The majority of Auditor General Shelley Spence’s 121-page Value for Money audit of the Ontario Place redevelopment centres on procurement. “We found that the CFD [Call for Development] process and realty decisions were not fair, transparent or accountable to all participants as would be required by the Realty Direction, the CFD document, and best practices,” writes Spence.

That language echoes the words of previous Auditor General Bonnie Lysyk, who analyzed changes to the Greenbelt in a 2023 report, concluding that the way the government proposed changes to the Greenbelt “was not publicly transparent, objective or well-informed, and was inconsistent with the vision, goals and processes of the Greenbelt Plan, as well as previous amendments to the Greenbelt boundary.”

Summarizing the Ministry of Infrastructure’s decision-making on Ontario Place, the report points to how, for example, “despite published guidance that contact with government officials was prohibited during the open period, some participants were invited to meet with government officials and high-ranking political staff during the CFD open period.”  These communications included nine e-mails and one call between a Vice President at Infrastructure Ontario and Therme’s legal counsel, an introduction of Therme to the transaction advisor leading the Call for Development, and an invitation to an event at the legal counsel’s firm. Minutes of these meetings—as well as separate meetings between the VP and other participants—were not kept, so there is no way to know what was discussed, let alone assess whether all participants had equal access to the same information.

Rather than following the Province’s standard procurement law, directives, or best practices, the 2019 Call for Development, as well as an earlier call in 2017, were categorized as real estate transactions. This is unusual—other large waterfront developments, in both Ontario and abroad, have proceeded as procurements. In any case, the current process also did not meet the lesser requirements of the Realty Directive, which strives for accountability and transparency. As a result of terms and conditions with considerable ambiguity (for instance, “The Government may select one, none or multiple submissions as part of the process”), a few participants did not invest a significant amount of time and resources into their submissions, sending in a one-page response.

The assessment process itself, in the Auditor General’s summary, “was irregular, subjective, and not always followed.” The process used a qualitative scoring framework, with criteria that were not finalized until after the submission deadline—with the result that a third of the criteria never appeared in the CFD document being referenced by submitters. Criteria were not assigned relative weights, leading to uneven scoring. In many cases, individual assessors’ scores were very different from each other—not unusual in itself—but after a consensus meeting that sought to reconcile those scores, some scores were altered two subsequent times. While assessors were required to score all areas, there were 126 instances (or 11%) where an objective was left unscored by an assessor. One assessor did not score any of the criteria for Therme prior to the consensus meeting. The process did not include a fairness monitor, whose job as an independent third party involves ensuring that the advertised process is followed, and all parties are treated fairly and equally.

One of the submitters, Triple Five Group, was asked to substantially revise and resubmit its submission, which was received 70 days after the submission deadline. This process moved the submission from a consensus score of “low” and the lead assessor writing that they were “unable to assess” the submission, to Triple Five Group eventually becoming the primary comprehensive site-wide solution option.  In other cases, proponents were selected for a short list or further discussions despite ranking lower than others. Due diligence meetings, in which Infrastructure Ontario sought to clarify information and/or confirm assumptions in submissions, were conducted with only six of the 34 participants, despite four additional participants receiving a high score for “Alignment with Government’s Vision” and an additional 13 participants assessed as receiving a moderate score on this criteria.

One of the biggest procedural missteps is that the Call for Developments envisioned two different types of bids: some that would present a comprehensive site-wide solution, and another scenario with multiple single tenants. “The same criteria were used to score these vastly different solutions,” notes the report. The full implications of the provincial costs of each solution were not presented to key decision-makers, even though by taking on its present role as Master Developer, the province has put taxpayers on the hook for public realm, parking, and last mile transit costs totalling over $950 million for the project. The report notes that several of the site-wide submissions includes designs for the public realm, parking solutions, and/or last mile designs, including, in some cases, provisions to pay for these features.

The social and environmental costs of redevelopment were not considered in the redevelopment, either—and the report makes notes that the government’s Rebuilding Ontario Place Act, 2023 exempts the site from key environmental assessments and heritage requirements. As critics have long noted, there was no input sought from the public until after the tenants had already been announced. In the 17 consultations held afterwards, a key sentiment, according to Infrastructure Ontario’s own reporting, was “why now and what’s the purpose; why [wasn’t the] public consulted on partner selection.”

“Taking what the public wanted into consideration from the beginning would have made the process more open and transparent to the public and could have prevented many of the issues, lawsuits, media attention, etc. that have occurred,” says the Auditor General’s report. “Between September 2019 and June 2024, the government has spent $8.5 million on legal fees associated with the 2019 CFD, MZO, lease negotiations and associated work.”

Related:

The Auditor General’s Report, Part 1: The cost of privatizing Ontario Place

The Auditor General’s Report, Part 2: The billion dollar question of parking

The Auditor General’s Report, Part 3: Therme

The Auditor General’s Report, Part 4: Collateral Damage

The Auditor General’s Report, Part 5: The Future, Continued Privatization of Ontario Place

The post The Auditor General’s Report, Part 6: Procurement appeared first on Canadian Architect.

The construction of Therme’s stadium-sized waterpark, the doubling in size of Live Nation’s concert venue, and the relocation of the Ontario Science Centre are considered to be the first phase of the redevelopment of Ontario Place. The Auditor General’s report also notes that a second phase is planned. In a May 2020 Treasury board submission, the Ministry of Heritage, Sport, Tourism and Culture Industries noted that “The approach to Phase 2 is currently under consideration and contemplates the development of a large-scale entertainment destination on a portion of the East Island and mainland.”

A second phase of privatization would, like the first phase, entail considerable public investment.  The Auditor General’s report notes that in an earlier briefing to the same ministry and to the Premier’s office, Infrastructure Ontario “stated that the government would be responsible for lagoon in-fill on the East Island for a larger-scale tenant for the future phase.”

Documents obtained by the NDP and shared by Global News earlier this year appear to confirm that Phase 2 would potentially involve filling in and paving the lagoon, also known as Brigantine Cove—the body of water between Budweiser Stage and Trillium Park. The purpose would be to add to the land available to build on. An August 2022 briefing prepared for the Premier’s office describes this as “Phase 2: Potential Future Development Opportunity (up to 25 acres).”

According to Global News, a September 2020 document explains that “Phase II contemplates development of a large-scale entertainment, retail and restaurant destination on a portion of the East island and mainland.”

What could that “large-scale entertainment venue, retail and restaurant destination” look like? One possibility for the nature of the development—and perhaps even the eventual developer that will be selected—is hinted at in the Auditor General’s report. One of the applicants proposing a comprehensive development on the Ontario Place site as a whole was a company called Triple Five. Triple Five initially received a low score in all categories of evaluation and was noted as having “Insufficient Information Provided to Assess.” But after the consensus evaluation meeting, a VP from Infrastructure Ontario reached out to Big Five to request clarification on submission details, and exchanged a series of further e-mails and phone calls with them—a process that was not pursued for any of the other 10 participants who had similarly provided “Insufficient Information to Assess”. Triple Five resubmitted their presentation 70 days after the deadline, receiving revised higher scores.

Triple Five is a company that, according to its website, “has developed, owns, and manages the world’s first, second and third largest tourism, retail and entertainment complexes of its kind,” including the West Edmonton Mall, Mall of America, and the American Dream indoor amusement park and luxury shopping mall.

Will the Phase II addition to Ontario Place be an outpost of the West Edmonton Mall? The Ministerial Zoning Order (MZO) for the property only explicitly prohibits “residential, hotel, and casino uses”— and in fact lists “retail stores” and “eating establishments” as permitted uses. And it would be easy enough for the government to explicitly add “shopping mall,” “nightclub,” or whatever they please to this list, as it’s part of a regulation which can be adjusted without approval from the Legislature, with little recourse for public debate or opposition.

Following the Money

The Auditor General’s report revealed substantial increases for public realm spending, both for Therme’s project and in the provincially-led portions of the site.

As noted in an earlier post, the day before the lease was released, Therme apparently confirmed with Infrastructure Ontario that they would be spending $700 million on their project—up from the $350 million stated in their Call for Development submissions and in subsequent documents dating from 2019 to 2024. This included a projected spend of $200 million on public realm work—up from $10 million in previous documents—an astounding increase of 2000%.

This may be, at least in part, an effort to conceal the direct subsidy that the Province is providing to Therme for the construction of these park areas. In addition to constructing a parkade whose spots will be mostly reserved for Therme (over $280M), demolishing the West Island’s buildings and trees ($40.4M), and completing site servicing of Ontario Place as a whole ($391.9 M), the Province is contractually obliged to provide an additional $25 million in direct subsidies to Therme’s construction work—$10 million for its public realm, and $15 million for its shoreline work.

As the Auditor General noted, there is no stipulated minimum spend for construction by Therme in its 297-page contract, so whatever figures are released publicly are of no material consequence to Therme’s actual construction budget.

However, Therme’s original projected spend of $10 million on public realm certainly would have raised eyebrows when the lease revealed a $10 million public subsidy that conveniently offset that amount—and on top of that, showed that the Province was contributing $15 million towards Therme’s shoreline work. This directly contradicts public claims, by the Province and Therme, that the Therme deal was justified in part by the Austrian company paying out of its own pocket for the construction of public parkland. The announcement that Therme is now, supposedly, spending $200 million on parks and public land conveniently conceals the $25 million public subsidy, and restores the narrative that Therme is paying for public parklands, even if the truth may turn out differently.

Is a similar narrative twist in the works for East Island? Infrastructure Ontario has stated that its current estimate for the public realm at Ontario Place is now $500 million, up from its $50 million estimate three years ago. It told the auditor general’s office that “early estimates prior to a fixed design may have reflected early concepts including a basic park of Trillium Park level of design” and that “estimates may not have taken into consideration the considerable site rehabilitation requirements.”

However, the majority of site rehabilitation requirements—including soil rehabilitation, shoreline reconstruction, and even the construction of roads—are accounted for in a separate line item. The $500 million budget amounts to some $18 million per acre, or $413 per square foot. At this price, the entirety of the public realm could be paved in high-end Italian marble. By comparison, the rehabilitation of Toronto’s Portlands amounted to approximately $1.5 million per acre, the construction of Trillium Park (including the raising of the land by a metre) cost around $4 million per acre, and the construction of Corktown Common (including the raising of the land to create a 8.5-metre-high flood protection berm) cost around $7.5 million per acre.

I do not intend to discourage spending on public space, but the number appears to be very large. It raises the question: Has the number been inflated to set the stage for the further privatization of Ontario Place? It is conceivable that the Phase Two development and privatization of East Island will entail an arrangement similar to that of Therme: in which a new private partner is given free rein on a large portion of land, in return for offsetting the cost of building something akin to privately-owned public space—even if that cost-transfer may, ultimately, be an illusion.

Related:

The Auditor General’s Report, Part 1: The cost of privatizing Ontario Place

The Auditor General’s Report, Part 2: The billion dollar question of parking

The Auditor General’s Report, Part 3: Therme

The Auditor General’s Report, Part 4: Collateral Damage

The Auditor General’s Report, Part 6: Procurement

The post The Auditor General’s Report, Part 5: The Future, Continued Privatization of Ontario Place appeared first on Canadian Architect.

Today, I look at two further areas of interest from the Auditor General’s report: the insights it provides about the relocation of the Ontario Science Centre to Ontario Place, and the continued environmental destruction that we might expect to see taking place at Ontario Place.

Planning continues for relocation of Ontario Science Centre to Ontario Place

Even if the Auditor General’s office has questioned the value-for-money proposition of the relocation of the Ontario Science Centre—both in its 2023 and now its 2024 report—plans are continuing apace to move the storied institution to a half-sized new facility at Ontario Place.

The estimate for building and operating a Science Centre at Ontario Place has gone up by $400 million from when the relocation was announced. The new price tag of over $700 million for a new Science Centre includes items that were considered “out of scope” when the business case for the relocation was completed, but that should have been anticipated. These include, for instance, an underground loading zone. To meet functional requirements for the Science Centre, this will likely be a two-storey underground space that also accommodates a bus loop, as well as car drop-off, bus entry, and shipping/receiving for Therme.

The report notes that there was only a single bidder on the $5 million contract for a planning, design, and compliance consultant for the new Science Centre—WZMH Architects is the consultant that was selected for this work. Their Output Specifications document is expected to be completed by early 2025, and the RFP planned to be released to up to three vendors in January 2025, delayed from the original projected date in the RFQ of Fall 2024.

While the government has stated in the past that a new Science Centre at Ontario Place would open “as early as 2028,” it has now told the Auditor General that the new building is expected to open in 2029. The RFP for a temporary location suggests that a new Science Centre may not be ready until as late as 2034.

That temporary location for the Ontario Science, which the government had promised to secure quickly, has not been publicly announced. A memo to Science Centre employees indicated that it may be selecting a conference facility in Mississauga. Meanwhile, the presence of the Science Centre is currently limited to temporary pop-ups at Harbourfront Centre and Sherway Gardens.

While the Auditor General came short of stating that renewing the legacy location of the Ontario Science Centre would represent better value-for-money than relocating it to Ontario Place, the ballooning costs for a new Science Centre supports this conclusion—making the unpopular closure and relocation an even worse proposition to taxpayers.

Continued environmental destruction at Ontario Place

As of October 2024, the report notes, 1,491 trees have been removed from Ontario Place. The Province is planning to remove an additional 298 trees, for a total of 1,789 trees. “Only 149 trees (or 8% of the original tree inventory at Ontario Place) will be conserved on the site,” the report notes. A 2022 arborist report prepared for Infrastructure Ontario had anticipated that while the Therme project would entail the removal of all trees on the West Island, 25% of the overall trees at Ontario Place would be protected.

Most of the Auditor General’s recommendations were accepted by the government, but these largely consisted of pledges to improve of procurement practices in the future. The government rejected the sole recommendation concerning the current Ontario Place project—a recommendation that it implements mitigation measure identified in a draft 2023 Heritage Impact Assessment report.  In its response, the Ministry of Infrastructure curtly “notes the site is exempt from the Ontario Heritage Act.”

The recommendations of the draft 2023 Heritage Impact Assessment report seem to be  relatively modest in the scope of a $2.2 billion project, but based on the government’s response, we should not expect to see them implemented by matter of course. Those recommendations were as follows:

• Site-wide native planting and new landscape features (e.g., berms) to address the removal of extant vegetation, trees and landscape features. It is anticipated that approximately 2,900 trees will be planted within Ontario Place.
• New pathway system to improve accessibility, support pedestrian circulation and address the removal of the extant pathway system
• New pathway nodes and plazas with vantage points for views, to address the removal of vantage points within the extant pathway system and the obstruction of views by new buildings
• New aquatic habitat and boardwalks to create the opportunity for close-range experiences of water and mitigate the removal of the extant waterbodies
• New accessory structures that interpret the design and history of Ontario Place to address the removal of extant buildings

This series will continue with two more parts, looking at the Call for Development process and the possibility for future, continued privatization plans at Ontario Place.

Related:

The Auditor General’s Report, Part 1: The cost of privatizing Ontario Place

The Auditor General’s Report, Part 2: The billion dollar question of parking

The Auditor General’s Report, Part 3: Therme

The Auditor General’s Report, Part 5: The Future, Continued Privatization of Ontario Place

The Auditor General’s Report, Part 6: Procurement

The post The Auditor General’s Report, Part 4: Collateral Damage appeared first on Canadian Architect.

The current post looks at what we might expect of Therme’s development, based on new information provided in the Auditor General’s report.

While the Auditor General’s report has described the Call for Development process for Ontario Place as “not fair, transparent or accountable to all participants,” the government has held steadfast to its plans. Public management professor emeritus Sandford Borins has summed this up in a post he entitled “Ford to Auditor-General: Drop Dead.” “It is clear,” writes Borins, “that the Government is going to ignore the report.”

So if it’s full speed ahead for the Ontario Place redevelopment and for Therme’s waterpark, what can we expect to see in the months and years ahead?

Acceleration of work, early handover to Therme

Based on a review of e-mail correspondence, the Auditor General found that Infrastructure Ontario has been in active discussions since early 2024 to move the handover date up by 11 months, to May 31, 2025, from the original hand-off date of April 30, 2026.

“If the site is handed over to the tenant earlier, once Therme has obtained its excavation permit, it would eliminate the Province’s ability to terminate the lease for convenience,” notes the Auditor General. Pulling out of the lease before the handover will carry a $30 million penalty. However, after the excavation permit is issued, pulling out would be near-impossible—the Province would be required to provide a five-year notice period after 10 years of operations, and pay for the demolition and rebuilding of Therme’s facility at a different provincial site agreeable to the Austrian company.

While the government apparently gave Infrastructure Ontario direction “to terminate the exploration of early site handoff” on November 4, 2024, the work has likely already been completed to secure an early hand-off. Demolition on the West Island was sole-sourced, at an added expense of some $10 million or more—the demolition cost $40.4 million, compared to initial estimates of $5 to $10 million and a later estimate of $31.5 million for this work.

The work may arguably have been accelerated to close Therme’s window to end the lease agreement. If interim utility services are not provided by December 31, 2024, Therme could exercise a right to terminate the lease, and, if the government did not have the site ready to hand over in 180 days, Therme could pull out from the project and charge the government $30 million in liquidated damages.

Will Therme’s Facility be a white elephant?

Public management professor emeritus Sandford Borins, whose analysis I referred to earlier, believes the Therme facility may “turn out to be a classic white elephant.”

This is based in part on the Auditor General’s notes that the proponent was selected with little scrutiny. Red flags were raised by a senior advisor at Infrastructure Ontario that prior to December 31, 2019, Therme Group had an equity value of less than one million euros, and that based on both its 2019 and 2020 financial statements, the company was “not cash flow positive.” These concerns were not addressed before the lease was signed, 12 days after the senior advisor raised these issues. In its submission, Therme presented six projects as evidence of its track record. No due diligence was done by Infrastructure Ontario—if it was, it would have revealed that five of those six projects were not actually owned and operated by Therme.

(Therme’s finances had, apparently, turned around by the end of 2020, but this was well after Cabinet had approved the redevelopment approach on January 30, 2020—at which time only Therme’s 2019 finances would have been available for review. Due diligence was only completed in the following months, when the required money—$100 million—turned up, and the sources of these investments are unclear. The Auditor General notes that: “The lease between the Province of Ontario and Therme includes a financial test. The lease required Therme Group to have a net worth of $100 million. An examination by IO of Therme Group’s 2020 audited financial statements show that Therme had met this financial test per the lease requirements.”)

The amount of rent that the Province will receive—some $1.1 billion over 95 years, or a more paltry $163 million in today’s dollars, accounting for inflation—is tied to the success of the project. The Province accepted Therme’s estimates of the number of visitors it expected—1.6 million visitors in Year 1, and up to 2.7 million visitors in Year 10 (some 7,400 visitors per day)—without any attempt at independent verification. The Auditor General estimates that Therme will break even on the project after 21 years, which Borins notes “is a long time.”

What will Therme really spend on the project?

Therme’s capital investment in the project may, in fact, be less than expected. When the lease was made public, a press release from the Province stated that Therme would be making $700 million in capital investments, including $500 million to build the waterpark and spa facility, and $200 million going towards creating 16 acres of public space.

But in previous documents from 2019 to April 2024, Therme’s investment was expected to be half that amount—$340 million on the facility, and only $10 million on the public realm, for a total of $350 million. Infrastructure Ontario says that the day before the lease details were released, Therme confirmed the doubling of the overall estimate to $700 million—an increase of 2000% on the public realm costs, and 147% on the facility costs. But as the Auditor General notes, there is no contractual obligation with the government for Therme to invest any specific amount in the project, let alone $700 million.

While Therme’s 297-page lease is explicit about the amount it must spend in advertising ($7.5 million during its first six years of operation), it does not stipulate a minimum amount of capital investment that Therme must make in the project itself. “This contrasts with the Province’s lease agreement with Live Nation, which specifies a dollar amount as the minimum capital investment to be made by Live Nation,” the Auditor General notes.

Therme’s contract also obliges the Province to make a $25 million contribution to the bill for work on Therme’s shoreline and public realm.

Infrastructure Ontario’s ability to monitor the build overall, and ensure quality of construction, is undercut by the Rebuilding Ontario Place Act, one facet of which removes requirements for municipal permitting.

The number of jobs that Therme is expected to create has also gone down from 2022 estimates, from 3,290 to 2,000 during construction, and from 848 to 800 during operations. As Borins has noted, in Ontario’s current strong economy, these job numbers are, in any case, an illusion: “If people weren’t employed building and operating the spa, they would be employed doing other things.”

A “commercial village” in Therme-built public areas?

The public areas that Therme is constructing aren’t entirely public: the lease gives Therme the exclusive right to conduct commercial activity and programming on up to 30% of these lands. Journalist John Lorinc has noted that the document gives Therme “considerable latitude to commercialize these areas beyond the walls of the spa building” and notes that “the province has thoughtfully indemnified Therme for anything that happens in these public areas that results in a lawsuit.”

The Auditor General’s report provides a hint at what these areas might end up looking like. In 2023, the Minister of Infrastructure’s Office  directed Infrastructure Ontario to enter negotiations with Ontario Live, despite concerns about an earlier submission by the group, which has close links to Premier Doug Ford. These negotiations identified Ontario Live as the preferred partner for establishing food and beverage services, people-moving infrastructure, and other amenities on the East Island. While contract discussions with Ontario Live were curtailed this July—possibly because of the upcoming Auditor General’s report—there is nothing to prevent the group reappearing as an operator of commercial spaces in Therme’s public areas.

It is plausible to imagine Ontario Live, or another group, constructing something similar to what Ontario Live originally proposed for the East Island, but now in the areas around Therme: a commercial development including “twelve restaurants, office space, and a marketplace, in addition to creating programming for special events.”

Next week, I will examine what the Auditor General’s report reveals about further privatization plans for Ontario Place, and the continued planning for the relocation of the Ontario Science Centre.

The Auditor General’s Report, Part 1: The cost of privatizing Ontario Place

The Auditor General’s Report, Part 2: The billion dollar question of parking

The Auditor General’s Report, Part 4: Collateral Damage

The Auditor General’s Report, Part 5: The Future, Continued Privatization of Ontario Place

The Auditor General’s Report, Part 6: Procurement

The post The Auditor General’s Report, Part 3: Therme appeared first on Canadian Architect.

This piece was amended on Sunday, December 8 to add in an additional scenario for the placement of the parking garage, and information about the “last mile” connection between the Ontario Line and Ontario Place.

In Part 1 of this series analyzing the Auditor General’s 2024 report on the Ontario Place Redevelopment, I broke down how the project has gone from costing the public $400 million to involving over $2.2 billion in taxpayer dollars.

Today’s post concerns one of the biggest ticket items in that cost: the proposal for new parking at Ontario Place. I have titled the post “the billion dollar question” as the estimated cost of providing the parking required in the Province’s leases with Therme and Live Nation ranges from over $280-million to over $1.3 billion dollars.

The signed lease with Therme requires that the Province will construct 1,600 parking spots for Therme within 650 metres from Therme’s entrance. The Auditor General’s report notes that the Province has also agreed to make 1,200 spots available to Live Nation, within 750 metres of its entrance. There is some overlap between the spots—several hundred of the Therme spots will be ceded to Live Nation on concert nights—but overall, the Province has agreed to build a 1,800 spot parkade.

Back in 2021, the plan was to create a five-storey underground parkade on the south side of Lakeshore Boulevard, up against Lake Ontario, with the relocated Ontario Science Centre on top of it. In fact, as the Auditor General noted last year, the relocation of the Ontario Science Centre itself was presented to key decision-makers as primarily to justify this site-wide parking solution.

We have now learned that Infrastructure Ontario’s total capital cost for a five-storey underground parkade, beneath the half-sized Science Centre, is over $1.3 billion. Value-engineering this to a four-storey parkade would still cost $975 million.

Infrastructure Ontario has, due to these high costs, turned to examining options for parking at Exhibition Place, across the street. The Rebuilding Ontario Place Act, passed as part of the New Deal for Toronto, gives the Province broad range to extract lands from the City that would enable the Ontario Place redevelopment, and parking arguably falls within this scope.

There are two large existing surface lots on the south side of Exhibition Place—one just south of BMO Field, and one southeast of BMO field. The southeast lot has been approved for redevelopment as a 7,000-seat e-sports stadium, developed by OverActive Media and designed by Populous, making it an unsuitable candidate for a new parking facility.

The parking lot directly south of BMO field is key to Exhibition Place’s marquis event, the Canadian National Exhibition (CNE)—it houses the entirety of the midway—as well as being part of the IndyCar Series (formerly the Molson Indy), during which it houses grandstands, general viewing areas, and vendors. It is also a vital staging and parking area for other conferences and events held at Exhibition Place. Therefore, any new parking on this site would need to be below-ground. Infrastructure has estimated the cost of a two-storey underground parkade here, providing some 2,125 spots, at over $800 million.

Infrastructure Ontario currently has two “recommended” options, which are less costly, to fulfill its parking obligations. The first is a four-storey above-ground parkade at Exhibition Place. Alternatively, they suggest a single parking level below the new Ontario Science Centre, paired with a three-level above-ground parkade at Exhibition Place. These options are priced, respectively, at over $280 million, and over $400 million.

While no site is specified in the documents, there are two possibilities. Neither is perfect. One is a parkade on the land adjacent to the current Exhibition GO stop (and future Ontario Line Exhibition stop), where the CNE currently houses its kid’s midway. This would take up a potentially prime spot for future development or expansion of the CNE. Moreover, while creating large park-and-ride facilities next to transit nodes may makes sense in the suburbs, it seems like an odd placement in this downtown location—particularly as the parkade would not serve transit riders, but almost exclusively visitors to Therme and Live Nation. 

The other would entail the demolition of Better Living Centre, a modernist structure designed by Marani, Morris & Allan in 1962. This would be closer to Lakeshore Boulevard, and the elevation change of the site (which sits higher than the road) would potentially conceal some of the parkade’s height. However, it would remove a heritage building, and a place which currently serves as a homeless shelter in the winter.

The report also contains a line item of over $60 million for a “last mile” connection between the Ontario Line terminus and Ontario Place—presumably a connection that would also include a stop at the parkade, wherever it lands. A Metrolinx report, referenced in a consultant document about Exhibition Place, mentions options including a shuttle bus, AV shuttle (self-driving buses? a monorail?), and two possible routes for a gondola.

The Auditor General’s report does note that the Province would own the parking garage, and would therefore also collect revenues for it. Financially, the parking structure (exclusive of the last mile connection) would be expected to break even in 28-35 years. But, other investments—such as in healthcare, education, and affordable housing—also involve spending money now, and expecting net financial benefits in the future (such as from the quantifiable benefits of a healthier and more educated population, better able to be productive members of society). Does investing hundreds of millions in a parkade make sense?

It would be fair to also ask whether this substantial investment in parking is justified given the proximity of Ontario Place to the expected terminus of the Ontario Line—a major public transit node—and the existing traffic congestion in this part of downtown Toronto. In short, Toronto drivers already know that Lakeshore Boulevard is a bumper-to-bumper traffic jam for most of the day. How will things look if we encourage—and expect—an additional 1,800 people to drive to this area each day?

The Auditor General’s Report, Part 1: The cost of privatizing Ontario Place

The Auditor General’s Report, Part 3: Therme

The Auditor General’s Report, Part 4: Collateral Damage

The Auditor General’s Report, Part 5: The Future, Continued Privatization of Ontario Place

The Auditor General’s Report, Part 6: Procurement

The post The Auditor General’s Report, Part 2: The billion dollar question of parking appeared first on Canadian Architect.

This article is part of a multi-part series examining findings from the Auditor General’s 2024 Report. Future parts will be posted in the coming week.

On Tuesday, December 3, 2024, Ontario’s Auditor General released its 2024 report, including a 117-page long analysis of the Ontario Place Redevelopment, on Toronto’s waterfront. The project—which includes a stadium-sized waterpark and spa by Austrian developer Therme, and expanded concert venue by LiveNation—has elicited public concern related to its privatization of public space, environmental impacts, and procurement process. The planned redevelopment is also linked to the closure of the Ontario Science Centre, which the government plans to replace with a half-sized facility at Ontario Place.

The Auditor General’s office noted that the public cost of the Ontario Place redevelopment has ballooned from when the call was launched. While initially, the government anticipated spending $335 million to $424 million preparing the site, the total tally for the project currently amounts to over $2.237 billion in taxpayer dollars.

Where did the extra $1.8 billion in costs come from? This bill includes the much-discussed parking garage. In the government’s lease with Therme, the Province has agreed to construct a 1,800-spot parking garage, with 1,600 spots reserved for Therme’s use. Its lease with LiveNation includes 1,200 parking spots. While the initial plans anticipated a 5-storey below-grade parking garage under the new Ontario Science Centre pavilion, the cost for this structure was estimated by Infrastructure Ontario to come in at over $1.3 billion dollars. The two currently preferred options are priced, respectively, at over $280 million and over $400 million.

The cost of a new Ontario Science Centre has gone up nearly $400 million. This results largely from additional scope changes. Those big-ticket items were, in my assessment, known but deliberately omitted from the initial business case. They include building a tunnel-and-bridge connection to the Pods, the construction of a basement level with loading dock, and the need for excavation and structural foundation work. The new cost estimates suggest that even in the Province’s faulty business case, the scales would now be tipped in favour of the cost-effectiveness of retaining and repairing the existing Science Centre, rather than replacing it with a new one.

More costs arise from an increase to the costs of demolition on the West Island, and increase in costs for restoring the Pods and Cinesphere. The Auditor General notes that the original contract for repairs to the heritage structures was awarded via an RFP, but that when the work was delayed, the work was transferred to another contractor—without an open procurement, and at a cost of $64 million, in addition to the $32.9 million already paid to the first contractor. That same second contractor was also sole-sourced for the contract for the West Island demolition, at a cost of $40.4 million (up from an initial estimate of $5-10 million).

The Province will also be on the hook for higher costs of site servicing and site preparation, which has doubled from $183.5 million in 2021 estimates to $391.9 in 2024. New costs also  include contributing over $20 million to the Therme shoreline and public realm, and over $60 million to relocate two combined sewer outflows, one of which impacts Therme’s planned beach, and the other of which is expected to conflict with proposed underground construction.

According to the Auditor General, the government has spent $8.5 million on legal fees, related in part to defending itself from court applications related to the controversial development.

The biggest part of the added expenses is an increase to the costs of public realm development—over $500 million for parks, paths, roads, facilities, and landscape at Ontario Place, up from having no budget in 2019, and an estimate of $50 million in 2021. This is, says the Auditor General, directly linked to the government’s decision to act as “master developer” for the site. But this was not pre-determined: in the Auditor General’s analysis, seven of the 10 comprehensive site-wide submissions from the Call for Development “included a design for the public realm, three of which included a provision to pay for the public realm.” Her office’s report also notes that “Seven included a parking solution, three of which included a provision to pay for parking.”

In deciding to select participants responsible for developing parts of the site (Therme, Live Nation, and Écorécreo), rather than a single developer to take on the full site, the Province was also deciding to bear these extra costs. However, no estimates for this additional, significant work were prepared or presented to key decision makers. There will also be additional costs to maintain and operate these spaces.

This $2.237 billion in investments would, in theory, be offset by revenues from Therme. However, as the Auditor General has pointed out, the $1.1 billion in rent payments that the Province has cited is in nominal dollars, over a 95-year period. The present value—that is the concept of today’s dollars being worth more than tomorrow’s dollars because of inflation—means that the near-century worth of rent payments are only worth about $163 million in today’s dollars.

Zooming out, it is worth taking a moment to consider the implicit promise of privatizing large sections of Ontario Place. Such a move was objectionable to many critics, but the government held fast to the idea that it would result in substantial savings to taxpayers—maybe even, some might have expected, a free ride, or close to it. As it turns out, a privatized Ontario Place is not free: in addition to giving away this waterfront land, the Ontario Place Redevelopment puts Ontario taxpayers on the hook for over $2 billion.

The Auditor General’s Report, Part 2: The billion dollar question of parking

The Auditor General’s Report, Part 3: Therme

The Auditor General’s Report, Part 4: Collateral Damage

The Auditor General’s Report, Part 5: The Future, Continued Privatization of Ontario Place

The Auditor General’s Report, Part 6: Procurement

The post The Auditor General’s Report, Part 1: The cost of privatizing Ontario Place appeared first on Canadian Architect.

Under cover of darkness, Infrastructure Ontario began the removal of 865 trees at Ontario Place on the evening of Wednesday, October 2, 2024. Within a single day, workers had cut down the vast majority of those trees.

The work—which includes the removal of every single tree on the western portion of the waterfront site adjacent downtown Toronto—is part of the approximately $200-million in site preparations that taxpayers are funding to prepare the land for Therme, an Austrian spa company, to develop a stadium-sized indoor waterpark on the site.

As the mini-forest was being razed on October 3, the Province released the details of its 95-year lease with Therme, which journalists and grassroots organizations have been seeking for years to obtain through Freedom of Information requests.

The timing, critics say, aimed to distract from the tree removal in progress. It also likely anticipates the expected release later this year of an Auditor General’s report about the lease, which would make public many details about the arrangement between the Province and Therme. (Agencies like Infrastructure Ontario are given early access to Auditor General’s reports in order to provide official responses.)

Hours after the razing of the site began, Ontario Place Protectors filed an emergency injunction asking for the tree removal to stop, pending the hearing of the appeal of its case that questions the Province’s ability to assume sweeping powers over the site, including ignoring its own environmental and heritage laws in redeveloping it. However, the speed at which the work is being done may mean that there is little left to save, even if the injunction is granted and the appeal is successful.

The lease details that Therme has the right to rent the property for 75-years, with the option for a 20-year renewal for a total term of 95 years. While Therme can terminate the agreement with minimal penalties—$250,000, and back-rent to a maximum of $5 million—the Province doesn’t have an easy way to back out.

If the Province ended the agreement today, they would have to pay Therme $30 million. But the window to exercise this option is closing quickly: it only exists until the “first applicable building permit (excavation permit) for initial construction of any aspect of the Project by the Tenant” has been issued. A fact sheet issued to journalists by Infrastructure Ontario indicates that this milestone will be reached around 2025.

After that, the Province can only cancel the contract after the facility has been operational for 10 years. They can then end the arrangement with 5 years’ notice—but taxpayers would be on the hook to pay for Therme’s buildings to be demolished, and for the facility to be rebuilt at an alternate site provided by the Province. This kind of clause has been described as a “poison pill.”

Therme’s rental cost for the prime waterfront site seems well below market rates for Toronto. The arrangement stipulates a “minimum rent” of 3.5% of the assessed land value, indexed to inflation, as well as, beginning in year six, a “performance rent” of 2.45% of Therme’s gross revenues. However, there is also a ceiling to this arrangement, with rent limited to 8% of the land value.

The current assessed land value, as stated in the lease, is $3.5 million per acre—a number that appears to be on the low side, but that Infrastructure Ontario says relates to the existing land-use and zoning rules for Ontario Place. The rent calculation uses the “core area” of the development, which does not include the public areas being constructed by the company. If Therme was to start paying its full rent today, the revenue to Ontario would be a paltry $1.8-4.1 million dollars per year. (The land value will only be reassessed at the 20, 40, and 60 year marks after the lease begins.)

RIP Ontario Place forest. See link to browse a 3D scan of the before and after effects (July 24 -> Oct 24+). https://t.co/eEypROFzNr @ONPlace4All pic.twitter.com/0YZW7iR4MV

— jonclement (@jonclement) October 3, 2024

To reach the higher end of this rent payment, $4.1 million, Therme would need to make $167 million annually in today’s dollars—meaning having an average of 5,300 visitors daily for 365 days of the year (some 2 million visitors annually), and charging each of them an after-tax average of $100.

The Province states that over the duration of the lease, the rent will amount to $1.1 billion dollars—but this figure depends on using the almost century-long term of the lease, and applying inflation to the rent over that term.

It adds that Therme will pay property tax and utilities. But since this is provincial land, at current rates in 2024, property tax would amount to only $10,500 a year. The City of Toronto receives about $1 million in payments in lieu of taxes from Ontario Place as a whole each year; as one of at least three key tenants, Therme’s share would likely be less than a third of this total.

Therme will also be responsible to contribute to ongoing site maintenance, which the government says will amount to $855 million over the term of the lease—but again because of the long lease, this will mean a yearly payment, in present dollars, of perhaps $2.5 million per year.

To receive this $4.3-6.6 million per year in rent and park maintenance, the Province has committed to spending over half a billion dollars in public dollars now.

In order to prepare the site, the Province is contributing some $25 million to flood mitigation, shoreline repair measures, and extending a public trail across the West Island. As Infrastructure Ontario stated in 2022, they are also spending approximately $200 million preparing the site for Therme, and are obligated under the terms of the lease to build and operate a parking garage with 1,600 spaces reserved for Therme customers.

A preliminary estimate for this garage pegged a 2,000-space underground parkade at $307 million. The current plan is to construct a 2,700-space parkade intended to also service the Live Nation concert venue and other visitors to the site. Assuming a straight-line extrapolation, this means the garage will cost some $411 million at minimum, bringing the tally of public investment on site preparations and parking to at least $636 million.

The Province states that Therme will spend some $700 million of private dollars on construction, including $500 million for constructing its 8.4-acre waterpark facility, and $200 million on lake infill, shoreline works, and creating 16 acres of public parkland  intended to compensate for the parkland that is being razed for the development.

However, while access to that parkland will be open to the public, the lease grants Therme the exclusive right to “conduct commercial activity and programming” on up to 30 percent of that park space. This potentially allows for a high density of commercial activity—comparable to the CNE fairgrounds—with food concessions, midway games, toy and souvenir sellers, personal care services, equipment rentals, cabanas, and other amenities that fit under the broad description in the lease of “year-round, inclusive and diverse, family-oriented, indoor and outdoor aquatic facilities focused on fun, health, wellness and relaxation.”

Ultimately, Therme may not even be the one operating those concessions, or even the facility as a whole. The lease allows Therme to sublet 25% of the project and surrounding lands without seeking the consent of the Province, and allows the licensing of the operation of up to 40% of the project and surrounding lands without seeking the Province’s consent.

The entire lease can also be assigned, but in this case, Therme would need to seek the Province’s written consent, and would share a portion of the revenue from such a lease assignment with the Province. In this scenario, Therme would retain a 25% internal rate of return and 70% of the net proceeds above that amount, with the Province receiving the remaining 30%.

While the lease cannot be assigned to a person involved in an illegal business, these clauses would effectively allow Therme to contract out large parts of its operation, on favourable terms, to parties that it selects without outside vetting or public oversight—or to sell the project outright and pocket the vast majority of the proceeds.

This article was adjusted on October 15, 2024 and October 9, 2024 to include updated calculation estimates (by the author) for the annual rent and maintenance payments owing from Therme to the Province.

The post Amid 865 trees coming down, Province releases 95-year lease with Therme appeared first on Canadian Architect.

The Ontario government has been adamant that building a new Science Centre at Ontario Place will be preferable to reinvesting in the Ontario Science Centre at its current site. But such an assessment does not hold up to scrutiny.

In past articles, I have examined how the cost of repairing the existing Ontario Science Centre is far less than the cost of building a new, half-sized science centre at Ontario Place. I’ve also looked at how a new science centre will not be ready until 2030-2034, depriving a full generation of Ontario kids and parents from a full science centre experience.

The current article takes a more granular look at the architectural details of a new science centre, based on currently available information, and what would be lost compared to reinvesting in the existing Ontario Science Centre.

An 18%-56% reduction in exhibition space

The government claims that the current Ontario Science Centre is inefficient in its layout, and that therefore, even though the new Ontario Science Centre has half the footprint, it will have a comparable amount of exhibition space.

But as the Auditor General has confirmed, the current Ontario Science Centre is 568,000 square feet in size, with 134,000 square feet of exhibitions. The proposed centre at Ontario Place is 275,700 square feet, with 110,000 square feet of indoor exhibit space—18% less than at the current Science Centre.

The amount of exhibition space in the proposed centre risks being reduced even further, considering that several key spaces have not been accounted for properly in the government’s preliminary calculations.

In the test fit, school intake, lockers, classrooms, unloading zones, first aid, storage, and exhibition maintenance and prep areas—some 23,226 square feet of functional program in all—were located in the P1 and P2 parking levels. However, as the design of these parking areas has evolved, the allocated space has been given over to other essential logistical needs, including a large underground bus drop-off loop and bicycle parking. As a result, these program elements will need to be accommodated in the above-ground portions of the building.

Another inconsistency is that in the business case, the heritage pods have been counted as being 100% usable space—adding up to some 40,000 square feet—whereas in reality, they will need to contain washrooms, exit stairs, mechanical areas, and corridors. In the test fit, some of these items begin to be blocked in, and the gross area comes in at 32,662 square feet—7,338 square feet less than originally anticipated.

In all, this adds up to another 30,564 square feet of space that is “missing” from the space planning calculations for the centre at Ontario Place. If this space come out of the exhibition areas directly, this means that the exhibition space would be reduced to just under 80,000 square feet—a 41% reduction from the current Ontario Science Centre.

In the relocation business case, exhibitions for the proposed science centre are not fully funded. According to this document, there will be no exhibitions in three of the five pods on opening day—some 20,408 square feet of exhibition. This means that when the proposed science centre at Ontario Place opens, it will have under 60,000 square feet of exhibition space—56% less than the current Ontario Science Centre.

In the currently available drawings, the 130-metre-long underground tunnel linking the science pavilion to the pods is labelled as “Pavilion Gallery Space.” Even though this is far from the optimal location for exhibitions, this comprises some 20,000 square feet of space that may to be “counted” as part of the Ontario Place location’s overall exhibition space. Accordingly, when the proposed science centre at Ontario Place opens, a third of its exhibition space may in reality be lower-quality space, on a basement level, that does triple-duty as a major circulation pathway, building flex space, and exhibition space.

Missing feature areas

What goes by the wayside when a Science Centre’s overall area is reduced by 50%, and its exhibition spaces are significantly reduced? Within the relocation business case, a few key areas are identified. To start, the new centre will not have a large immersive space that replicates the experience of the TELUS Rainforest. Even the business case admits that “this creates a gap in the overall science centre experience,” adding that “a unique and fully immersive experience is what helps create a world class tourist destination.”

There will be no adventure playground, equivalent to the Cohon Family Nature Escape and Science Plaza at the current Ontario Science Centre. “The new OSC@OP has limited outdoor space envisioned in the current plans,” the business case admits.

The planetarium, which was expected to reopen this year, will also be excluded from the new centre. “An immersive state-of-the-art modern New Planetarium is core to the science centre experience,” the report says. “Planetariums are not just for young learners,” it explains. “They welcome everyone from the community to attend public events. A state-of-the-art spectacular planetarium has the potential to engage researchers as scholars interested in engaging with the public.”

A fabrication facility, too, is absent from the plans for a new centre. Creating exhibitions is part of the Ontario Science Centre’s core mandate. It’s also part of the Science Centre’s magic: there is an immediate feedback loop from the exhibition floor to the workshop, that allows the Science Centre’s exhibition designers and fabricators to hone their work in response to visitor behaviour. Observers have noted how this design process would not be nearly as fulsome with an off-site fabrication facility.

The current facility generates $2.5-3 million annually from exhibition sales and rentals. The government’s own pricing anticipates that leasing an appropriate space will cost $420,000 to $690,000 per year, plus an initial design and fit-out cost. While it notes that “ideally there is some proximity to the OP precinct,” the industrial spaces it prices out in its business case are chosen for their proximity to the 400-series highways—not to Ontario Place.

More missing areas

Moriyama Teshima Architects, the firm that designed the original Ontario Science Centre, has compared the size of each major program component in the current Ontario Science Centre with the proposed centre.

In terms of public space, the IMAX theatre increases substantially in size, doubling its capacity from 300 to 600 seats. This is more space where it is not needed: while a large IMAX theatre may be useful for occasional evening premieres, the bread-and-butter of the Science Centre’s IMAX is frequent, daytime showings for smaller audiences. Even the relocation business case notes that the larger “capacity is rarely likely to be reached.”

Almost everything else goes down in size: the building entry and visitor amenities shrink by 43% from 46,200 square feet to 26,650 square feet, education spaces are reduced a whopping 88% from 11,700 square feet to 2,600 square feet, and the OSC School disappears entirely, as do dedicated event and rental spaces.

The lack of education spaces is particularly concerning: it will certainly mean the elimination of special immersive STEM programs geared to high school groups, such as the popular Voyage to Mars and Return to the Moon. The webpage for the OSC School—a specialized program that allows grade 12 students to spend a full semester at the Ontario Science Centre—has already been taken down.

In addition to the noted 18-56% reduction in dedicated exhibition areas, the support space for those exhibitions is reduced by 38%, while overall building support spaces are reduced by 85%, and administrative spaces by 58%. The loss of support space is notable since the hallmark of an interactive science museums is the “host” concept, where staff interact with visitors, and provide demonstrations and assistance in interpreting exhibits. This program requires space both within and outside of the exhibit spaces for prep, storage and staff needs. The dramatic reduction in support spaces, along with proposed reductions of staff by at least 17% in the business case, indicates that this essential aspect of the science centre program will undoubtedly be compromised.

As mentioned in the last section of this analysis, exhibition design and fabrication spaces are absent from the proposed centre. This area is often used as part of “behind the scenes” public tours—another part of the visitor experience which will be lost in the proposed relocation to Ontario Place.

While it makes sense that some areas would shrink in a half-sized science centre, one would anticipate that if the intention was to maintain exhibition spaces at the current size, then the same size of support spaces for those exhibitions would also be required. Moreover, the business plan for a new science centre is premised on growing attendance by 50%—an indication that visitor amenities would need to expand, rather than shrinking by 43%.

From personal experience, the current Science Centre’s cafeteria space is already at capacity on weekends. It is hard to understand how a significantly smaller cafeteria could hope to accommodate a significantly greater number of visitors. In a recent summer trip to Montreal, I visited the Montreal Science Centre, which did not have an operating cafeteria and also had little by way of dedicated student intake area in evidence. At lunchtime, my child and I were obliged to walk through the rain throughout the Old Port area looking for a food concession. In any case, we would have had trouble making our way into the science centre in any case, since the entry area was blocked by summer campers eating brown-bag lunches throughout the hallways—the kind of scenario that would be common in a Ontario Place science centre with insufficient student and visitor support spaces.

Urban design

But what would the proposed science centre at Ontario Place look like? While there are no renderings available, we can get some sense of the answer by considering the immediate context.

Although Ontario Place as a whole is large, the proposed science centre would occupy a relatively constrained site between two private developments: the Therme indoor water theme park and spa, and the enlarged 29,000-capacity LiveNation venue. The Therme development has a footprint of 8.4 acres, comparable to the footprint of the SkyDome. The proposed Science Pavilion’s footprint on the mainland is 88% smaller—about the size of that baseball stadium’s infield.

Detailed plans are not yet available for the LiveNation venue, but its new footprint will be of a similar scale to the Therme development, as seen in publicly available site diagrams.

Architect Brian Rudy of Moriyama & Teshima Architects describes the situation like this: “This diagram strikes me as the most blatant representation of the problem: the massive Therme on one side, the huge future expansion of Live Nation on the other side—with the half-sized science centre squashed in the middle, almost literally as an afterthought. The science centre is like several leftover and insufficient bits & pieces of ill-arranged garnish, sandwiched between two slices of bloated and soggy white bread.” He adds: “How can the science centre possibly stand on its own to create its own identity—let-alone create an environment for inspiration and learning—in this location, squished between these two giant money generators?”

The Science Pavilion occupies a constrained site, against Lakeshore Boulevard and the Martin Goodman trail to the north, and Lake Ontario to the south. There are two entrances to the Pavilion: a car drop-off to the east, and an entrance off an outdoor plaza to the west. (The same outdoor plaza also gives access to the Therme project). Even though some reports say that the building is four storeys high, the “roof” includes a substantial built-up portion, so the true height of the building is five storeys. Overall, it will be around 115 feet tall—almost twice as high as the 60-foot-tall Cinesphere.

The moniker “pavilion” is somewhat deceptive, since “pavilion” usually indicates a low-slung, one-storey-high building. Instead, the science building will essentially form an opaque wall between Lakeshore Boulevard and the waterfront. While this means that the building will block views of the heritage Cinesphere and Pods, the Science Pavilion’s wedge shape allows for glimpses of those structures from Lakeshore Boulevard and the Martin Goodman trail, approaching Ontario Place from the east. From the west, views of the Cinesphere and Pods will be blocked by the Therme development.

In the original proposal, the Science Pavilion sits atop a five-storey, 2,000-car underground parkade meant to serve Ontario Place as a whole, including dedicated parking spots that the province is obliged to provide under its signed lease with Therme. (It is anticipated that the lease agreement with LiveNation will similarly require dedicated spots.) And while there is some discussion about this site-wide parking moving across the street to Exhibition Place, the need will likely remain for the Science Pavilion and Therme entrance pavilion to include two underground levels.

This is because of several shared services that take place in that underground area: notably, a double-height bus drop-off loop, shipping/receiving zones for both the science centre and Therme, and an underground car drop-off zone for Therme. While for many buildings, such services are located at street level, the tightness of the Ontario Place site makes these functions virtually impossible to accommodate anywhere expect underground.

The P1 level also includes an underground link, which would allow for science centre visitors to connect to the exhibition-containing Pods and Cinesphere without exiting the ticketed zone. After traveling through the link, visitors would pop up into a tower squeezed next to the Therme entrance pavilion, from which a bridge crosses over to the elevated pods.

Visitor Journey

As a visitor to a science centre at Ontario Place, you would be dropped off at the east entrance or underground, travel through three floors of exhibitions, then travel through a tunnel and/or series of bridges to see the pods and Cinesphere.

Off the bat, there are some aspects of this journey that are less than ideal. IMAX theatres are typically located near the entrance of science centres, rather than at the end: this allows people to access them as a separate attraction, and also to more easily select a show time without having to account for finding and making one’s way to the theatre. (As a mother with a young kid, I can tell you that making it to a ticketed show, at an unknown distance, for a specific timeslot can be significantly challenging.)

Moriyama Teshima’s office has performed a helpful exercise of diagramming out what this visitor journey would look like, in comparison to a visitor journey at the current Ontario Science Centre. In the current Ontario Science Centre, a one-way trip that includes all of the exhibitions entails a 730 metre walk. In the proposed science centre at Ontario Place, that same trip would be 1.3 kilometres long—almost twice the distance—to see less exhibit space. While good for those counting steps, a longer journey can create accessibility issues: creating an additional burden to those with mobility issues (such as grandparents) or those with strollers (such as parents with kids under the age of 4). It’s an additional measure that points to a poorer experience for visitors.

A risky proposition

The inclusion of a 130-metre-long underground tunnel and some 400 metres of bridges not only creates for a long visitor journey, but it makes the building vulnerable to future major repair requirements.

As architect Brian Rudy explains: “As we have seen, the existing Ontario Science Centre had a vulnerability when the bridge between Buildings A and B was deemed unsafe and closed to the public. While we may debate why the province didn’t immediately set to fixing this 60-metre-long bridge, imagine the vulnerability of the approximately 400 metres of bridge as part of the OP proposal, and then also consider that this bridge is already over 50 years old.” He adds, “Speaking of vulnerabilities, also imagine a 130-metre-long tunnel built right next to—and 2.5 metres below the waters of Lake Ontario [as it is shown on in current sections]. Are we confident that the provincial government 50 years in the future will be willing to invest in a 50-year-old leaky tunnel?”

Rudy also notes that the presence of so many bridges makes for a very inefficient structure—echoing the Province’s key criticism of the existing building. The Province wrote in its business case that “the 568,000 square feet of the [current Ontario Science Centre] is expansive and spread across three buildings and multiple levels, creating a highly inefficient structure…[resulting] in a significant amount of inefficient spaces.” Says Rudy: “While it is hard to argue that the existing Ontario Science Centre is the most efficient building in the world, the Ontario Place proposal will almost certainly be less efficient than the existing Ontario Science Centre—given its constrained five-story pavilion footprint, long tunnels, and bridges connecting relatively small spaces over a vast area. This lack of efficiency will cost more to build, cost more to maintain over the long run, and likely result in further compromises and reductions of usable (ie. exhibition) space.”

Customized design vs. P3

As with most endeavours, the process affects the product. In the case of the proposed science centre at Ontario Place, the architectural outcome will largely be related to the way it is procured: through a public-private-partnership, or P3.

A traditional procurement model for a building is straightforward: the client (Infrastructure Ontario and the Ontario Science Centre) would vet a number of architects, then choose one to work with in designing a building to suit their needs and the site. As part of this process, other sub-consultants, such as engineers and heritage specialists, are brought onto the team. When the design is complete, contractors are invited to bid on constructing the project. This is how all museums and cultural facilities in Ontario and Canada have been designed to-date.

Introduced in 2005 in Ontario, the P3 model is typically used for large infrastructure projects and buildings, including highways, hospitals, courthouses, and sporting venues. In this model, Infrastructure Ontario first vets and hires a compliance architect, who puts together a master specification, known as the Project-Specific Outcome Specification (PSOS). Instead of dictating the final design, this is intended to be a general specification that lists all of the project’s requirements, but doesn’t foreclose opportunities for saving money through a creative solution to those requirements.

Three teams—each consisting of a contractor, architect, and subconsultants such as engineers—are then invited to submit bids that include the price to design, build, finance, and maintain the project for a specified number of years. Once the winning team is selected, they are responsible for the full execution of the project.

In theory, this process results in competitive bidding, taxpayer savings, and the transfer of risk to the private sector. But as auditor general Bonnie Lysk pointed out in a report nine years ago, this is not the reality of how P3s have played out. Because the private sector is taking on financing costs at a higher cost than the public sector, is responsible for higher ancillary costs (such as legal, engineering, and project management fees), and tends to over-price project risks, Lysk concluded that the cost of the 74 projects taken on between 2005-2015 was 29% higher than if the same projects had been managed through traditional procurement—costing the government an additional eight billion dollars that decade.

Yet, P3s remain attractive to governments. This is largely because, despite evidence to the contrary, they still have the appearance of carrying taxpayer savings. In a Design-Build-Finance-Maintain contract—the kind being used for the proposed Ontario Place—project costs are paid for in installments over a long period, usually 30 years. This means that a project can be started while putting little cost on the government’s books, with the majority of costs ultimately passed along to future governments.

For architects, the downsides of P3s are well-known. Bidding for a P3 can involve a massive amount of work that isn’t sufficiently compensated—a significant financial gamble for any office. The selection process generally weighs heavily on the side of lowest cost, rather than the most innovative design. As a member of the winning proponent team, architects work for a developer, not for the building’s users. Often they have little direct contact with the client. On both proponent and compliance sides, reams of paperwork can bog down a project’s progress—as well as the morale of employees.

Many players in the industry feel that overall, P3s also represent poor value for the built environment. With few exceptions, P3 projects fall short of the architectural quality that might have been achieved with a comparable budget, under a traditional stipulated-sum contract.

Because of its complex preparatory setup and legalistic nature, the P3 process also has a longer timeline than traditional projects.

For the proposed science centre at Ontario Place, the government has so far completed the selection of a compliance architect. An RFQ was issued for proponent teams last spring, with submissions due on July 4; an RFP with the completed PSOS is expected to be issued to the finalist teams in early November. At this rate, a proponent team would not be selected until 2025 or 2026. Construction documents and approvals would still need to be completed from that point. Optimistically, construction would not be finished until 2030, with exhibition installation and commissioning taking some months longer.

This timeline correlates with the government’s RFP for a temporary science centre location, which asks for a lease going until 2030, with the possibility of yearly extensions until 2034. As I have written, the only plausible explanation for this long lease is that the Province does not expect the OSC at Ontario Place to be open until 2030-2034—not 2028, as they have been telling the public.

Reopen, renew, and reinvest

Overall, a new science centre at Ontario Place will be a shadow of what we have at the Ontario Science Centre’s current location. It will have significantly less exhibition space, will lack key feature areas, and will lose other important program areas, including educational spaces, event rental areas, the OSC school, and support spaces.

The proposed science centre at Ontario Place will be compressed on its site, where it will be dwarfed by the private Therme and LiveNation developments. It will necessitate a visitor journey that is twice the length, to see fewer exhibits. The P3 process by which it is being constructed will mean poorer quality architecture, delivered on a longer timeline.

The Moriyama-designed building was closed less than two months ago, and while reopening it and performing necessary repairs will take some doing, it can happen more quickly than preparing a temporary location (which would not open until 2026) or pursuing a relocation to Ontario Place (which would not open until 2030-2034).

The right decision is clear: Ontario must reopen, renew, and reinvest in the Ontario Science Centre at its current location.

Related:

Infrastructure Ontario document lists “scaling back programming” and “staffing reductions” as money-saving “pros” of Science Centre closure

As Province edges towards demolition of Science Centre, documents point to a manufactured crisis

How to pay for repairing the Ontario Science Centre? Let’s start by using the money it’s taking to close it

The true cost of repairing the Ontario Science Centre is much, much less than what Infrastructure Ontario has been saying—and the proof is in its own documents

Cost of Ontario Science Centre temporary location exceeds cost of roof repairs

Ontario Science Centre doesn’t require full closure: A close reading of the engineers’ report

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In late July, a court decision in Ontario upheld the province’s claim to sweeping powers to redevelop Ontario Place, a provincial site
on Toronto’s waterfront originally designed by architect Eberhard Zeidler with landscape architect Michael Hough. The court’s decision underscores how the current provincial government has put itself above the law, particularly with regard to heritage matters.

Ontario Place Protectors’ case contended that the Rebuilding Ontario Place Act (ROPA), part of Bill 154, is unconstitutional in immunizing the Province from civil liability related to their work at Ontario Place. It also contends that, in declaring Ontario Place to be exempt from the Environmental Assessment Act, the Ontario Heritage Act, and the City of Toronto’s noise bylaws, the Province has violated the doctrine of public trust—the principle that the site ultimately belongs to the people of Ontario, and is held in trust by the Government of Ontario.

While immunity clauses are not uncommon, Ontario Place Protectors argued that the one in ROPA is particularly extreme. The clause states, in part, that “no costs, compensation or damages, including for loss of revenues or loss of profit, are owing or payable to any person and no remedy, including but not limited to a remedy in contract, restitution, tort, misfeasance, bad faith, trust or fiduciary obligation, any equitable remedy or any remedy under any statute, is available to any person in connection with anything [resulting from work under the authority of ROPA].” 

Ultimately, the judge upheld the Rebuilding Ontario Place Act, agreeing with the government’s lawyer that the buildings and land at Ontario Place are under the Minister of Infrastructure’s control, and that the government has a right to make, amend, and repeal laws, including exempting itself from its own laws.

The judge did allow that judicial review—a process by which courts make sure the decisions of administrative bodies are fair, reasonable, and lawful—would be permitted under the Rebuilding Ontario Place Act. But the broad scope of exemptions may limit other civil and suits that can be brought against the Province. For instance, if in the course of the redevelopment, a contract is broken, a building code violation is found, or construction proceeds without stamped drawings from architects or engineers, there may be no straightforward legal recourse to address this—even if the Province is in principle still obliged to comply with the Building Code Act, Architects Act, and Professional Engineers Act.

“The government could not possibly have gone further than eliminating all remedies under all Ontario statutes,” said Eric Gillespie, legal counsel for the applicant. “The overarching issue is this: if you can essentially eliminate all laws for Ontario Place, there is now nothing preventing the Government from doing this for anything, including new expressways, airports, eliminating the Greenbelt, or any other government project.”

Bill 154 is just one way in which heritage and planning laws are being legislatively sidestepped by the present Ontario government. Ministerial Zoning Orders (MZOs), a tool that supersedes local planning authority, are meant for situations of extraordinary urgency. The present government has issued over 100 MZOs in the past five years; previous governments had issued about one MZO a year.

As part of the More Homes Built Faster Act, which came into effect in January 2023, the Province amended the Ontario Heritage Act to allow the Minister of Tourism, Culture, and Sport to review and revise the heritage status of any property in Ontario. Moreover, it allowed provincial properties to be exempted from the requirement to comply with heritage standards and guidelines, if the exemption could be shown to advance a provincial priority—such as transit, housing, health and long-term care, other infrastructure, or another priority as prescribed by the Province.

Had Ontario Place Protector’s court challenge been successful, the contested developments—an indoor water theme park by Austrian developer Therme and a doubling in size of LiveNation’s Molson Amphitheatre—would still have been allowed to go ahead as acceptable land uses. But they would have had to do so while respecting the cultural heritage of the site and the environment, including mitigating shoreline impacts, protecting trees, and preserving open space. This process may have resulted in a smaller set of facilities, carefully inserted into their landscape setting.

Instead, following the court decision on the Rebuilding Ontario Place Act, the demolition of structures on the West Island of Ontario Place—which had paused while the case was heard—has now resumed.

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In an all-day hearing on Friday, July 19, advocacy group Ontario Place Protectors challenged the fast-tracking of work at Ontario Place before Ontario’s Superior Court of Justice. A decision on the challenge by Justice Lisa Brownstone is expected in the coming week, with the Province agreeing to continue the halt on demolition work until the decision is rendered. Justice Brownstone also indicated that she will consider Ontario Place Protectors’ request that the stay on demolition continue for an additional five days following her decision, so as to allow time for either party to file an appeal.

Ontario Place Protectors’ case contends that the Rebuilding Ontario Place Act, part of Bill 154, the New Deal for Toronto Act, 2023, is unconstitutional in immunizing the Province from civil and criminal liability related to their work at Ontario Place. It also contends that, in declaring Ontario Place to be exempt from the Environmental Assessment Act, the Ontario Heritage Act, and the City of Toronto’s noise bylaws, the Province has violated the doctrine of public trust—the principle that the site ultimately belongs to the people of Ontario, and is held in trust by the Government of Ontario.

The constitutional challenge focused on two issues: the first contended that ROPA limits the power of the court itself to perform judicial review, a process by which courts make sure the decisions of administrative bodies are fair, reasonable, and lawful. The second argued that ROPA infringes the right of the public to bring suits against the Province.

While immunity clauses are not uncommon, Ontario Place Protectors argues that the one in ROPA is particularly extreme. The clause states that “no costs, compensation or damages, including for loss of revenues or loss of profit, are owing or payable to any person and no remedy, including but not limited to a remedy in contract, restitution, tort, misfeasance, bad faith, trust or fiduciary obligation, any equitable remedy or any remedy under any statute, is available to any person in connection with anything [resulting directly or indirectly from anything done at Ontario Place under the authority of ROPA].” Lawyer Eric Gillespie argued that the scale of exemptions is “unprecedented” and that the Act essentially allows the Province a “blank cheque” in terms of accountability for its actions. Quoting a precedent case, Gillespie said, “Complete government immunity has become intolerable.”

The third issue focused on the doctrine of public trust—a doctrine that Gillespie argued has been established in Canadian law. The principle is that Ontario Place belongs to Ontarians, rather than to the Ontario government, and development at the site should comply with existing laws such as the Environmental Assessment Act, Ontario Heritage Act, and municipal noise bylaws. However, the doctrine of public trust has never been upheld in relation to a particular case. Gillespie contended that this is because previous cases were too broad in the kind of public trust they asked for (things like the protection of Canada’s permafrost, or its air), whereas in this case, the property is a discrete parcel that is also a Crown holding whose high value is demonstrated by national and international recognition of its significant cultural landscape and architecture. In other words, if there was ever going to be a case where the doctrine of public trust was applied, this would be it. If Judge Brownstone chooses to accept this part of the Ontario Place Protectors’ argument, it would make this a landmark court decision.

The government’s lawyer responded to the challenge by arguing that broad immunity clauses exist elsewhere, for instance, in the way that members of a union are barred from bringing individual cases to court, but must do so through their union. They challenged the standing of the applicant—that is, the group’s right to bring this issue to the court in the first place. They also asserted that the buildings and land at Ontario Place are under the Minister of Infrastructure’s control, and that the government has a right to make, amend, and appeal laws, including exempting itself from laws such as the Environmental Assessment Act and the Ontario Heritage Act.

The hearing took place at the Toronto Courthouse at 361 University Avenue, in a building designed by Marani, Morris, and Allan, with landscape by Michael Hough—the same landscape architect who worked on the historic landscapes at Ontario Place.

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As It Is: A precarious moment in the life of Ontario Place takes readers on a journey through the landmark site, aiming to capture the essence of the iconic buildings by Eberhard Zeidler and waterfront park by Michael Hough, while painting a picture of Ontario Place’s uncertain future.

The book’s 102 black-and-white photographs were taken by Evans between November 2021 and June 2023. The images are interwoven with texts by Evans, urban affairs journalist John Lorinc, and AGO curator of photography Maia-Mari Sutnik.

According to Evans, the project sparked during the pandemic. “It was something that was going to keep me busy in the dark days of COVID,” he recalls. “I went down there and almost immediately had a flashback to all of the experiences that I’ve had at Ontario Place,” he says, adding that he had gone there as a child, and brought his own children years later.

“Going back there, I was really struck by the place and how at that moment, it looked so decayed, and how sad it was. I really understood that the place was in trouble,” says Evans. “The buildings were rusting, there was an abandoned amusement ride, and the landscaping had deteriorated; it wasn’t in great shape. I was drawn to that because of the history that I have of documenting abandoned and neglected places.”

For Evans, putting together the book was more than just a way to revisit memories: it became an opportunity to showcase the significance of the landmark and its impact in Ontario and beyond. “Ontario Place is, in part, about history and about making history. It was a gift to the people of Ontario, and it was a place where people could come to understand where they lived, what their history was and imagine what the future might be,” says Evans, who notes that its futuristic architecture also represented optimism about the province’s prospects.

“When I started this whole thing, I wasn’t really aware of the political dynamics or the Ford government’s long-term plans. It wasn’t a motivating factor for me then, but it has since become an abiding one. I think people need to be alert to what’s happening at Ontario Place, and I really hope that the book will become part of the wider conversation about the importance and meaning of public space,” says Evans. 

As It Is: A precarious moment in the life of Ontario Place can be purchased in person or online from Swipe Design and the Spacing Store. An exhibition of the book’s photographs was on display at Urbanspace Gallery in Toronto. A panel discussion recorded at the exhibition opening featuring Rt. Hon. Adrienne Clarkson, author John Ralston Saul, and landscape architect Walter Kehm can be viewed at urbanspacegallery.ca.

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The proposed redevelopment of Ontario Place is posing an “imminent threat” to the wildlife and trees that sit on the man-made waterfront site, says The Cultural Landscape Foundation’s (TCLF), who has recently elevated the threat level associated with the project.

Toronto’s Ontario Place is a waterfront park located just off the shore of Lake Ontario that was designed by landscape architect Michael Hough. The park opened in 1971 and is listed in the City of Toronto’s Heritage Register. In 2019, Ontario Place was enrolled in TCLF’s Landslide program, during which plans began emerging for its redevelopment. “The man-made islands are part of an integrated landscape architecture vision that was part of Hough’s idea to integrate native Ontario trees into a site that reflected the diversity of Ontario’s natural heritage,” writes Beth Kapusta in a recent article for TCLF explaining the change in threat status. “The landscape has matured, realizing Hough’s design intent, and providing habitat for nesting birds and other animals and supporting international bird migratory routes. This area is at immediate risk, with nearly 1600 trees slated for removal on both islands.”

The proposed redevelopment led by the Toronto office of the Vienna-based Therme Group consists of a private spa on West Island, which Ontario’s provincial government is advancing. The private spa and the underground parking garage threatens to alter the integrated landscape of Ontario Place as well as its public nature, obstructing views of the site along with its architecture from nearly every vantage point. The spa will also eliminate existing structures, trees, and public beaches on West Island, with only a slight portion of the waterfront, created with new landfill, designated as fully publicly accessible.

While keeping climate change top of mind, civic leaders continue looking for solutions. Most recently, Mayor Olivia Chow and Ausma Malik have proposed the relocation of the spa site to Exhibition Place. Ontario’s independent Auditor General also recently announced that they are looking into the provincial government’s controversial plans by conducting a value-for-money audit. Rallies have been organized at Ontario Place, City Hall, and the provincial legislature, which encourage the participation of the public in motions and legislation related to the redevelopment.

Additionally, the Architectural Conservancy of Ontario has collaborated on political advocacy campaigns and provided knowledge on the site’s design history, while identifying major concerns in Heritage Impact Assessment procedures. The World Monuments Fund (WMF) has also placed Ontario Place on a 2020 “watch list” of global cultural heritage sites. A collaboration with WMF and the Daniels Faculty at University of Toronto produced the awareness-raising The Future of Ontario Place Project. Public awareness has increased since the site’s enrollment in TCLF’s Landslide program as an at-risk landscape.

The TCLF is urging readers to [a] contact Doug Ford to express opposition to the Therme Canada development proposal; [b] contact Mayor Chow and other city officials and buttress their stated opposition to the project; and [c] sign the recently launched Change.Org petition created by Ontario Place for All concerning the current plans. “This Modernist icon cannot be redeveloped as proposed,” writes TCLF’s Director of Communications, Nord Wennerstrom.

To read the TCLF’s article, visit https://www.tclf.org/imminent-threat-ontario-place
With files from The Cultural Landscape Foundation

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Amidst controversy surrounding the mega private spa set to occupy provincially owned land, Toronto’s mayor, Olivia Chow, has put forth an alternative proposal.

According to a CBC News article, Chow suggests that Therme Canada’s spa and indoor water park, originally slated for a portion of Ontario Place, could instead find its home at the Better Living Centre within Exhibition Place.

Mayor Chow’s suggestion comes in response to inquiries from the media on September 29, regarding whether Premier Ford’s recent change of plans regarding Greenbelt development might signal a possible reconsideration of the contentious 95-year lease granted to Therme. The Better Living Centre is situated on land owned by the city, and has a similar footprint to the proposed Therme facility.

The Ford government’s controversial decision to grant provincial land for the construction of a private spa has sparked ongoing tension, and  encountered significant public opposition. Currently, city staff are in the process of reviewing the resubmitted plans for the spa and water park.

Regarding the discussions leading up to her alternative proposal, the Mayor did not provide any details on September 29 and did not respond to requests made. According to CBC News, as of Wednesday afternoon, the city’s planning division had not received any direction from the city council or a council committee to explore alternative locations for the proposed Therme facility.

Mayor Chow did not specify whether her proposal would involve granting the land, offering a lease arrangement, or pursuing a sale.

Mayor Chow pointed out that the Better Living Centre is presently not fully utilized. Don Boyle, the CEO of Exhibition Place, corroborated this statement, adding that he envisions Exhibition Place becoming a destination where people can enjoy a full day or even a weekend visit throughout the year.

Advocacy group Ontario Place for All is optimistic that both Therme and the province will be more receptive to considering alternative locations.

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Therme, along with architects Diamond Schmitt and landscape architects STUDIO tla, have revealed a revised design of their proposed waterpark at Ontario Place, on downtown Toronto’s waterfront. The design was presented at a set of two City of Toronto-led community consultation meetings on September 7 and 12.

According to Therme, the new design includes 15.9 acres of public space, up from 12.5 acres, including 3.4 acres of green roof and publicly accessible parkland on top of the waterpark building. The building itself will be 25 per cent smaller in volume than the original design, which is done by shrinking the height and the scale of the building, representatives said. The new building has an 8.4 acre footprint.

Key design changes include the introduction of a terraced profile along the sides of the facility, which the proponents say is intended to soften the edge between the facility and the public realm, and an entry pavilion which has been reduced in size. The plaza now includes access to a publicly accessible “land bridge” atop a portion of the Therme buildings up to four storeys in height. A series of pathways on the land bridge are shaped like the Credit River, which Therme says resulted from collaboration with the Mississaugas of the Credit First Nation.

The proponents say that because the West Island will be expanded with additional lake infilling in their design, the design will deliver a net increase of public parkland compared to the existing West Island.

Attendees who commented at the public meeting on September 7 remained firmly opposed to the development. Their concerns focused on the privatization of the prominent site, the government’s refusal to disclose the terms of the 95-year lease, and the lack of transparency in deciding on the site’s use as a large recreational waterpark, which numerous commentators felt was an inappropriate use for Ontario Place. Several people who spoke at the meeting also expressed concern about the position of the new beach on the West Island. The design  replaces the existing south-facing beach with a west-facing beach located near a combined sewer outflow; residents are concerned that the new beach will be in shade much of the day, and exposed to high winds and polluted water.

Opposition New Democrat Chris Glover, who represents Spadina-Fort York, writes that “(Premier Doug) Ford’s Conservatives continue to hide the details of this 95-year lease to give away some of the most valuable public parkland to a private corporation.” The Official Opposition has sent a letter of support for a public request to begin an investigation into a value-for-money and compliance audit with respect to proposed redevelopment of Ontario Place. Glover also notes concerns of cronyism related to Therme Group Canada’s Vice President of Communications and External Relations, who was previously the Premier’s Deputy Chief of Staff.

“We haven’t seen any actual plans yet,” urbanist Ken Greenberg, a member of advocacy group Ontario Place for All, told Spacing contributing writer Ian Darragh, in response to the revised concepts. “These are bird’s eye renderings. The public can’t actually see how the buildings are laid out, how the circulation works. There are some fundamentals which you can’t design around, which are extremely problematic. There’s the 95-year secret lease. The footprint is still the same. About 850 trees will still have to be clearcut for this development. It will take decades to replace those trees. When Ontario Place opened, it cost a dollar to get in. [The land bridge] is not a park. It is a privately managed, accessible open space, on top of an enormous, privately accessed building. To describe it as parkland is really misleading.”

A revised development application is expected to be filed with the City of Toronto this fall.

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Steven Evans, an architectural and documentary photographer, is releasing his self-published documentary project with essays centered around Ontario Place.

This compelling 160-page book, called As it is: A precarious moment in the life of Ontario Place, includes 102 black-and-white photographs meticulously captured by Evans from November 2021 to June 2023. The book also boasts insightful essays contributed by John Lorinc and Maia-Mari Sutnik.

It is divided into six thoughtfully sequenced sections that comprehensively explore the entire Ontario Place site. These sections cover a wide range of aspects, including Eberhard Zeidler’s iconic architecture, the innovative landscape design of West Island by Michael Hough, the hauntingly abandoned and deteriorating Wilderness Adventure Ride, the enchanting East Island, and the remarkable success story of Trillium Park and the William G. Davis Trail.

This book’s release is particularly timely, as it coincides with significant developments in the provincial government’s plans that may alter the fundamental public purpose of Ontario Place.

In his preface, Evans states, “These photographs show Ontario Place at a physical, political and economic crossroads. It is an important moment to record it comprehensively, to understand it as it was, as it is, and to thoughtfully consider what it might become.”

Contributors to the book include the following.

Steven Evans, a Toronto, Canada resident, boasts a prolific career centered around documenting the city he calls home. His primary focus lies in capturing heritage architecture and exploring the intricate relationship between urban environments and the natural world. Evans’ work has earned recognition on both national and international stages, gracing the pages of magazines, books, and websites. His artistic endeavors have received support from prestigious organizations like the Canada Council and the Ontario Arts Council. Additionally, he has clinched two National Magazine Awards, with his photographs finding homes in both public and private collections.

Author John Lorinc has made a name for himself through his insightful writings on urban issues. His contributions have been featured in a multitude of national publications, including the Globe and Mail and Spacing Magazine. In 2022, he clinched the Writers’ Trust of Canada Balsillie Prize for Public Policy for his book titled “Dream States: Smart Cities, Technology, and the Pursuit of Urban Utopias.”

Maia-Mari Sutnik holds the title of Curator Emeritus and is the founding Curator of Photography at the Art Gallery of Ontario. With a lifelong dedication to curating exhibitions, conducting research, teaching, and crafting written works about both historical and contemporary photography, Maia has established herself as a distinguished figure in the field. Her writings have graced the pages of numerous national and international journals, and she has actively served on international art juries and panels. Currently, she contributes to the board of the Contact Photography Festival. Among her recent projects is the exhibition and catalogue titled “Memory Unearthed: The Lodz Ghetto Photographs of Henryk Ross.”

A free book launch event took place on September 14 from 6:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. at 401 Richmond Street West in Toronto.

Books will be available at Swipe Design, Spacing Store and Helio Gallery.

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This year, the Ontario government has continued to unfold plans for Ontario Place, on Toronto’s waterfront. In 2021, the province pledged to retain Eberhard Zeidler’s 1971 Cinesphere and Pods. But in the scheme currently going through approvals, two private developments occupy prime spots on the property: an aquatic recreational facility run by Austrian company Therme, and a 20,000-person concert venue run by LiveNation.

While the East Island will boast significant parkland and the public area encircling the Therme facility on the West Island has been expanded from its initial design, the prominence of the private facilities is still significant. In a submission to a joint City of Toronto and Waterfront Toronto Design Review Panel in late March, the Therme development occupies over half of the West Island, and its greenhouse-enclosed pools top out at 45 metres—50 percent taller than the Cinesphere. The panelists were largely supportive of the public realm master plan for the East Island, but raised concerns about the “fortress-like” Therme buildings and their “dominant scale and massing,” according to meeting minutes. “The main Therme building feels oversized for the West Island, overwhelming the proposed public realm and the existing heritage attributes, including the ‘pods’ and Cinesphere,” the panelists report. (Architects Diamond Schmitt will be resubmitting a refined design to the City in August.)

The proposal for the site as a whole includes necessary public investment—$200 million will be spent on the repair of infrastructure, erosion, and flooding damage, along with restoration of the site’s heritage structures. And initially, a suggestion that the Ontario Science Centre would occupy the Pods and Cinesphere seemed a positive fit. But this spring, the province announced that the Ontario Science Centre would be entirely relocated to Ontario Place, occupying the heritage structures and topping a new underground parking garage. The proposed Science Centre Pavilion site is a fraction of the size of the Therme and LiveNation developments, and only provides half the space of the Science Centre’s present facility. The existing Ontario Science Centre, a Centennial project completed in 1969 by Raymond Moriyama, would be demolished.

The ministerial announcement of this plan was accompanied by reference to a business case for the move, but at the time of going to press, Infrastructure Ontario had not yet been able to provide that document to me. (It seems unlikely that such a business case would have explored a full range of options. In response to a request for estimates of the costs to update the current Ontario Science Centre, the ministry responded that they “are currently developing feasibility and options for stabilization and rehabilitation, and do not have any information to share at this time.”)

In the meanwhile, the province has moved with alacrity, issuing a call for proposals for a planning, design, and compliance consultant for the relocated Ontario Science Centre, setting the stage for a P3 competition.

Bureaucratic processes may slow down the timeline to allow for reconsideration. A provincially led environmental assessment, issued in July, only covered the public realm of Ontario Place, excluding the large tracts slated for redevelopment by Therme and LiveNation. Advocacy group Ontario Place for All is appealing to the federal government to conduct an impact assessment on the entire site. 

Toronto’s new mayor, Olivia Chow, is opposed to the redevelopment, and the City owns 16 acres of land necessary to access and redevelop Ontario Place. The province has indicated that they would expropriate the land if needed, but Chow has suggested she wouldn’t give it up without a fight. “Expropriation is a blunt instrument and it takes time also because what we don’t want is to waste a lot of money in court, but that is available and hopefully we wouldn’t get to a stage where we have two levels of government seeing each other in court,” she has said.

When they were constructed, both Ontario Place and the Ontario Science Centre exemplified the innovation and sensitivity to landscape that put Canadian modern architecture on the global map. In an era when environmental sustainability is of paramount concern, Canada once again has the chance to show leadership in caring for its heritage, while crafting places that foster meaningful interactions between built and natural environments. The future of Ontario Place and the Ontario Science Centre may initially seem to be a local matter, but we would be wise to take a bigger picture of the significance of these sites, and what they are able to offer to Canadians—and the world—both now and for the future.

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