Highway 31 (Ontario)

Bank Street (French: Rue Bank) is the major north-south road in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. It runs south from Wellington Street in downtown Ottawa, south through the neighbourhoods of Centretown, The Glebe, Old Ottawa South, Alta Vista, Hunt Club, and then through the villages of Blossom Park, Leitrim, South Gloucester, Greely, Metcalfe, Spring Hill, and Vernon before exiting the city limits at Belmeade Road.

Bank Street made up much of Ontario Highway 31 before it was downloaded in 1998 (all of it south of Heron Road). Currently it is also known as Ottawa Road #31.

Between Wellington Street and Gladstone Avenue in downtown, Bank Street is a shopping and business development district officially known as the "Bank Street Promenade" and the street is lined with common signage affixed to streetlights and street-level advertising billboards showing this distinction.

The area between Somerset Street West and Gladstone Avenue (within the Bank Street Promenade) is considered the centre of Ottawa's burgeoning gay village, characterized by a small concentration of businesses targeted to Ottawa's gay community. In 2011, the city officially unveiled signs identifying the neighbourhood as Ottawa's gay village, at the intersections of Somerset, James and Nepean Streets with Bank Street.

Travelling south, there exists a shopping district in The Glebe running exclusively along Bank Street from approximately the Queensway to Holmwood Avenue. Bank Street is home to Lansdowne Park where the Ottawa 67's and Ottawa RedBlacks play. Even further south, after the road passes over the Rideau Canal on the Bank Street Bridge, Bank Street is home to the Billings Bridge Plaza and eventually, the South Keys Shopping Centre.

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Wikipedia