The excerpt below is from the the CBC story “‘History kiosk’ project uses Ottawa traffic boxes to tell local stories“. The full story is available online.
They’re among the more unassuming, most overlooked parts of the urban landscape.
But this month, more than one dozen traffic control boxes at intersections in Ottawa will be wrapped with archival photos and original art and transformed into interactive history exhibits where — by scanning a QR code — people can learn some of the city’s lesser-known stories.
The Capital History Kiosk project is a collaborative effort between Carleton University, the Workers History Museum, and Ottawa 2017.
The first kiosk, which highlight’s Ottawa’s long love affair with the sport of lacrosse, was unveiled Wednesday on Bank Street at the entrance to Lansdowne Park.
“Lansdowne has been a public space for sporting activity for nearly as long as the country’s been around,” said Lisa Bullock, the Carleton University master’s student who researched the city’s lacrosse history for the project.
“Lacrosse history — which was really big at the turn of the 20th century — was completely missing from the space. There was no streetcar that came down here, quite yet, down Bank Street. But eight to twelve thousand people would come out routinely for games.”