Ottawa West—Nepean

Ottawa West—Nepean follows the Ottawa River between Ottawa Centre and Kanata—Carleton, extending south through more than thirty neighbourhoods of the former City of Nepean. The riding takes in Britannia's heritage homes along the river, the suburban tracts of Bayshore, Centrepointe, Crystal Beach, and Crestview, and the Algonquin College campus that anchors its central section.

Candidates

Anita Vandenbeld (Liberal) — The incumbent MP since 2015, Vandenbeld grew up in Calgary as the daughter of Dutch immigrants and was the first in her family to graduate from university. She built a career in international democratic development spanning more than twenty countries, working with the United Nations Development Programme in New York and Bangladesh and with the OSCE Mission in Kosovo, for which she received the Canadian Peacekeeping Service Medal in 2008. She held degrees from the University of Calgary and a master's in political and constitutional history from York University.

Abdul Abdi (Conservative) — A fifteen-year veteran of the Ottawa Police Service, Abdi took an unpaid leave from the force to campaign for the second time in the riding. A recipient of the Queen's Diamond Jubilee Award for building relationships between diverse communities and the police, he had also volunteered with the Boys and Girls Club of Ottawa and worked with the RCMP on national security matters.

Angella MacEwen (NDP) — MacEwen was a senior economist with the Canadian Union of Public Employees and a policy fellow with the Broadbent Institute. She had previously served in the Canadian Naval Reserve before shifting to economics and spending six years as the economist at the Canadian Labour Congress. She was also a research associate with the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives.

David Stibbe (Green Party) — Stibbe was a high school teacher in Ottawa's west end who co-founded Ottawa City Rafting. He held a Bachelor of Education from the University of Ottawa and a Bachelor of Arts in geography from Carleton University.

Other candidates included Serge Guevorkian (People's Party), Sean Mulligan (Christian Heritage Party), Vincent Cama (Communist), Butch Moore (No Affiliation), and Nick Lin (ML).

About the Riding

Ottawa West—Nepean's character reflects the post-war growth of the former City of Nepean, with many of its neighbourhoods built between the 1950s and 1980s as the federal government expanded and the public service workforce grew. A substantial share of residents were employed in the federal public service, and the riding's proximity to both the downtown core and the technology corridor in neighbouring Kanata gave it a professional, middle-class identity.

The riding's diversity had increased substantially in recent decades. The Bayshore area, anchored by Bayshore Shopping Centre, had become a hub for newcomer settlement services and multicultural community organizations, with growing populations from South Asia, the Middle East, East Africa, and China. Britannia, on the Ottawa River, retained a village-like character with heritage homes, a sandy beach, and a yacht club — a sharp contrast to the more densely developed neighbourhoods further south.

Algonquin College, one of Ontario's largest colleges of applied arts and technology, brought a student population and employment base to the riding's centre. Transit connectivity, particularly bus service along routes that slowed considerably during rush hour, was a persistent frustration for commuters. The aging housing stock in some neighbourhoods, combined with rising property values across the city, had made affordability a growing concern.