Live in Kanata
A planned town of the 1960s that became the country's densest technology cluster, absorbed by Ottawa in 2001 and still, in every way that matters, its own place.
Kanata was not a village that grew. It was designed. In the 1960s the developer and urban planner Bill Teron bought more than 1,200 hectares of farmland twenty-two kilometres west of Parliament Hill and set about building a model community on garden-city principles: a mix of densities rather than a uniform subdivision, a great deal of open space, and a series of separately named communities — Beaverbrook, Glen Cairn, Katimavik, Hazeldean, Bridlewood, Morgan's Grant, Kanata Lakes — each meant to have its own commercial centre and its own character. The first street, Tiffany Crescent, went in in 1964. The second half of the plan mattered more than the first: Teron set aside land for a technology park and offered it to the first companies to come at no cost beyond servicing, which brought Atomic Energy of Canada, Northern Electric and Mitel, and eventually produced the thing people mean when they say Silicon Valley North. Kanata incorporated as a city in 1978, chose its name by referendum over Hazeldean, March and Kairnwood, and was amalgamated into Ottawa in 2001. It is now the most expensive rental market in the region and the one part of Ottawa where the commute is a technology-park commute rather than a federal one.
A town that was designed, and a technology cluster that was deliberately seeded
Kanata sits west of the National Capital Greenbelt, about 22 km from downtown along Highway 417, with an area of roughly 139 km². Stittsville and Richmond are immediately to the southwest, Bells Corners is on the inner side of the Greenbelt, and the Carp River runs through the western part. This guide covers six Ottawa Neighbourhood Study neighbourhoods: Beaverbrook, Brookside – Briarbrook – Morgan's Grant, Glen Cairn – Kanata South Business Park, Kanata Lakes – Arcardia, Katimavik – Hazeldean, and Bridlewood – Emerald Meadows.
Kanata did not grow out of a crossroads. In the 1960s Bill Teron, a developer and urban planner, assembled more than 1,200 hectares of farmland twenty-two kilometres west of Parliament Hill and built a model community on garden-city principles: mixed densities rather than uniform subdivision, a great deal of open space, and a set of separately named communities — Beaverbrook, Glen Cairn, Katimavik, Hazeldean, Bridlewood, Morgan's Grant, Kanata Lakes — each intended to have its own commercial centre and its own character. The first street, Tiffany Crescent, went in in 1964.
The part of the plan that mattered most. Teron set aside land for a technology park and offered it to the first companies that would come at no cost beyond servicing. Atomic Energy of Canada, Northern Electric and Mitel took it, and the technical workers who followed built the town. By the 1990s the Kanata North Business Park was Silicon Valley North; it survived the dot-com collapse and Nortel's failure and rebuilt around BlackBerry, Ciena, Nokia, Cisco, Dell, Mitel and MDA. Kanata incorporated as a city in 1978 — the name won a referendum against Hazeldean, March and Kairnwood — and was amalgamated into Ottawa in 2001.
What you get. Newer housing than anywhere else on this site, on lots that are actually lots, with schools and neighbourhood centres inside walking distance because the plan put them there. The Kanata Recreation Complex and the four-pad Richcraft arena. The Canadian Tire Centre and the Senators. Two 18-hole golf courses, one of them public. And Stony Swamp — twenty square kilometres of Greenbelt conservation area with groomed ski trails and chickadees that will land on your hand — five minutes from most addresses.
The honest version. The commute is the whole question, and the answer is Highway 417. There is no O-Train in the plan for Kanata; the nearest rail interchange, Bayview, is twenty-three kilometres away. If you work in the technology park you have the best commute in the region. If you work downtown you have one of the worst, and a single collision at Eagleson stops the entire thing. The other honest note is price: CMHC put the average two-bedroom rent in the Kanata–Stittsville zone at $2,527 in October 2025, the highest of any zone in the region — Kanata is not the cheap option it was when the tech workers arrived.
- There is no rail plan for Kanata; the nearest O-Train interchange is 23 km away at Bayview
- If you work in Kanata North or the Research Park, this is the shortest commute in the city; if you work downtown, it is among the longest
- The Kanata–Stittsville rental zone is the most expensive in the region — the tech-worker premium is real and it is priced in
- Housing is newer than anywhere else on this site, which mostly means fewer surprises and full central air
- Teron's plan put schools and neighbourhood centres inside walking distance; check which sub-community you are actually in, because they differ
- The Carp River floodplain runs through the western subdivisions — worth checking on any address near it
How Kanata got here
- Early 1800sMarch Township is settled by Europeans along the Ottawa River. Pinhey's Point, the Hamnett Pinhey estate on the shore northwest of the modern town, survives from this period and is now a City heritage site.
- 1960sBill Teron buys over 1,200 hectares of farmland and begins building a planned community on garden-city lines — mixed densities, commercial and residential together, large amounts of open space, and a series of named communities each intended to have its own centre. Tiffany Crescent is the first street, in 1964.
- 1960s–1970sTeron sets aside land for a technology park and offers it to the first companies to arrive at no cost beyond servicing. Atomic Energy of Canada, Northern Electric and Mitel take him up on it, and the influx of technical workers drives the community's growth for the next thirty years.
- 1978The Province incorporates Kanata as a city, out of March Township and parts of Goulbourn and Nepean. The name is chosen in a referendum, beating Hazeldean, March and Kairnwood.
- 1990sThe Kanata North Business Park is known nationally as Silicon Valley North. Digital Equipment Corporation, then Compaq and Hewlett-Packard, occupy the campus; Nortel and Bell-Northern Research build just outside the boundary to the east; and the Palladium, now the Canadian Tire Centre, opens for the Senators in 1996.
- 1998–2006A cenotaph is dedicated in Village Green Memorial Park on 20 September 1998. The Kanata Avenue–Castlefrank Road overpass opens in December 2003 and is renamed the Valour Bridge on 1 December 2006.
- 2001Amalgamation. The City of Kanata, then about 59,700 people, becomes part of the new City of Ottawa — and immediately loses the thing that made it distinct, which is its own council. Residents have been reminding the City of that ever since.
- 2000s–2020sThe population of the former city reaches 98,938 by 2021, and 137,118 counting the Stittsville side of the population centre. The technology cluster survives the dot-com collapse and Nortel's failure and rebuilds around BlackBerry, Ciena, Nokia, Cisco, Dell, Mitel and MDA. What has not arrived is rail: there is no O-Train in the plan for Kanata, and the Queensway is still the whole commute.
The best conservation area in the city is five minutes away
Kanata's eastern boundary is the National Capital Greenbelt — 203.5 km² of federal land, of which the NCC owns and manages 149.5 — and the piece of it on this side is Stony Swamp, about twenty square kilometres with the Jack Pine, Old Quarry and Lime Kiln trails through it, groomed cross-country skiing in winter, and the tamest chickadees in Ontario. Inside the town, Teron's plan left a great deal of open space and a linked pathway system, and the Carp River runs through the western subdivisions. Further out are Wesley Clover Parks, Pinhey's Point on the Ottawa River, and Fitzroy Provincial Park.
The resident's angle: the Greenbelt is the reason Kanata feels like a separate town rather than an outer suburb, and Stony Swamp is genuinely one of the best things about living here. The same Greenbelt is also the reason your commute is what it is — every route downtown crosses the same few kilometres of protected federal land, and there is no room to widen anything.
24 places, with real drive times
Road-adjusted distance and drive time from the centre of the community to each destination, nearest first. Filter by category.
Showing 1–12 of 24 places, nearest first.
Method: distances and drive times are estimated from a representative point near Katimavik, using straight-line distance multiplied by a road factor and a tiered speed model — honest ranges, not routed times. Treat the downtown figures here as the free-flow case: the 417 between Eagleson and the Greenbelt is the most reliably congested stretch of road in the region, and a bad morning is double the number in this table.
Every gym within reach
The Kanata Recreation Complex on Walter Baker Place is the City's west-end anchor — two pools, two arenas, a gymnasium and a fitness centre at municipal prices — and the Richcraft Recreation Complex on Innovation Drive adds four ice pads and a walking track above them, which is where most of the minor hockey in this part of the city happens.
- A 25-metre lane pool and a leisure pool, two arenas, a gymnasium and a full City programme list
- Richcraft Recreation Complex on Innovation Drive has four ice pads and an elevated walking track
- The Marshes Golf Club is the public 18 holes in the Research Park; Kanata Lakes Golf & Country Club is members only
- Commercial gyms cluster in Kanata Centrum and along Hazeldean and Eagleson rather than in the residential communities
| Facility | What it is | Drive |
|---|---|---|
| Kanata Recreation Complex open | 100 Walter Baker Place — the City's west-end anchor: a 25-metre pool and a leisure pool, two arenas, a gymnasium, a fitness centre and a full programme list. Municipal pricing, and the facility most Kanata households build their week around. | 4–7 min |
| Richcraft Recreation Complex — Kanata open | The four-pad arena complex on Innovation Drive in the north business park, with a walking track above the rinks and a gymnasium. It is where most of the minor hockey in this part of the city happens. | 6–9 min |
| The Marshes Golf Club open | Not a gym: the 18-hole public course threading the Kanata Research Park, open to anyone. The other course, Kanata Lakes Golf & Country Club, is members only. | 6–10 min |
| Stony Swamp open | The free option, and the best one: 20 km² of Greenbelt conservation area on Kanata's eastern edge, with the Jack Pine, Old Quarry and Lime Kiln trails, groomed cross-country skiing in winter, and chickadees tame enough to land on your hand. | 11–16 min |
The free option is Stony Swamp, and it is a good one: 20 km² of Greenbelt with groomed cross-country trails in winter, dry footing most of the year, and the Jack Pine Trail five minutes from most Kanata addresses.
Schools inside walking distance, because the plan put them there
Teron's garden-city plan gave each sub-community its own school, which is why Kanata's elementary catchments are unusually walkable for a suburb of this era. The secondaries are Earl of March in Beaverbrook, which carries the west end's International Baccalaureate programme, and A. Y. Jackson on Abbeyhill for Katimavik, Glen Cairn and Bridlewood; All Saints on Kanata Avenue is the Catholic secondary for Kanata and Stittsville.
| School | Board | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Earl of March Secondary School | OCDSB | The catchment secondary on Dumaurier Avenue in Beaverbrook, with the International Baccalaureate programme for the west end. |
| A. Y. Jackson Secondary School | OCDSB | The catchment secondary on Abbeyhill Drive serving Katimavik, Glen Cairn and Bridlewood. |
| All Saints Catholic High School | OCSB | The Catholic secondary on Kanata Avenue, serving Kanata and Stittsville. |
| W. Erskine Johnston Public School | OCDSB | One of the elementary schools in Beaverbrook, and typical of the neighbourhood-centre schools Teron's plan put inside walking distance of the housing. |
| École élémentaire publique Kanata | CEPEO | The French-language public elementary on Rothesay Drive — the only one in the west end, and a long trip for families further out. |
French-language public schooling is thinner here than the population would suggest — École élémentaire publique Kanata on Rothesay is the only CEPEO elementary in the west end. Confirm the current catchment for a specific address with the school board before you buy, because Kanata's boundaries have moved repeatedly as the subdivisions filled in.
Month by month, what living here looks like
Not a highlights reel — the actual annual rhythm, including the dates residents have to remember.
- The worst month for the 417 commute: dark at both ends, and a single collision at Eagleson stops the whole thing
- A daily mean of −10 °C and 59 cm of snow on average — Kanata's arterials clear well, its crescents less so
- Stony Swamp's cross-country trails are groomed and are five minutes away
- Peak minor-hockey season, and the four pads at Richcraft run from six in the morning
- Calabogie is an hour west, closer from Kanata than from anywhere else in the city
- The coldest fortnight of the year — about 16 nights a year fall below −20 °C
- The Carp River rises, and the floodplain through the western subdivisions does what floodplains do
- March break empties the schools and the Queensway briefly behaves
- Sugar bushes open in the Carp Ridge and out towards Almonte
- Stony Swamp's trails are closed or unpleasant for a few weeks while the ground thaws
- The Carp market and the Diefenbunker reopen for the season
- Playoff season at the Canadian Tire Centre, in a good year
- Golf season starts at the Marshes and at Kanata Lakes
- The Carp Farmers' Market's outdoor season begins on Saturdays
- Best cycling weeks of the year on the Trans Canada Trail towards Stittsville
- Sunset near 8:50pm, and the trails and golf courses stay usable well past eight
- Kanata's community events season — the Beaverbrook and Bridlewood associations both run theirs this month
- School ends, and with it the morning arterial congestion around the schools
- The technology park thins out for holidays and the 417 is briefly tolerable
- A July daily mean of 21.2 °C with humidex regularly past 35 — the newer stock here almost all has central air
- Fitzroy Provincial Park and the Ottawa River beaches northwest are forty minutes away
- Peak humidity, and the month everyone discovers whether their air conditioning is sized correctly
- The Carp Ridge and the river beaches northwest are the default weekend, and the 417 west is empty on a Saturday morning
- Back-to-school traffic returns in the final week
- The technology park, the schools and the 417 all come back on the same Tuesday
- The best weather of the year, and the best hiking weeks in Stony Swamp
- Senators pre-season starts at the Canadian Tire Centre
- The Carp Fair runs in the second half of the month — the agricultural fair the whole west end goes to
- The Carp Ridge and the Greenbelt woodlots turn, and Stony Swamp is at its best
- The first frost usually lands in the first half of the month
- Golf season ends, usually abruptly
- Dark by half past four, and the 417 commute becomes a two-way night drive
- The overnight winter parking ban starts — less of a problem here than downtown, because almost every house has a driveway
- Snow tires go on, and in Kanata this is not optional
- Outdoor community rinks open across the subdivisions when the cold holds
- Kanata Centrum's car park becomes the argument for shopping anywhere else
- The first serious storm, and the annual reminder that the 417 west of the Greenbelt has no alternative route
24 photographs of Ottawa and the region
Drawn from the site's shared, freely licensed Ottawa photo library — not photographs of Kanata itself. Filter by category.
Showing 1–12 of 24 photographs.
About these photographs. Openly licensed images geotagged in or near Kanata, found on Wikimedia Commons and served from there with full attribution. Inline photos elsewhere on the page may still come from the site's shared Ottawa library.