Ottawa

Ottawa, officially the Ottawa Capital District Metropolis (Ottawa CDM; French: Métropole du District capital d'Ottawa, MDC d'Ottawa), is the federal and national capital of the Canadian Republic, and the country's fourth-most populous city, with a population estimated at 2.55 million in December 2020, and a metropolitan population of 4.43 million.

The sovereign state of Canada, which is organised as as a federation, consists of multiple federative states called provinces, each responsible for a majority of domestic affairs, while wider-reaching, national issues, including national defence, economy, climate change, public health, etc. remain the primary responsibilities of the Canadian federal government.

Ottawa is governed as a single municipality composed of 16 boroughs under the jurisdiction of a municipal corporation, led by an executive council with devolved authority from the federal government via statute of the Parliament of Canada; it represents the only locality in Canada not part of any Canadian province or territory. As Canada is officially a bilingual country at the federal level, so too is the federal capital city of Ottawa an officially bilingual city, with all municipal and public communications, commercial advertisements, street signs, other public communications, police officers and all other emergency services like ambulances and fire department vehicles and equipment, hospitals, etc. being functionally bilingual; approximately 45% of residents of Ottawa speak English at home, 37% French, and the remaining 18% various other languages spoken by the city's many large immigrant communities. A 2016 survey found that at least 90% of Ottawa residents are either fluent or semi-fluent in both English and French, the remaining 10% accounting mostly for monolingual English speakers and for monolingual speakers of languages other than English or French.

Ottawa is designated by the Senator of Ottawa and President of Canada as a ceremonial county, and as such is the only Canadian county (ceremonial or otherwise) located outside of any province or territory. Functionally, Ottawa resembles a territory, especially in its relationship with the federal government via devolution. As it consists, however, of a single-tier municipal council rather than multiple municipalities as in the territories or provinces, Ottawa is typically considered a distinct political entity within the federation.

In December 2020, Ottawa (officially the Ottawa Capital District Metropolis/Ottawa CDM) had an estimated population of 2.55 million; this does not include the surrounding metropolitan area (Greater Ottawa), which consists of neighbouring counties and municipalities in the provinces of Ontario and Quebec: together with Ottawa proper (the Ottawa CDM), Greater Ottawa has an estimated population of 4.43 million. In addition to Ottawa proper, Greater Ottawa consists of 22 other incorporated municipalities located in five counties (two in Ontario and three in Quebec). Ottawa is the only municipality in Canada to be policed at the local level by its own police department; it is also the location of the headquarters of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), Canada's primary federal law enforcement agency as well as the main police body within the five territories.

History

From Canadian Confederation in 1867 until 1922, Ottawa served as the federal capital but was a municipality within the Province of Ontario. In September 1922, a nationwide plebiscite was held to determine the status of the federal capital, with 77% of respondents voting in favour of making Ottawa a federal district separate from any province or territory, which it has remained ever since. Unlike many other federal districts around the world, however, Ottawa has representation in both chambers of the Parliament of Canada: one seat in the Senate and 19 in the House of Commons.

Cityscape

As the seat of the federal government, Ottawa is home to the headquarters of all federal government ministries and the great majority of subordinate and independent federal agencies. The central, most populous, and most densely populated borough is Centretown, also known as Bytown (the historical name for Ottawa), which includes Downtown Ottawa and the CBD, Parliament Hill, Chinatown, Lowertown, Little Italy, Sandy Hill and Carleton University. The ten other boroughs consist primarily of semi-urban and suburban neighbourhoods, featuring low-rise condos and apartments, large malls, industrial zones, some neighbourhoods of single-family homes, parks, and even some farmland.