building originally housed a department store and was home to a number of pubs over the decades, including the Duke of Somerset.

The building was granted a designation under the Ontario Heritage Act in 1997, and Somerset Ward councillors and Heritage Ottawa members fought to preserve its status through years of council debate over the building’s fate.

The building was purchased by TKS Holdings in 2004 with plans to renovate the interior, but sustained a partial collapse in 2007 during those renovations.

Owner Tony Shahrasebi submitted several applications to the city since the collapse, according to a staff report, with no action taken apart from the removal of the building’s east wing in 2016.

Shahrasebi submitted a report in 2019 recommending the building be demolished, though reviews concluded the building was not in danger of collapse and could be repaired.

“I’m always surprised at how long these things seem to take,” said Hunter McGill of Heritage Ottawa. “I can’t remember how many times we’ve appeared before the built heritage committee to urge the city — even with the limited tools that it has — to bring pressure to bear on the property owner.

“It really has been a blot on the landscape of an important part of Ottawa’s heritage,” said McGill, who shared that same “cautious optimism” over the building’s future.

“Plans have been presented in the past but nothing ever materialized,” he said. “In its prime, it was very handsome structure and at a very prominent location… This is a prime site. It could be made a very handsome, multi-purposed structure and it simply sat there.”

McGill said some brief excavation work was done in 2024 but there had been no further visible action until work crews arrived on the site earlier this month.

Ottawa Public School Board administration building — 330 Gilmour Street

While a long-awaited resolution could be in sight for Somerset House, the future is less certain for other designated heritage buildings on the city’s at-risk watchlist.

The former Ottawa Public School Board administration building at 330 Gilmour St. in Centretown and the vacant Sisters of the Visitation monastery at 114 Richmond Rd. are both owned by Ashcroft Homes Group, which was forced into receivership earlier this year.

Somerset Coun. Ariel Troster told the committee on May 13 the sprawling heritage building on Gilmour Street has been “utterly neglected and is also a significant source of concern for the community.”

Troster, along with fellow Coun. Jeff Leiper, have been vocal in calling for more legislative tools to force property owners to comply with city orders and to give owners incentives to build once proposed restorations and developments meet city approvals.

“It is enormously frustrating when a community is very mad and saying, ‘Surely there’s something you can do.’ And beyond shoring up a building that could be falling over or enforcing bylaws around basic property maintenance, there’s very little financial disincentive for a developer that wants to buy heritage property and just sit on it,” Troster said. “This is an entire block in Centretown that has been sitting empty.”

The original structure was built in 1922 and was the site of the administrative offices for the former Ottawa Public School Board. The building has been vacant since the land was purchased in 2001 by Ashcroft Homes.

Following a lengthy approval process, Ashcroft received permission in 2008 to construct a retirement home.

“But they’ve never gone ahead with it,” McGill said. “For those of us who walk by it on a daily basis, it doesn’t appear they’ve done any maintenance unless the city has compelled them to do so.”

The building is boarded up and overgrown with fencing erected around the perimeter, McGill said, with sections of the roof that have fallen into disrepair.

“There’s no question that converting the building and restoring and stabilizing it would not be an inexpensive proposition, but, considering the history of the building and the potential for alternative uses… it would be very worthwhile.

“Even in its deteriorated state, with the right uses, it would be a very handsome and useful addition to Centretown life.”

City staff said the building was one of 10 watchlisted properties that was visited last fall by a team of heritage planning staff and bylaw and building code services officials.

Conservation authorities submitted engineering reports on each building and staff issued “a number of orders” and notices of violations to the building owners.

The orders were “particularly relevant” for the Ashcroft-owned properties on Gilmour Street and Richmond Road, staff said, “where we are seeing ongoing issues and concerns from the structural engineer about the condition of the buildings.”

Sisters of the Visitation Convent — 114 Richmond Rd.

Kitchissippi Coun. Jeff Leiper vented his frustrations with the years-long standstill over the Ashcroft-owned Sisters of the Visitation Convent on Richmond Road.

The historic convent just west of Island Park Drive was purchased in 1910 by the secluded and cloistered order of nuns, Sisters of the Visitation of Holy Mary, who resided in the three-storey stone villa and monastery until 2008, when only eight nuns remained.

The stone villa, named The Elms, was constructed in 1864 and 1865, while the monastery was completed in 1913.

The sprawling grounds extend south to Byron Avenue and were once enclosed by a high stone wall, said David Jeanes, who fought to preserve the building’s heritage designation when the convent was listed for sale in 2009 and purchased by Ashcroft Homes.

A years-long debate over proposed redevelopment of the site stalled as “hidden issues” materialized, Jeanes said, making the restoration a very expensive proposal.

“This is obviously wildly frustrating,” Leiper told the May 13 committee. “I am deeply disappointed. We gave that developer permission in 2018 to do a partial demolition in order to do an adaptive reuse. They were very keen to see that. And then simply didn’t take advantage of the permissions that were provided.

“I don’t have any evidence that the developer has done any kind of preventative maintenance in the intervening time.”

Ashcroft, meanwhile, erected condominium towers along Richmond Road featuring two archways that offer a glimpse of the heritage buildings standing behind. Those condo towers were sent into receivership in June 2024 after Ashcroft defaulted on a $6.5 million loan.

The convent has since been listed for sale, and Leiper told the committee he will ensure any prospective buyer adheres to the heritage designation.

“The residents of Kitchissippi, the residents of Ottawa are angry that this developer has not maintained the building, but they’re angry with us as well, and, I think, justifiably,” Leiper told the committee. “I get that the system is not set up to allow cities to go in and and charge people with violations of laws and it is a very cumbersome system, but this one is becoming another Somerset House, and I, for one, will not look kindly on any application to demolish that building if it does find a new owner.”

Jeanes said the heritage designation is not affected by any sale, “So any new owner is still restricted by the existing heritage designation.”

“It was a little walled-in paradise,” Jeanes said. “I would love to see it restored.”

Magee House — 1119 Wellington St. W.

One of the oldest buildings in the city and a cornerstone of the earliest days of Hintonburg, Magee House has been sitting vacant since its southwest wall collapsed on July 24, 2018.

Situated in a bustling commercial district on Wellington Street between Melrose and Sherbrooke Avenue, the building secured a heritage designation in 1996.

That was the “first foray” into heritage designations for the Hintonburg Community Association, said Hintonburg resident and Heritage Ottawa vice-president Linda Hoad.

Magee House was partially built as early as April 1874 and completed in 1881, Hoad said, and was owned by Frances Magee, the matriarch of Ottawa’s prominent Magee family.

Her son, Charles Magee, was a prominent banker and has a different heritage house that bears his name on Lisgar Street, next to City Hall.

Magee House in Hintonburg was leased to Northern Crown Bank in 1908 (which was bought by the Royal Bank of Canada) and remained a bank until the 1940s, Hoad said.

The city’s built heritage committee approved a demolition permit in 2018 after staff found signs of advanced deterioration in the stone walls that had likely been ongoing for 40 years, Hoad said.

City engineers found the mortar had “completely disintegrated” over the decades, Hoad said.

Owner Ovidio Sbrissa did not proceed with the demolition, and two years after the wall collapsed, the building was listed for sale. The demolition permit still exists, Hoad said.

“We didn’t realize it was on the watchlist, because the watchlist is for vacant buildings — and (Magee House) wasn’t vacant,” Hoad said.

Sbrissa, an architect, had been living in the upper floors until the collapse. At one point, he posted his own architectural designs for a redevelopment in the ground floor windows, but no work commenced.

The city stepped in and completed the stabilization work after the wall collapsed, shutting down that stretch of sidewalk for nearly a year.

“We always knew the building wasn’t going to be saved as-is,” Hoad said. “It was expected there would be some redevelopment, but that depends on who would buy it and what their ideas might be… The property is very valuable.

Église Unie St-Marc — 142 Lewis Street (and 325 Elgin Street)

Built in 1900 to house the First Unitarian Congregation of Ottawa, the church was sold to the St-Marc parish in 1965 and was considered the most significant house of worship for the city’s French protestants.

Council approved the demolition of the church tower “for safety reasons” following a partial collapse in 2021.

Following the partial demolition, then-Somerset Coun. Catherine McKenney insisted the building “must be adequately protected to prevent further damage and allow the tower to be stably rebuilt.”

McKenney said the original stone and building materials “should be retained and reused to rebuild the tower where possible.”

The congregation moved to another church on Cumberland Street.

“Restoring and rebuilding to its original condition would be a major undertaking,” said McGill. “And churches typically have limited resources, so unless a government — whether that’s municipal or provincial — is willing to come through with a grant, the congregation is stuck.

“And it’s a shame, because with its location on Elgin Street at Minto Park and its affiliation with the early French-speaking congregation in downtown Ottawa, it is an historic and important part of Ottawa’s heritage,” McGill said.

Vittoria Trattoria — 35 William Street

Heritage planning staff told the May 13 committee that a building permit has been issued for the historic building at 35 William St. in the Byward Market and “is in the process of, hopefully, beginning construction soon.”

The historic building was home to Vittoria Trattoria before the restaurant was ravaged by fire in April 2019. Constructed in 1872, the building was home to a hotel, butcher’s shop and bistro before the restaurant set up shop in 1995.

It was the first building to receive a grant under the city’s Heritage Community Improvement Plan, a financial incentive for designated heritage properties to encourage restoration, rehabilitation and integration of the buildings.

“It usually means the owner is doing restoration work in addition to development on the site,” said Hoad. “In the case of 35 William St., they are restoring the facade of the restaurant and will be adding to the rear of the property an additional two stories of residential on top of the two-storey facade.

The owner will be eligible to receive the grant after the restoration work is completed, Hoad said.

“The work is moving along very slowly, but the owner is intent on restoring it, and restoring it with a heritage character,” McGill said. “They will have to ensure the interior meets current building codes, but, of course, it is in a heritage district, so the consistency of architectural treatment and consistency with its neighbours will be an important element.”

What comes next

The city’s heritage watchlist now includes 47 vacant buildings around the city, with 16 buildings added since the last update to the built heritage committee in December 2024. Most are considered “stable,” but six are listed as “at risk” of demolition. Another 11 properties are diplomatic or foreign-owned.

Heritage planning staff are expected to provide another update to the committee in the fall.

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