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the community in Ottawa

Bells Corners is a suburban neighbourhood in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. It is located along Robertson Road west of downtown, within Ottawa's western Greenbelt, in College Ward. As of the Canada 2016 Census, the community had a population of 9,272.

On the north side of Robertson Road between Bells Corners and Hazeldean was the first of several Nepean sandstone quarries from which rock was taken for the exterior of the parliament buildings, Confederation Building, Connaught Building and what is now the Canadian Museum of Nature. It can be seen also in many smaller buildings throughout the city. Dick Williams, a Welshman who came to Canada in 1902, opened a small quarry in the Nepean formation on the farm of his father in law on lot 3, concession II, Ottawa front. The two began making paving stones in 1912 and in 1916 they were joined by a young Scot, Archie Campbell, a recently apprenticed quarryman. The quarry eventually became known as Campbell's Quarry. Contracts were signed with seven different quarries, but the bulk of the stone for the Centre Block and the Peace Tower came from Campbell's Quarry. According to Campbell "Our first order came from Peter Lyall Construction Company for 1,000 tons of sandstone all for the Parliament Buildings. When we got the parliament job there were several hundred men on the job and they just gobbled up the stone. We couldn't get the stone out fast enough Stone was hauled up to the building site by teams of horses, struggling along poor roads with six ton loads. Each team could make but one trip a day." The quarry continued operation under various owners until September 1962, when the National Capital Commission expropriated the land for part of Ottawa's Greenbelt. Natural Resources Canada offices, laboratories and experimental sites now occupy the quarry and surrounding property.

In 1950, Ottawa annexed the main urban areas of Nepean Township including Westboro, where the town offices were located. A new town hall was then built in Bells Corners at the intersection of Richmond (now Old Richmond Road) and Robertson Roads where Arnold's General Store had been, which was used from 1966 to the late 1980s, when a new Nepean city hall was built at Centrepointe. The City of Nepean was finally amalgamated with 10 other municipalities into the City of Ottawa in 2001.

Once a rural community with many dairy farms, Bells Corners is now a residential, commercial and industrial island surrounded by greenbelt, woods and farmland. For a time Bells Corners was a hi tech area and home to such Canadian technology icons as Computing Devices Canada, the Ottawa based defence electronics company (bought by General Dynamics), which blazed the trail for later defence technology firms in what would become known as Silicon Valley North in neighbouring Kanata. Many of the houses in Bells Corners are in a neighbourhood called Lynwood Village (Bells Corners East), built in the late fifties and early sixties. It is one of the first examples of tract housing in Ottawa. The first area to be developed was Stinson Avenue in 1950. This was followed by Arbeatha Park in 1955 58, and then Lynwood Village proper in 1958 66. In the fifties Nepean had acknowledged the rights of property owners to subdivide their land for housing but usually individual lots were sold to small builders. In Lynwood Village, land speculators Cyril Lloyd Francis and Donald Sim had assembled a vast tract of land. In 1958, they brought in Bill Teron to build the entire subdivision. By 1960, four hundred families lived in Teron's bungalows; another four hundred homes were built in 1961. Many more were built in 1962, 1963, 1964, and 1965. The last area of Lynwood to be developed was the area bounded by Richmond, Robertson, and Moodie Drive in 1966. Today there are over 1700 homes in the Lynwood area. The magnitude of the shift to tract housing is demonstrated by the fact that most of the subdivisions built in Ottawa during the rest of the sixties were the work of three large firms (Minto, Campeau and Assaly/Johannsen). To the west of Lynwood Village is Westcliffe Estates (Bells Corners West), founded in 1969, it is a growing community of over 2000 homes. Assaly Construction and later the Thomas C. Assaly Corporation built most of the older (1969–76) homes in this area. The Westcliffe community is characterized by significantly higher residential densities than other parts of Bells Corners. There is a multi storey housing complex operated by Nepean Housing as well as a multi storey senior's residence and a co operative housing project. The Terrace Drive/Mill Hill area of Westcliffe Estates was developed in 1986. Bells Corners has a reputation as a retirement community, hosting three retirement homes in Lynwood Village and another in Westcliffe Estates. Bells Corners is also the home of Bellwood Estates (formerly the Bellwood Mobile Home Park), consisting of 256 homes. The park was established in 1959 by Ken Hughes. It is now owned and operated by Parkbridge Lifestyle Communities.

Bells Corners is probably best known for the commercial strip along Richmond and Robertson Roads, which is dominated by car oriented retail uses, gas stations, restaurants, strip malls, shopping plazas, and automobile dealers. In 2009, the City of Ottawa designated the strip a Business Improvement Area under the Ontario Municipal Act. Because of the residential development in neighbouring Kanata to the west, the strip is now a major thoroughfare for residents travelling to and from work within the city centre to the east. The amount of daily traffic, particularly during rush hour, can cause serious traffic congestion in Bells Corners. To the north of these roads lie the majority of commercial and industrial businesses, with most residential real estate located to the south. It is now proposed to build high rise condominiums on this strip. There was some considerable controversy over renaming Richmond and Robertson Roads. In the end it was decided to keep the Robertson name for both. The change took effect in 2012.

The Central Canada Railway was chartered to run from the Brockville and Ottawa Railway at Carleton Place through Bells Corners to Bytown. This line opened on 15 September 1870. This was a broad gauge rail line and but was converted to standard gauge in 1880. It was leased and then taken over by the Canadian Pacific Railway on 6 June 1881. The Bells Corners Station was located to the northwest of the community approximately where Fitzgerald Road is now located. In 1915, Canadian Northern Railway (later Canadian National) built its mainline from Ottawa to Brent, Ontario just to the northeast of the community. A new Bells Corners Station was built on Northside Road just west of what was then known as Cedarview Road (now Cassidy Road) and an overpass was built east of Moodie Drive where the two competing rail lines crossed. On 28 February 1957 a Canadian National Continental train hit a tractor trailer at a Bells Corners crossing derailing two diesel units and ten passenger cars. There were only minor injuries to three persons on the train. The junction between the two rail lines, Bells Junction, was not installed until 29 July 1966. On 28 August 1967 at 12:00 noon, CP Rail abandoned what was then known as the Carleton Place Subdivision between McRae Avenue in Ottawa and Bells Junction. The remaining portion westward from the junction was abandoned on January 15, 1990 and is now a part of the Trans Canada Trail from Fitzgerald Road to Carleton Place. The CN line continues to exist only as far as Pembroke and is known as the Beachburg Subdivision. However, this once continental line has been abandoned and CN has removed all of the track between Nepean Junction and Pembroke. This line also served a portion of the Pontiac region in west Quebec. Ottawa Central Railway operated a short line providing freight service on this track from 1998 to 2008 when it was bought out by CN. To this day, there still remains one freight movement per week through Bells Corners on the Renfrew Sub. This train provides Caprolactam to Nylene Canada Inc. in Arnprior.

Bells Corners is an island, surrounded by Greenbelt and farmland. The area of the Greenbelt around Bells Corners is known as the Stony Swamp Conservation Area. It is the largest forested area of the Greenbelt and has a great diversity of trails with interpretive exhibits on the geology and natural history of the area. Those, combined with the many trails that lead from Bells Corners through other natural areas, such as the Trans Canada Trail and the Rideau Trail, provide it with a wide diversity of urban wildlife. Squirrels, snowshoe hares, raccoons, skunks, chipmunks, groundhogs, beaver, and foxes are all native inhabitants. A large deer population makes the Greenbelt home but they can often be found roaming streets and yards at night. Black bears have been sighted, as well as coyotes. There have been unconfirmed reports of a wolf in the area just to the west of Westcliffe Estates. In 2017, wild turkeys made an appearance in that area as well.

In 2010, Bells Corners was the location for the feature length film Going Thru a Thing produced and directed by former Bells Corners resident Jo Marr. Bells Corners is the home of musician Tyler Kealey. New York based jazzman and saxophonist Michael Webster is also a former resident of Bells Corners. Former NHL hockey star and general manager of the Tampa Bay Lightning Steve Yzerman is a former resident of Bells Corners where he attended Bell High School. Author Marion Voytinsky (Face Your Fears, CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, 30 June 2013) is a resident of Bells Corners. The cover of her book features the Bel Air Motel. Iain Reid's novel The Truth About Luck: What I Learned on My Road Trip with Grandma (House of Anansi, 20 February 2013) also references a Bells Corners motel. In the fall of 1956, the first meeting of Radio Control Model Club, later to become the Ottawa Remote Control Club, was held at the Monarch Motel in Bells Corners. Recently the remains of two other area motels were rediscovered in the Greenbelt just to the west of Bells Corners.