Then and Now: York Street

I doubt the horses had trouble parking. That their drivers, eyes scanning the large area, had to roll in a counter-clockwise oval, hoping that someone would exit a store, bar, restaurant, or nightclub, get into their vehicle, and pull out.

With any luck, the driver would get to that vacated slot before another driver and horse took that space.

Probably not.

Then again, there wasn't a clear parking area. there was no fountain in one of the city's smallest parks (Memorial Park). Back then, around 1911, York Street was full of grocery stores, butcher shops, hardware shops, and more. Where the restaurant, 18, stands, long before it was Guadala Harry's, the building housed a cheese factory. Before then, in 1877, it was the Institut canadien-francais d'Ottawa.

York Street, circa 1911. Photo from Wikipedia.

Today, York Street is still full of life. Some of the buildings are gone, but many still exist. From the outside, they seem untouched by time, right up to the paint on the sides of buildings. But where horse and buggy once pulled right up to the shop fronts, automobiles now vie for a space in the centre of the large boulevard. Parking garages flank the south and north sides of the street.

And, of course, there's that large AWATTO sign.

But without Ottawa, even backwards, there's a giant "AW."

Aw... Joseph Grant's sign, still visible.