RENOVATION ON HOLD
Work on Paul Martin building in limbo while sale mulled.
Downtown watchers were upset and surprised to learn Friday that the scaffolding surrounding three sides of the federal Paul Martin Building for the last two years is not a temporary measure needed for renovations, but a safety precaution to keep deteriorating limestone panels from crashing down on pedestrians.
A major and expensive rejuvenation — which involved removing some of the thousands of limestone pieces, cleaning them, chipping off the mortar, installing new backing on the building and then reapplying them — has been put on hold while the government decides whether to sell the landmark 1933 building, Meeta Gandhi, the regional communications manager for the government landlord, Public Works and Government Services Canada, told The Star.
She wouldn’t say who may be interested in buying it. “All options are being considered.”
And there’s no timeline for when a final decision will be made. In the meantime, the needed work on the building remains in a holding pattern. She didn’t have a dollar figure for the work.
“It would be considerable, and so in order for us to invest that kind of money on three sides of a building, when we haven’t made a final decision on what we are doing with the building, that wouldn’t be prudent.”
Downtown business people don’t like how these scaffold tunnels mar the downtown’s streetscape and discourage pedestrian traffic, but they’re tolerated because they signal that good things — renovations and construction — are happening, said Downtown Windsor Business Improvement Association chairman Larry Horwitz.
“We assumed there was construction going on, you kind of bear with it, but if there isn’t construction going on ... it’s kind of ridiculous,” he said.
“If it’s just staying there, it’s an eyesore and it’s not fair for the merchants around it because it creates a dead zone all around that structure.”
People don’t want to walk under it, so they stay away, he said.
The scaffolding covers all of the limestone facade on the building’s Ouellette Avenue, Pitt Street and Chatham Street sides.
Once the city’s main post office, it is now home to Revenue Canada employees, plus Canada Post workers in the rear of the building. It’s named after the late Paul Martin Sr., the legendary Windsor MP who served as an influential cabinet minister and was the father of former prime minister Paul Martin Jr.
“It’s a major block and a major building,” said Horwitz. “This is the federal government. Something has to be done, it’s not like they don’t have resources.”
Joan Shanfield, whose Shanfields-Meyers Jewelry and China store is located across the street from the building, has been asking herself: “Why is it taking so long?”
Learning that there’s no work being done or even approved for the building, she expressed frustration.
“It’s a fiasco, it’s an eyesore, it’s ugly,” Shanfield said of the scaffolding.
Mayor Eddie Francis did not return telephone messages left Thursday and Friday, seeking comment on whether the city is interested in buying the building.
Coun. Fulvio Valentinis, who represents the downtown area, has been hearing complaints about the length of time the scaffolding has been up and the lack of progress at the site.
“This is our main street and this is a very prominent building,” Valentinis said.
He’s heard rumours that the government may be disposing of the property, an issue that cropped up as early as 2004 when the building was on a list of 365 federal properties the government was looking at selling and then leasing back.
But he added that the downtown is in the midst of lots of construction activity. The new aquatic centre’s being built, the former Palace Theatre building is being transformed into the new home of The Windsor Star and plans are afoot to renovate the current Star home, the old Greyhound station and downtown Armouries building into University of Windsor locales.
“I think we’re going to have to put some pressure on the federal government to get moving on this,” Valentinis said.
MP Brian Masse (NDP-Windsor West) said the length of time the scaffolding has surrounded the building — with no activity — is getting outrageous.
He said people have become so used to seeing the scaffolding they don’t think about it as a downtown eyesore.
“Walls are crumbling and their solution it to put a tent up and leave it for us as a community — frustrating,” Masse said.
He said his office would be investigating what’s happened to the project. “It’s not fair to the downtown merchants.”
The government spokeswoman, Gandhi, she said there has been no instances of limestone falling from the building, and that inspections are conducted monthly.
“Ultimately, we take the safety of people who work in the building and the people who visit the building into serious consideration and we want to make sure there is some preventative measure should there by any kind of issue with the limestone.”
The initial work on the building’s exterior began in 2009 as part of a $1.9-million makeover. But only one side of the building was part of that work, which was completed in 2010. The three other sides were part of a new project which was put on hold last year, according to Gandhi.