Sparks Street

Sparks Street (French: Rue Sparks) is a pedestrian mall in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. It was a main street in Ottawa that was converted into an outdoor pedestrian street in 1967, making it the earliest such street or mall in Canada.^[1]

Sparks runs from Elgin Street in the east to Bronson Avenue in the west. The Sparks Street Mall, which contains a number of outdoor restaurants and several works of art and fountains, only runs from Elgin to Bank Street. The pedestrian-only portion continues for another two blocks westward. The final two blocks, west of Lyon Street, consist of a regular road, merging into Bronson Avenue heading south.

The mall and most of the buildings on the south side are owned and operated by the National Capital Commission. Buildings on the north side of the mall were expropriated by the Government of Canada in 1973, and are currently operated by Public Works and Government Services Canada.