New arena downtown eyed
Market Plaza, former public works yard preferred site
Morrow Park is no longer the preferred location for a new sport and entertainment centre to replace the Peterborough Memorial Centre — a consultant now says a downtown site is likely better.
The preferred location in the consultant’s report is a large triangular site including the city’s former public works yard on Townsend Street plus Market Plaza, Smitty’s restaurant plaza and the Tim Hortons on George Street.
It’s by no means settled, however. Private landowners hold much of the property on the site and consultants will only negotiate with them if council is interested in the location.
Meanwhile, there may be other development plans soon for Morrow Park. Council may consider putting a new twinpad arena there instead of at Fleming College.
At a committee meeting on Monday, city councillors will
consider each matter separately: the idea to put the new sport and entertainment downtown and the proposal to put the twin-pad at Morrow Park. Reports on both projects were released Thursday on the city’s website.
One of those reports is from Sierra Planning and Management — a Toronto firm — and it discusses the potential new sport and entertainment centre. It offers projected construction costs: a new 5,800seat facility, with an accompanying ice pad for community use, would cost somewhere between $91.3 million and $97 million if built in 2020. If the facility were scaled back somewhat — 5,000 seats and no community ice sheet — then the cost is between $82.3 million and $88 million. Those figures are construction costs only — they don’t take into account any property acquisition.
The report also explains that while Morrow Park is still a good site for a replacement for the Peterborough Memorial
Centre, the public works/plaza site would likely be even better because it would help boost downtown vibrancy.
The revitalization that comes from building an arena downtown makes it worth having the consultants negotiate with downtown landowners to see whether they’re interested in working out a deal with the city, states the report. Those discussions could start in 2021, the report states, if council gives its approval (and city staff recommend it, in an accompanying report).
There is $353,500 in a fund set aside for planning for the new facility that council could use for further consultant fees, the staff reports adds. But councillors won’t be expected to decide any of this on Monday. Staff will come back in 2021 to ask for approval to start talks with the private landowners at the public works/plaza site.
In the meantime, the consultant’s report identifies two other downtown locations that have potential, though they don’t rate as high as the public works yard/mall location in the consultant’s report. One of them is the former Baskin-Rob
bins site, where the vacant ice cream refrigeration plant was recently demolished (although owners have not been asked whether they’ve got other development plans). The site would include the demolished plant, plus other buildings on the block (such as Jim’s Pizza).
That site is downtown but has drawbacks, states the report: it’s too small for the proposed 5,800-seat facility, for instance. It could fit if scaled back to 5,200 seats, the report states, but even then it leaves little room on the site for loading (not to mention parking).
Another location mentioned in the report is a commercial and residential area fronting George Street across from No Frills grocery store. The site would be hemmed in by Dalhousie Street to the north, the rail tracks to the south, George Street to the east and Aylmer Street to the west. But that would mean the city having to buy 53 private properties, the report points out, and would result in the loss of much residential property near the downtown.