Heron Road Workers Memorial Bridge

Ottawa Mayor Charlotte Whitton initially opposed the plans of Prime Minister John Diefenbaker to build the bridge to ease east–west traffic in the city. In 1961, Diefenbaker's government threatened to reduce the amount of federal grants to Ottawa by the cost of the bridge if the city did not agree to build it. After further negotiations, an agreement on building the bridge was signed by the municipal, provincial, and federal governments in 1964. The original construction plan included two three-lane, bridges, one eastbound and one westbound, and was budgeted at two and a half million dollars. The bridge was slightly north of Hog's Back Falls and was to connect Baseline Road and Heron Road over the Rideau River and the Rideau Canal for both motorists and pedestrians. The City of Ottawa awarded the contract to build the footings of the concrete piers supporting the bridge to Beaver Construction in February 1965. This work was completed by June 1965. The final plan for the project still had two three-lane bridges, but the prestressed concrete bridges would only be 877.5 feet long. In August 1965, the city awarded the bridge construction contract to O.J. Gaffney Ltd and hired M.M. Dillon & Company Ltd as consulting engineers for designing and supervising the project. Each bridge had four spans, for which the concrete was poured in two layers. Work started in fall 1965 on the western spans, which were mostly finished by August 1966. Meanwhile, wooden falsework was used to support the less complete eastern spans still being built. The first concrete layer for the third of both bridges' four spans had been poured back in July 1966 without issue. ==August 10, 1966 collapse==

On August 10, 1966, a shift of about sixty to seventy workers were almost finished pouring of concrete on the eastern side of the partially completed third span of the southern bridge when it collapsed at 3:27 p.m. According to an eyewitness account from a M.M. Dillon manager, the crew had been pouring concrete eastwards from the centre of the span when the western end of the span was flipped upwards and onto the rest of the bridge, bringing it down. Among the dead were Leonard Baird, the project's resident engineer, and Clarence Beattie, the site foreman; the other seven workers who died were Jean Paul Guerin, Omer Lamadeleine, Edmund Newton, Lucien Regimbald, Dominic Romano, Raymond Tremblay, and Joao Viegas. The accident remains the deadliest construction accident in both Ottawa and Ontario history. Inquest and aftermath An inquest into the collapse was completed in November 1966 after a week of testimony from over seventy witnesses. The total cost for the inquest was $100,000. It was led by Ontario coroner H.B. Cotnam, who retained the engineering firm H.G. Acres Ltd to help conduct the investigation. Officially, the inquest was into the causes of death for site foreman Clarence Beattie. The bridge was rebuilt and opened to the public on June 29, 1967. == Later history ==

In November 1987, a plaque honouring the nine workers killed was placed just west of the bridge on Heron Road. In July 2016, after a campaign by the Ottawa and District Labour Council, the Ottawa City Council voted to rename the bridge the Heron Road Workers Memorial Bridge to honour the victims of the collapse. A new plaque was unveiled at the event. == See also ==