Parliament Building Research Articles

A Canadian Dilemma

Whether to think of Canada primarily in its relationship with the United States or as open to the whole world is a dilemma for Canadians and for Canadian society as a whole. Canadian governments' actions at any time are likely to be determined by conflicting interests and pressures of the moment on specific issues.1 The perspective attributable to Canadian society is broader and deeper and may be expected to develop and change slowly over time. So I shall attempt to address the question in a long-term historical perspective.TWO ORIENTATIONSHistorical scholarship shows two conflicting orientations of Canada to the world. They can be represented in geographic terms as an east-west perspective and a north-south perspective. Donald Creightoris work gave a firm basis to the east-west conception of Canada's place in the world. The commercial empire of the St. Lawrence that he wrote about was its first manifestation-the linkage between the production of the great plains of the west, the financial and commercial interests of Montreal, and the transatlantic markets of Britain and Europe, tied in also with the commerce of the Caribbean.2 This perspective, though expressed in economic terms, was not a product of economic determinism. It was as much political and cultural. It reflected the option that created Canada with a strong central government designed to bind the broad extent of the country together and to defend it against incursion from the rising world power to the south. The war of 1812 was as vivid in the minds of Canadians in the years of Confederation as the beginnings of the Cold War are in ours, and at the very time of Confederation the Fenian raids into Canada reinforced that image. The British connection sustained defence of the new country. Transatlantic political and cultural ties as well as economic relations were vital to postConfederation Canada. This was Sir John A. Macdonald's vision of Canada.The north-south perspective was at first primarily a matter of economics but it has also had a significant political and cultural component. It emerged violently and abortively in 1849 in a short-lived annexationist movement led by the English-speaking merchants of Montreal who were the fulcrum in the grain trade between Canada and Britain. They were reacting in anger to Peel's repeal of the Corn Laws in Britain, which had given Canada a protected market for wheat. Adding insult to injury, these merchants and their supporters were enraged by the British crown's endorsement of responsible government, which threatened their local political dominance by giving due representation to the Francophone population. An Anglo mob in Montreal tossed refuse at the representative of the British monarchy and burned down the parliament buildings. Four of the principal English-language newspapers of Montreal supported annexation to the United States. Nothing much survived of this petulance.It was, however, in the 1890s that union with the United States gained a more sophisticated intellectual status thanks in part to the efforts of an Englishman, Goldwin Smith, who had settled in Toronto. Smith had been Regius Professor of modern history at Oxford where he expounded the liberal economic views of Cobden and Bright and contested ecclesiastical dominance in the university. A family tragedy, the suicide of his ailing father, interrupted his life in England and he resurrected his career across the Atlantic as one of the leading lights at the newly founded and secular Cornell University in upstate New York. From there he moved to Toronto where he married a wealthy widow, settled in the Grange, which after his death became the Art Gallery of Ontario, and animated an influential political and literary circle. He may have been the first to play the role of the public intellectual in English Canada.In the British liberal tradition he was anti-imperialist, mainly because of his profound belief in the Manchester school of economic liberalism. …

From Bath House to Parliament Building: The Ambivalence of Colonial Desire

From Bath House to Parliament Building: The Ambivalence of Colonial Desire

Sites of Creation and Contest in Northern Ireland

Symbols provide the material through which communities, groups, nations, and states attempt to "imagine" themselves. Since 2001, we have conducted research, funded by the United Kingdom's Economic and Social Research Council, into the changes in the use of rituals and symbols in Northern Ireland. We wanted to see whether the new political dispensation led to the creation of new symbols reflecting a "new Northern Ireland" or whether conflicts continued around the displays of British and Irish symbols. The dominant paradigm amongst social scientists for exploring identity politics argues that ethnic, national and cultural identity is in a constant state of being constructed and reconstructed in an instrumental, pragmatic way to achieve group allegiance and solidarity. Our research has attempted to explore how this has taken place in Northern Ireland. This paper looks at the way disputes over the flying of official flags have been handled and the way in which Parliament Buildings Stormont, historically and symbolically a bastion of unionism, came to be viewed as an acceptable venue for the new Northern Ireland assembly by Irish Nationalists.

Parliament Buildings and the Sinking of the Titanic

The RMS Titanic was the ultimate symbol of the power and ubiquitousness of the British Empire. Everything was in the finest Edwardian Classic style. The public rooms were sumptuous with a grand Baroque stairway leading into the Grand Salon. There was the first-ever on board swimming pool, a Palm Court, a Parisian Café and a lounge modelled after a room at the Palace of Versailles. On the evening of 14 April, 1912, the ship hit an iceberg. It took two hours and 40 minutes after hitting the floating ice for the ship to go down.
 Construction of the Parliament Buildings in Wellington began in 1912. The finally approved design was an amalgamation of the winning competition entry of John Campbell and Claude Paton and the fourth placed design by Campbell and Lawrence. The design was in the distinct Edwardian Classic image of the British Empire but with only a little of the exuberance of some of Campbell's Imperial Baroque work. Interestingly, the building displayed some New Zealand character, most notably in the use of materials and in the Māori Affairs Committee Room. The building was not completed, half finished, until 1922.
 This paper discusses the nature of the entries to the Parliament Building competition and the politics surrounding the event. It focuses on the architecture of John Campbell, most notably his affinity for the Edwardian Classical style. The paper explores the significance of the style in the New Zealand context and conjectures on other influences that might have held some sway. Finally, the paper suggests the building might have benefited from suffering a fate similar to that of the Titanic.

The Politics of Empire and the Architecture of Identity: Public Architecture in New Zealand 1900-1918

During the period from 1900 to 1918 new governmental buildings were constructed throughout New Zealand as part of a campaign to provide accommodation for government departments. Post offices, court houses and departmental buildings appeared in provincial towns as well as in major cities, almost all products of the government's architectural office, led by John Campbell. The exuberant Imperial Baroque style adopted for these buildings reflects a new national confidence but also follows closely the precedent of British public building of the period. Auckland's former Chief Post Office (1908-11) for example, is closely modelled on Sir Henry Tanner's Central Post Office in London (1907).
 The extent and consistency of the Government's building programme was intended to promote a sense of national unity although its dependence on British models seems to confirm Hurst Seager's argument that New Zealand had yet to develop a distinctive architectural style. The use of the Imperial Baroque style, culminating in Campbell's design for Parliament Buildings of 1911, reflected New Zealand's strong sense of identification with the British Empire, also expressed through the contributions of its politicians at Imperial Conferences from 1897 to 1911. Unlike their counterparts from Canada and Australia, New Zealand politicians argued for stronger imperial bonds as a way of ensuring greater influence over imperial policies. This paper will argue that in fact, New Zealand public architecture of the period 1900-18 reflects a clear sense of national identity but one that is defined in terms of Britishness and conceived within the larger framework of the security provided by imperial solidarity.

William Henry Dunning: The Quiet Man

Tasmanian-born architect William Henry Dunning (1872-1933) commenced his New Zealand practice in Timaru in 1907. Initially trained in Hobart, under the notable church designer Alexander North, Dunning's experience as a colonial architect was further extended in Cape Town. His association with fellow Tasmanians Alfred and Sidney Luttrell drew him to Dunedin where he supervised the construction of the New Zealand Express Company Building.
 Dunning was an ambitious architect. His competition entries included designs for the New Zealand Parliament Buildings (1911) and the Auckland War Memorial Museum (1922). Despite the quality of his work, and efforts towards self-promotion, Dunning's most significant contribution to the city's architecture, the National Bank (1911) has been frequently attributed to another designer. The remainder of his work is also little known. This paper seeks to explore the ways in which architects asserted authorship during the period and will attempt to map the shifting responsibilities between architects and builders that allowed Dunning's contribution to the National Bank project to become obscured.

Spring in Victoria

Victoria, British Columbia was an inspired choice as the site of the 2004 joint meeting of the ASEH and NCPH. A compact city, Victoria’s downtown, alone, is home to dozens of sites—from gardens to heritage houses and museums to the monumental Parliament Building—in which cultural and environmental histories are enmeshed. Vital elements among these projects include the cultural conservation efforts launched by the island’s First Nations peoples under the auspices of national and provincial institutions and in autonomous contexts. The wealth of sites and exhibitions is testament to the enthusiasm with which municipal, regional, and national pasts are debated, recalled, and conserved by both professional historians and the broader public. And the city’s 2002 “Heritage Strategic Plan” (www.city.victoria.bc.ca/common/ pdfs/heritage_strategicplan.pdf ) offers ample evidence of the serious and ongoing commitments that municipal authorities have made to incorporate conservation into development and planning goals. With such a varied palette of resources, it was indeed difficult to select sites for inclusion in this special conference city reviews section. The eleven reviews that follow are distinctive in

Excavation and support of underground excavations beneath Canada's Historic Library of Parliament Building, Ottawa

The Library of Parliament in the City of Ottawa in Canada dominates the Quebec side of Parliament Hill. Originally constructed in the 1860s and extensively rebuilt in 1953, the Library remains as one of three original buildings on the Hill. As existing space on Parliament Hill is at a premium and heritage and sensitive historic, visual and environmental requirements necessitated that all existing structures would remain visually unaltered, measures had to be taken to develop underground space in order to provide much needed upgrading of mechanical, electrical, heating and ventilation services to standards appropriate for preservation of the Library's collections. Precedent had been set two years previously in construction of the Centre Block Underground Services Building by deep excavation into the rock mass beneath the perimeter and main chamber of the House of Commons that, with careful excavation and a comprehensive program of sequenced rock support installation, excavation could be undertaken in close proximity or even under the actual building structures. For the Library the key challenge was being able to develop sufficient underground space without compromising the stability of the fragile masonry building structure. Achieving this has required detailed design of complex excavation geometries and implementation of stringent control procedures to ensure that the required quality of excavations was achieved. Optimization studies lead to development of a concept involving excavation of an 8 m deep, 20 m diameter excavation, concentrically located directly beneath the core of the structure with associated cross tunnels, stairs, and an elevator, together with angled raise bores to facilitate the necessary services. Design of the excavations and of the monitoring arrays of instrumentation and detailed supervision of the excavation works has been key to ensuring minimal disturbance to the existing building by (i) requiring extremely high standards of perimeter excavation control and (ii) pre-supporting all load-bearing areas of the existing bedrock foundations adjacent to the excavations. Control of excavation sequencing and monitoring of movement behaviour of both the rock and the foundation zones of the structure have allowed control to be maintained of building and rockmass performance. This has been achieved by comparing as-observed movement trends with inferences derived from evaluation of the comprehensive output generated from detailed 2D and 3D numerical modelling undertaken during the detailed design stage. This paper describes the concept assessment, the design development and support detailing, outlines the instrumentation installations developed at the design stage and implemented during construction and then presents some of the data from the excavation response behaviour of the rock mass and structure to the excavation works undertaken within and adjacent to the building. (A). Reprinted with permission from Elsevier. For the covering abstract see ITRD E124500.

Obituary: Ilya Prigogine (1917–2003)

Obituary: Ilya Prigogine (1917–2003)

Leading Labor: Unions, Politics, and Protest in New Democracies

the spring of 1996, against a background of grain shortages, inflation, rising crime, and a dispute over the military's role in the NATO alliance, the Bulgarian Democratic Left government of Zhan Videnov found itself under intense pressure from parliamentary discontent and mass demonstrations led by the independent trade union Podkrepa. To make matters worse, the largest labor confederation, the Confederation of Independent Trade Unions of Bulgaria (KNSB), faced with a rising tide of wildcat stoppages, dropped its initial reluctance to join with Podkrepa and cast its lot against the government. Mass demonstrations organized by Podkrepa and the KNSB resulted in attacks with stones and eggs on the headquarters of the Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP) in Sofia. Protest spread quickly to Plovdiv and other cities, with demonstrations lasting for a number of consecutive days. On January 10 violence broke out when demonstrators attacked the parliament building, and many were injured as the police tried to break through to free trapped parliamentarians. After a month of mass demonstrations and civil disobedience, the president-elect, Petur Stoyanov, resolved the crisis by appointing a caretaker government until elections could be held in April 1997.1 On September 29, 1999, the Executive Committee of the General Council of the Federation of Independent Trade Unions of Russia (FNPR) announced that the total debt on wages in the Russian Federation had reached more than 56 billion rubles; more than 17 million employees at 107,000 enterprises were not being paid on time. As a testament to the leading role which the FNPR plays in defending the interests of Russian workers, the press statement went on proudly: In September alone, strikes without time limit were announced by about 7,000 people at 226 education institutions in six regions of the Russian Federation [Altai and Khakhassia Republics, Volgograd, Smolensk, Tver, and Chita oblasts]. Out of 17 million unpaid workers, only 7,000 teachers were on strike, none in the capital or even in St. Petersburg and most in remote republics of Siberia and the Far East.

Negotiating Beyond Deadlock: From the Constitutional Assembly to the Court

On May 7, 1996 about 50 politicians were gathered together in the Parliament buildings in Cape Town negotiating the final details of South Africa's long-awaited democratic Constitution. There, too, were huddles of advisers, the long-suffering members of the administrative staff of the Constitutional Assembly, and members of the press who, generally absent from the process, had come to record the last moments. Behind the scenes the lay-out team was ready to put the last touches to the document and printers stood ready. Late that night, Cyril Ramaphosa, the Chairperson of the Constitutional Assembly, pleaded with the group in his characteristically ironic fashion: “I know it's late but just 20 minutes more, just 20 minutes – for our Constitution which is for the next 20 years, no, 50 years, 100 years, 200 years. …”

Street Scene: Berlin's Strasse des 17 Juni and the Performance of (Dis)unity

One of Berlin's most prominent streets, named after the East German workers' uprising of 1953 (in which Brecht was controversially implicated), serves as the performative location for Nicolas Whybrow's topographical interrogation of the politics of German nationhood. Particular attention is given to the new parliament building, the Reichstag, which has been out of action for the majority of its troubled history. The article considers attempts to perform democracy and unity since the fall of the Wall through various mediations, including Norman Foster's refunctioning of the Reichstag, Christo's facilitation of its rebirth, and a permanent installation by Hans Haacke which rewrites the building's prominent inscription of 1916, ‘For the German People’. Finally, Whybrow places the annual ‘Love Parade’ in the context of the long history of mass marches and demonstrations on this particular street, and analyzes its claims to be a unifying political event. Based loosely on the Benjaminian flâneur figure's practice of a first-hand experience of the street, incorporating both subjective immersion and detached observation of the revealing ‘detritus of modern urban life’, various tensions and superimpositions are rendered visible as the city undergoes transformation since reunification. Nicolas Whybrow, whose book Street Scenes: Brecht, Benjamin, and Berlin is forthcoming, is Senior Lecturer in Theatre at De Montfort University, Leicester.

Consolidating ‘Ulster’: Regime Propaganda and Architecture in the Inter-War Period

At first sight there can be no more telling example of the distorted and parochial priorities of the Northern Ireland government at the outbreak of the Second World War than its preoccupation with the safety of a statue of Lord Carson. The statue fronts the Stormont parliamentary buildings and a committee had been established to consider how it could be protected from bomb damage at a time when the population of Belfast lacked adequate air-raid protection.1 The government’s action, however, is more comprehensible if seen in the context of Anglo—Irish politics since 1921 rather than the beginning of a conflict whose dimensions and horrors had yet to unfold; and in particular, if it is seen in the context of attempts to create an identity for Northern Ireland so as to enhance its security in a period when its existence was vigorously contested. This paper, focusing on government-related publications, state emblems and, especially, the Stormont parliament building, will attempt to assess the relative effectiveness of that image construction.

Sir James Craig and the constrution of Parliament Buildings at Stormont

Architecture has its political uses: public buildings being the ornament of a country; it establishes a nation, draws people and commerce, makes the people love their native country, which passion is the original of all great actions in a Commonwealth.Sir Christopher WrenWhen the prince of Wales formally opened the new Northern Ireland Parliament Buildings at Stormont on 16 November 1932, it brought to an end over ten years of controversy, delay, confusion, and wrangling over both finance and design. Although approval to build a new parliament house and administrative offices was given in the autumn of 1922, and preliminary work began on the site in 1923, the above-ground foundation stone was not laid until 1928, and the departmental offices were not occupied until April 1931. There is an extensive literature which stresses the political significance of the architecture of civic and public buildings such as parliament houses, law-courts, government offices and even theatres. Other writers have noted the linkages between architecture, empire, nationalism and state formation. Thomas Metcalf commented that distinctive architectural forms ‘sought to manifest the ideals of imperialism’ and were designed to enhance ‘the hold of Empire over ruler and ruled alike’. For architects such as Herbert Baker, classical design, with its monumentality and ideals of law, order and government, was the only architectural form appropriate for the representation of empire. This was an architecture which gave a ‘visible shape to the new imperialism of the turn of the twentieth century’.

Architectural intersections: Museum of Contemporary Art, Helsinki

Steven Hollwon an international competition for the Museum of Contemporary Art in Helsinki, Finland, based on the concept of intertwining or ‘chiasma’. That idea stems from the museum's site, which stands at the point where the city and Töölö Bay, the commercial core and the Parliament building come together. Intertwining also characterizes the form of the building, in which a gallery wing twists over and around a rectangular block, separated by a tall, curving entry hall dominated by a broad ramp. The museum has a few functional lapses, but is generally successful.

A City Beautiful plan for Canada's capital: Edward Bennett and the 1915 plan for Ottawa and Hull

The 1915 Report of the Federal Plan Commission on a General Plan for the Cities of Ottawa and Hull was one of Canada's first comprehensive plans. It was prepared by Edward Bennett, a leading City Beautiful architect, who combined both technical and aesthetic planning. Bennett employed some of the most advanced techniques of the day, similar to the 1909 Plan of Chicago. The 1915 Ottawa-Hull plan is almost unknown today, since it was shelved shortly after it was released. The plan was dogged by a fire in the Parliament Buildings, a European war, poor implementation provisions and reaction against its City Beautiful urban design recommendations. Nevertheless, many of its technical recommendations were implemented by the National Capital Commission over forty years later.

Mortar Study of Mechanical Properties for the Repointing of the Canadian Parliament Buildings

This paper contributes to the ongoing conservation work for stone masonry structures on the Parliamentary Precinct in Ottawa, Canada. A major part of the work focuses on deep repointing of Nepean sandstone masonry. To help define durable repointing mortars, two related test programs were commissioned by Parks Canada/Environment Canada/Public Works and Government Services Canada (PWGSC) in 1994-95; these programs essentially dealt with mechanical properties and frost durability. While work on the mechanical properties is the subject of this paper, a companion paper deals with the frost durability testing [1]. Together they represent the first comprehensive test program on repointing mortars where both mechanical properties and frost durability are examined together. Previous work carried out in the early 1990s concentrated on selected mechanical properties, including the bond between various mortars and masonry units [2]. Throughout the current test programs two basic mortar types were used: masonry cement (MC) and portland cement-lime (PC-L) mortars. Mortarmaterial variables included the type of lime (hydrated types N or S, lime putty, and hydraulic lime) and partial sand replacement by means of crushed clay brick and clay brick dust. At the outset 26 trial mixes were prepared to determine their plastic properties and help select workable mixes for later specimen construction. The trial-mix work was followed by two phases of mortar mixes, including specimen construction for mechanical property and frost-durability testing. While phase 1 involved 17 mixes over a wide range of mortar material variables, phase 2 concentrated on 16 mixes within a narrower range of material variables. Recommended repointing mixes for the conservation work on the Parliamentary Precinct structures came from the refined phase 2 mixes. Because conservation work typically requires relatively low-strength, softer mortars, mortar proportions corresponded to type N or weaker mixes throughout the test programs. The determination of mechanical properties included the mortar's compressive and split-tensile strengths, as well as its modulus of elasticity, and the masonry's flexural bond strength. The test results were judged against a set of performance criteria that represent a first attempt to delineate such criteria for repointing mortars. This paper provides an overview of the mechanical test program for Nepean sandstone mortars, summarizes key results, and gives recommendations for suitable mortar mixes and future work. Further details are presented elsewhere [3].

Women in Parliament caucus for action to end violence

The future of the women's movement depends on MPs in Parliament building open channels of communication with women in civil society. PAMELA SHIFMAN, NOZIZWE MADLALA-ROUTLEDGE and VIV SMITH report on the joint civil society campaign to end violence against women and children

Frost Durability Testing of Stone Masonry Mortars: Restoring the Canadian Parliament Buildings

Restoration of historic masonry is not only a matter of removing failing stone or mortar and replacing it with new. It is necessary to maintain the historic fabric of the structure and ensure that any intervention is reversible. It is also very important to ensure that the repointing effort has a high degree of durability. In much of northern North America and Europe, freeze-thaw durability is key to long-term service life. This is a particular challenge in climatic regions where winter thaws can result in temperature swings from -200C to '+5C and back to -200C in less than 24 hours. Driving rain is often associated with this type of weather pattern. Mortar failure in a single season is not uncommon under these severe climatic conditions. Ottawa, Canada, is in this type of region. Accelerated testing for frost durability of masonry is not a standard test. ASTM C-666 [1], which was developed for freeze-thaw durability testing of concrete, is commonly used for testing mortar; this is an unrealistic test. The durability of masonry is a complex interaction of the mortar and masonry unit. Recognizing this, the National Research Council of Canada (NRCC), Institute for Research in Construction (IRC) developed a frost durability test for masonry [2]. The development of the test was in direct response to the need of Public Works and Government Services Canada (PWGSC) to produce a guideline for specifying for the current, largescale restoration of the buildings that make up the Parliamentary Precinct of Canada's capital city, Ottawa. The results reported in this paper represents the 1994-95 test program of an ongoing investigation. Two phases of mixing were conducted. The first phase investigated a broad range of mix designs and the second a refinement of the favorable mix designs. A companion paper in this issue by Suter et al describes the mechanical testing protocols and details the results. The purpose of this paper is to describe the approach and outcome of frost durability testing of mortars and to discuss those physical properties that appear to relate to freeze-thaw durability. The work was conducted under the umbrella of the Masonry Retrofit Project, which is a strategic research focus of the Institute for Research in Construction.

The Reichstag’s New Dome

The project to revive the Reichstag parliament building in Berlin has included restoring the structure’s original visual profile by rebuilding its large central dome. The new dome, however, is far from a replication. On the contrary, it is remarkable state-of-the-art architectural and structural expression of the renaissance of this historic building as the seat of Germany’s parliament. With its visitors’ ramps and observation platform above a glass floor over the legislative chamber, the concept behind the new Reichstag dome is to open the workings of government to the public.