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But even if arrangements are made for members of the public to have easy access to the site, the question remains about whether they will travel to the west end of Ottawa to visit the memorial. Would it have made more sense to place the memorial in downtown Ottawa where a large numbers of people work and where visitors to the city tend to congregate?

As Defence Watch has noted before, the military and civilian DND staff who operate at campus will see the memorial. And the families of the fallen will be sure to visit.

But since the site is not in downtown Ottawa, it likely won’t be seen by many visitors to the city, or its inhabitants, unless they want to make a special trip to the west end.

The DND headquarters campus wasn’t the first choice for the memorial.

In 2011, a military working group recommended that the cenotaph instead be located on DND property at Dow’s Lake in central Ottawa.

At the time, three Ottawa venues were considered the most serious options as a home for the cenotaph; Beechwood Cemetery, just east of downtown; the former Nortel site in the west end, and the Dow’s Lake property, according to a July 2011 briefing note prepared for then army commander Lt.-Gen. Peter Devlin.

“When weighing the criteria, the Memorials WG (working group) considered Sanctity to be the most important, followed by Visibility and Accessibility,” Devlin was told in the documents obtained by the Citizen.

The Dow’s Lake option came out on top, followed very closely by Beechwood Cemetery, according to the briefing. One of the main reasons the recommendation was made for the Dow’s Lake site was because it would be the most accessible site for the public as it is a well traveled location, particularly for visitors to the capital.

The former Nortel campus was a distant third (even as a location for a new headquarters, DND staff have referred to the site in various documents as “isolated.”)

Somewhere along the line the decision was made to forgo Dow’s Lake in favor of the west-end Ottawa site. But no explanation why has ever been provided publicly.

(Analysis)