AHA! centre unique idea

Arts + Heritage Awareness project part of highrise But Hummingbird development still needs funding

The Royal Ontario Museum’s decision to cancel its condo tower has been hailed as a victory by those who fiercely oppose any Toronto arts institution seeking to build a residential skyscraper next door.

Predictably, messianic crusaders in the anti-development camp are already hoping and predicting that the domino theory will apply. Now that the ROM tower has been called off, they assume, Daniel Libeskind’s proposed 49- storey tower adjacent to the Hummingbird Centre must also be facing a death warrant. But the chances are they’re wrong.

In fact, there are crucial differences between the two projects that are conveniently overlooked by the anti- development zealots. And Daniel Brambilla, CEO of the Hummingbird, is ready to play his best card — the superdemocratic, multicultural diversity card.

Libeskind’s tower, you see, would house not only private residences. At the base of it would be a spectacular, elegant 7- storey podium where Brambilla wants to build something that would give Toronto a unique attraction that would be partly intended to benefit the people of this city and partly meant to draw tourists from all over Canada and the rest of the world. Welcome to the Arts + Heritage Awareness Centre, already nicknamed the AHA! Centre — which he bills as five unique attractions assembled into one compelling concept at one single location.

“ This is not just an extension of a museum or another opera house, but a towering beacon designed to celebrate Canadian values,” boasts a handsome booklet Brambilla has commissioned, “where over 232 cultures and 160 languages intersect to form a tapestry that is unique throughout the world.” The purpose of the booklet is to help promote the concept and raise the $75 million needed to realize his dream. But Brambilla also has a number of other crucial factors working in his favour.

Unlike the ROM condo tower, the Libeskind skyscraper — planned by the Hummingbird in partnership with its development partner Castlepoint — would not be rising in a peaceful, other- worldly precinct of 19thcentury Victorian academic buildings. Indeed, it would be placed in the midst of Toronto’s central business district, where skyscrapers are the norm.

Unlike the ROM tower, the Hummingbird plan has been endorsed by the city.

Unlike the ROM, the Hummingbird would face extinction if this project were cancelled. Most significantly, unlike the ROM tower ( which was vehemently opposed by all its neighbours, including the University of Toronto) the Hummingbird redevelopment has earned overwhelming support within its own community. Some local merchants and residents seemed skeptical at first, but their issues were successfully addressed at a series of public meetings. In the end, the more they scrutinized Libeskind’s plan, the more they came to regard it as a work of genius, not just creatively but in terms of how it would improve and enrich life and commerce in their neighbourhood.

At the final public meeting a few months ago, they even burst into applause for this ambitious proposal, which would save a historical theatre while at the same giving the city a one- of- akind cultural attraction. The Arts + Heritage Awareness Centre is designed to promote Canada as a paradigm for social cohesion, dedicated to fostering cross-cultural understanding, and created in response to feedback during two years of consultation the Hummingbird has conducted with numerous ethnoracial groups. At the heart of the centre would be a 40,000- square- foot highly interactive attraction explaining the contribution to each of the seven lively arts by each of the many different cultures represented by the population of Toronto.

“ The idea is to create a venue reflecting on the importance of the arts to society,” says Brambilla.

That may sound heavy- duty,

but even if the information is serious, he insists

the delivery of it would be

humorous and entertaining — with computer- generated cartoon characters

acting as hosts for the journey awaiting visitors. The admission fee to the centre would be $ 20, with special rates for schools and other groups. According to the Hummingbird’s business plan, the new attraction would have an annual attendance of 400,000 to 500,000. The cost of building the AHA! Centre is $75 million, with Castlepoint spending another $ 125 million to build the condo tower. Of the $75 million, $ 15 million would be provided by Castlepoint for the right to build the tower. Brambilla is busy lobbying federal and provincial politicians, with the hope of getting $ 15 million from each of the two levels of government. Another $ 15 million would come from a corporate sponsor taking naming rights to the centre. That would leave another $ 15 million to be raised privately.

In case Brambilla fails to raise the money by early 2007, when construction is scheduled to begin, there is a Plan B. The residential tower would go ahead, and the box at the base would be used for shops and restaurants for a decade.

Brambilla would then be able to use the developer’s $ 15 million fee ( plus an additional $3 million) to pay for much- needed repairs and refurbishments to the theatre itself. And then 12 to 15 years from now, the city would get a second chance to reclaim the podium and build either the AHA! Centre or some other attraction.

Either way, this is one tower that shows no sign of going away. mknelman@thestar.ca