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Photo by Danica Mitric and Kseniia Beliae / Carleton University

If the comments left by visitors this weekend were any indication, there’s an appetite for a design that doesn’t completely ignore the original architecture that’s being complemented. “Larco needs to hire these people,” read one. “At least they looked at the site.”

“Every one of these is more imaginative and pleasing than the current plan!” another said.

Photo by Luis Panchi Galvan / Carleton University

Coffman is critical of the public consultation over the past couple of years. “There are two types of consultation,” he said. “There’s the consultation you undertake because you want to get ideas that will help you produce a better result, and then there’s the consultation you do because you want to tick off the box that says ‘consultation.’ I think we’ve had a lot of the latter and not so much of the former.”

The significance of the renovation cannot be overstated, according to Coffman. The building, one of Canada’s great railway hotels, is one of the most beloved edifices in Ottawa. Situated across from Parliament Hill and directly beside the Rideau Canal, a UNESCO world heritage site, it has enormous heritage value. “I’m hard-pressed to think of another heritage site across the country that can surpass where the Château Laurier is in the Parliamentary precinct. It’s been on the back of the dollar bill and on postage stamps. So much of our national narrative is encoded there.”

Photo by Teagan Hyndman and Lauren Liebe / Carleton University

However, Coffman doesn’t expect Larco to greet the students’ new designs with any great interest or enthusiasm, nor does it need to: City Hall has already accepted the company’s most recent design on the condition that it revise the plan to better incorporate the historic nature of the hotel, he said, and that amended design won’t go back to council, but rather straight to the city’s planning committee for site plan approval, where it’s unlikely to be rejected.

Photo by Merissa Lompart and Arkoun Merch / Carleton University

“Planning committee cannot reject a design based on heritage considerations,” Coffman said. “It’s simply not their mandate. They don’t have the jurisdiction. So, essentially, city council washed their hands of it and Larco only really has to satisfy city staff that they’ve ticked all the boxes. So I don’t have a lot of optimism.”

bdeachman@postmedia.com

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