[Halifax] Nova Centre | 65-58-58 m | 16-15-14 fl | Completed

[halifaxboyns]

From Nanaimo nightmare to Halifax horror show?

By ALAN RUFFMAN
Fri, Dec 17 - 4:54 AM
It was not supposed to turn out this way.

The Vancouver Island Convention Centre (VICC) was supposed to revitalize downtown Nanaimo — the home of Nanaimo Bars — by attracting large conventions and the high spending of the numerous delegates.

In fact, it took several extra years to build, it went more than 100 per cent over budget, a number of attempts to win P3 partners failed, the promised next-door downtown hotel has never materialized, one of the unfilled commercial retail spaces has recently been rented to "The Great Canadian Dollar Store" and the centre has just decided to lease space to a rock church!

It was not a pretty story through to the grand opening on June 7, 2008. On the following Nov. 15, Gary Korpan, who had served as mayor for 15 years, lost his re-election bid with a dismal third-place finish and barely 16 per cent of the vote.

Concerned Nova Scotians, and that would include our MPs and our MLAs, I assume, can read of the Nanaimo misadventure with their VICC, a.k.a. the "Port of Nanaimo Centre," in a book, Nanaimo Between Past and Future, co-edited by former Dalhousie professor, Eric W. Ricker and Frances Christopherson. Prof. Ricker retired to his hometown of Nanaimo and became immersed in the public opposition to the project.

B.C.’s municipal act allows councils to hold, or citizens to force, a referendum on municipal spending issues. This was one that went to such a vote. The electorate voted to support a $32-million expenditure that was to include a new hotel that was to be built by a private developer. It all sounds quite familiar, doesn’t it? It was a poorly worded referendum that left the Nanaimo council with the power to vote for overruns that ultimately ran the cost up to over $72.5 million.

There were a couple of failed negotiations for a public-private partnership. In the end, Nanaimo was to get an 18-storey hotel next to the Port Nanaimo Centre that was to be built by two real estate developers, Millennium and Suro Development Company. Millennium has subsequently become infamous when the City of Vancouver had to take over the billion-dollar Olympic Athletes Village from the developer in 2009. In the years before this debacle, Millennium and Suro backed out of their Nanaimo hotel commitment. In mid-June of 2010, the city of Nanaimo filed a $3-million suit against the developers for the municipal costs in the failed scheme.

The Port of Nanaimo Centre has had problems in attracting the bookings needed to remove the centre’s dubbing by critics as "a white elephant that will cost the taxpayers of Nanaimo millions of dollars for years." The City of Nanaimo, which brands itself "The Harbour City," must cover all the annual losses in perpetuity — similar to the situation that Halifax and the province of Nova Scotia will find themselves in with the proposed $160-million underground complex they seem to be so set on for Halifax.

The "high-end" commercial retail spaces in the Port of Nanaimo Centre are now controlled by First Capital Realty, which bought them from the city for $3.78 million, as a company that would attract high-end retailers to downtown — a downtown that was dying as a result of a long string of council-sanctioned suburban developments well to the north of the Central Business District. First Capital has had trouble attracting tenants to the convention centre.

The big news item of last June 17 was that The Great Canadian Dollar store was to move from one space downtown into the "high-end" retail space at the VICC to complete a block of storefronts that include a coffee shop, an insurance company and an eyeglass centre.

First-time city councillor Jim Kipp was forced to put on a brave face and declare, "A dollar store is high-end considering the economic downturn we are coming out of. There was talk in the beginning that they didn’t want certain stores in there because they wanted a certain image, but I have no problems with a dollar store. I am happy to see there are businesses in there and the windows are not empty."

And that’s not all: The Nanaimo Daily News reported on Nov. 27 that the Nanaimo Athletic Commission has "endorsed mixed martial arts fights at the Vancouver Island Conference Centre in order to help stimulate bookings at the facility, which is supplemented by tax money to the tune of $1 million this year."

This, as well as news from early October that the Port of Nanaimo Centre has decided to lease space to a rock church, combined with all its other misadventures in the convention centre business since 2002 when the VICC was hatched, surely can but give second sober thought to Halifax and the province of Nova Scotia?

Or do we already have God on our side with a long-term ecclesiastical rental locked-in for our $160 million proposed underground bunker/dungeon that we will not even own after 25 years of lease payments and annual deficits? At least Nanaimo still owns its white elephant and it is above ground where the taxpayers can all see it!

Allan Ruffman lives in Ferguson’s Cove.

[hollistreet]

Ruffman either neglects to realize, refuses to accept, or has selective hearing/reading ability as the developer has agreed to cover any cost over runs, will sell the convention centre to the city/province for a $1 in 30 years and has agreed to do the entire project all at once. There is a hotel component to the project!
The centre in Nanaimo can only hold 1300 delegates in total and outside of the main ball room (13,697 sq ft) the next largest space is 1337 sq ft. The entire convention centre is only 38,000 sq ft. Nanaimo has a population of about 80,000 people and the region has a population of about 137,000. No offense to Nanaimo but I do not consider it to be much of a vacation destination. I have been to Nanaimo and while it is a lovely place it is not the area people go when thinking of vacationing in BC. The East Coast of Canada is a top choice for conventions in this country.

[q12]

It won't look good if the feds funded Ottawa's Convention Centre and not Halifax's.

"How we funded the convention centre", OTTAWA CITIZEN By DAVID REEVELY THU, SEP 16 2010

[halifaxboyns]

Originally Posted by hollistreet

Ruffman either neglects to realize, refuses to accept, or has selective hearing/reading ability as the developer has agreed to cover any cost over runs, will sell the convention centre to the city/province for a $1 in 30 years and has agreed to do the entire project all at once. There is a hotel component to the project!
The centre in Nanaimo can only hold 1300 delegates in total and outside of the main ball room (13,697 sq ft) the next largest space is 1337 sq ft. The entire convention centre is only 38,000 sq ft. Nanaimo has a population of about 80,000 people and the region has a population of about 137,000. No offense to Nanaimo but I do not consider it to be much of a vacation destination. I have been to Nanaimo and while it is a lovely place it is not the area people go when thinking of vacationing in BC. The East Coast of Canada is a top choice for conventions in this country.

I submitted a letter to the editor to respond to his article. I doubt that they will publish it; but I basically said the same thing.

[someone123]

A few months out some were claiming the writing was on the wall because the provincial NDP were not immediately publicly supporting the project.

The federal government has funded several recent convention centre developments. It would be odd for them to suddenly change their tune for Halifax.

[HRM]

Remember though that the federal gov took a pass on coughing up some funding for Peter Kelly's (a Conservative) rinks in his home turf of Bedford and instead provided funding for a private for-profit rink (fronted by another Conservative) in a different part of Bedford. So it would appear that our fine mayor has little sway re federal funding. We'll have to rely on others to twist the arms of Harper and MacKay.

[q12]

Wish list may be too long
Stadium, convention centre both vying for federal funds

By STEPHEN MAHER Staff Reporter
Wed, Dec 22 - 7:08 AM

Peter MacKay’s comments about a new convention centre and a stadium for Halifax Regional Municipality suggest that the city may be muddying the waters by promoting two projects at the same time.

In Pictou County on Monday, MacKay, Nova Scotia’s man in the federal cabinet, seemed to signal that Ottawa may not want to provide $47 million for a new Halifax convention centre, while he was neutral on the prospect of a new stadium.

"I want to see all the information before I make any determination as to whether we’ll support the project," he said about the convention centre. "There appears to be growing division of opinion on whether this is a project that would merit federal support."

The municipality and the province both support the proposed public-private project, but Halifax MP Megan Leslie has expressed mixed feelings, as have several other Nova Scotia MPs.

MacKay spoke more neutrally about a proposed stadium.

"If there is a concrete proposal coming forward from the mayor, from the province, again, I will be happy to see that detailed information, and then make an assessment," MacKay said.

A new stadium would cost about $30 million. In a three-way split, the federal share would be about $10 million, which might be more appealing to a federal government that has promised to rein in spending in the next budget.

Regional council voted last week to prepare a bid for the 2015 FIFA Women’s World Cup, which would require a 20,000-seat stadium. The city will present its application and a non-refundable cheque for $25,000 to Soccer Canada by Friday.

Canada will submit its bid for the games by February, and, if successful, choose six cities to host events across the country. Other cities submitting bids, including Moncton, already have stadiums that could handle the events, but Halifax would have to build one.

Events Nova Scotia advised council that Halifax shouldn’t submit a bid, warning "timelines do not allow for proper due diligence on venue feasibility, public input or funding partnerships."

Council decided to proceed, saying that a stadium would be desirable whether or not the city ends up hosting the soccer event.

On Monday, the federal government announced that it supports Canada’s bid and promised $15 million in funding, but that money would go to operational costs, not building a stadium.

MacKay’s comments were taken by some in the media to suggest Ottawa would be more likely to approve stadium funding than convention centre funding, but his spokesman said Tuesday that the defence minister said nothing of the sort.

"All he said was he has to do due diligence in reviewing the project," said Jay Paxton. "He’s approaching them both with the same frame of mind."

Paxton said civil servants at Transport Canada are reviewing the convention centre proposal in detail.

Mayor Peter Kelly said Tuesday that MacKay has not expressed doubts to him about the convention centre.

"I’ve not heard that from him, so I’m waiting to see their formal response," he said.

Kelly said a stadium for the city should be able to be used for many functions — sports events, concerts and trade shows, and should be located in a part of the city where it won’t cause traffic problems. Shannon Park, a former military community in Dartmouth, is considered a potential site.

Coun. Sue Uteck says the city should invest in expanding the existing stadium at Saint Mary’s University.

"Unlike the mayor, I don’t see a stand-alone stadium in Halifax," she said. "I don’t see it."

Kelly said her proposal may not work because there might not be enough room to expand it, it may not suit non-sporting functions and it may cause traffic problems.

"We must not only see things in one light," he said. "We must see it in the total elements of opportunities and make sure we maximize each and every one of them."

Coun. Tim Outhit opposes the stadium, saying the city should leave event hosting to Moncton and focus on business activities, which would be better advanced by a convention centre.

He said he is afraid the stadium will be a distraction from the convention centre, a project that would inject $500 million into downtown Halifax.

"Ottawa has always used divide and conquer against us down here, so we don’t even have our local MPs supporting the project," he said. "We’ve got, potentially, Mr. MacKay suggesting he’s interested in a stadium, which would put us in competition with Moncton, which I have no interest in competing with."

If Canada wins the right to host the Women’s World Cup, the process of selecting six host cities would begin in April. Soccer Canada would pick the successful cities in April 2012.

http://www.thechronicleherald.ca/Front/1218517.html

[fenwick16]

I think that some news writers can take insignificant statements and try to make them sound controversial. MP Peter MacKay didn't say very much regarding the two proposals, certainly nothing to indicate that it would be one or the other. However, I read that he is a rugby player and therefore he is likely also a sports fan - this explains his support for a stadium. What sports fan wouldn't want to see a stadium in Halifax?

I think that the biggest question mark at this point is whether or not Canada will get the FIFA Womens Cup so that there will be federal funding available.

[worldlyhaligonian]

Come on MacKay, start supporting NS... Other cities have already built their CCs and are building stadiums too, all from the public purse. Timing is irrelevant.

If this was in Quebec or Ontario, this wouldn't even be a debate given the lower cost of our projects compared to theirs.

[sdm]

Originally Posted by worldlyhaligonian

Come on MacKay, start supporting NS... Other cities have already built their CCs and are building stadiums too, all from the public purse. Timing is irrelevant.

If this was in Quebec or Ontario, this wouldn't even be a debate given the lower cost of our projects compared to theirs.

Did not last week Harper kill funding for a new arena in quebec?

[worldlyhaligonian]

Yeah, a rediculously expensive project in comparison.

[halifaxboyns]

Originally Posted by worldlyhaligonian

Come on MacKay, start supporting NS... Other cities have already built their CCs and are building stadiums too, all from the public purse. Timing is irrelevant.

If this was in Quebec or Ontario, this wouldn't even be a debate given the lower cost of our projects compared to theirs.

I take his comments to be neutral - I am still being cautious about the CC because nothing is a done deal yet.

[fenwick16]

There was an article in the Chronicle Herald yesterday regarding the convention centre that also mentions a stadium. Mayor Kelly seems to be focusing on the convention centre at this point. Probably most of us would agree that after all the municipal planning and debates that have led to the HRM and province giving support to the Nova Centre project that this is the correct strategy to take. I think that the Nova Centre is an important project for Halifax so I would like to see it under construction before the focus shifts to a possible stadium project. However, I hope that over the coming year that there will be more discussions and planning regarding a stadium.

January 2011 will be an interesting month since we should know if the Nova Centre will proceed. If a decision is made by the federal government in January then excavation could begin within the next couple of months.

(source: http://thechronicleherald.ca/Front/1219219.html )

Projects won’t put taxes up, Kelly says

By DAVID JACKSON Provincial Reporter
Tue, Dec 28 - 11:43 AM

With big-ticket projects like a convention centre and sports stadium talked about for Halifax, who could blame the municipal taxpayer for worrying that taxes are going up?

But Mayor Peter Kelly says taxpayers can rest easy. Their bill won’t rise for the municipality’s $56-million share of the convention centre project, which still awaits a federal contribution.

And he said it’s much too early to know what impact a stadium would have on ratepayers since there’s isn’t an actual proposal yet. The city would require a stadium if Canada wins its bid to host the 2015 FIFA Women’s World Cup and Halifax is approved as a host city.

In an interview Monday, Kelly emphasized there’s only one project — the convention centre — at the level of a request before the federal government.
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The city and province are still waiting for a decision from Ottawa on whether it will contribute $47 million to the $159-million convention centre project.

As for the World Cup, Kelly said Halifax met the Christmas Eve deadline to submit its expression of interest for being a host city if Canada gets the event. The city would need a stadium with at least 20,000 seats, a project that would cost an estimated $30 million.

That could set up a funding split among the three levels of government of $10 million each. Kelly said building a stadium for the city is a matter of when, not if, but it’s too soon to say what the impact on taxpayers could be.

He said variables include involvement from the private sector, the universities in the city and other levels of government.

"Right now, that’s premature until council determines that is the route or the direction they wish to take. We need to keep our eyes on what’s before us, and clearly the convention centre is before us."
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[halifaxboyns]

Has there been any new news on this project?

A bunch of my family work in the Tourism and Culture dept with the NS government and this was an interesting discussion around the dinner table over Christmas. They all seem eager to see it go forward.

Personally - for me (I've said it before and I'll say it again); I'm not particularly concerned if this doesn't make money initially or at all - the loss can be recouped by the investment in confidence into the downtown which will come from the project. What I mean is: If this project is built, the confidence capital (as I call it) in downtown as a place to do business will be worth the costs in the long run because other projects will come off the shelf and get built that otherwise would continue to take on dust.

[hfxtradesman]

Jan 19 is when the feds will decide, and by the back room talk now by the feds, everything sounds positive.

[fenwick16]

That is great news. I think that the Rank Inc. deadline was January 14 2011 on the price quotation. Do you know if that has been formally extended? What I have read is that Mayor Kelly expected it to be extended (which makes sense).

[someone123]

It's not a done deal yet but like I said I think the media are exaggerating the level of controversy of this development. It seems like a stretch to believe that the feds would refuse to fund this project because there might be a stadium built in Halifax someday, for example.

The comparison to Nanaimo is also really sketchy. Nanaimo is a smaller city that is very close to both Vancouver (which has a giant new convention centre) and Victoria. The Nova Centre won't have regional competition for the big events that are the reason for the upgrade in the first place.

I'm looking forward to the large-scale excavation for this project. Tower cranes on the site will also look great mixed in with the downtown skyline. The towers will only be 18 and 14 floors but they will look about 6 storeys taller because they are higher up the hill. Their roof elevation may even be significantly higher than buildings like 1801 or Purdy's.

[fenwick16]

Yes, I agree. Because of the elevation these towers will look much more significant on the skyline. Being on a hill makes the Halifax skyline look much more impressive than it would be on flat land.

[-Harlington-]

Halifax awaits feds decision on convention centre:


Canadian Press: Friday, January 7, 2011 9:49 AM
The Nova Scotia government says Ottawa will come through with $47-million for a new Halifax convention centre before a January 15th deadline.
The Nova Scotia government says Ottawa will come through with $47-million for a new Halifax convention centre before a January 15th deadline.
Photo Credit: Andrew Vaughan, Canadian Press

HALIFAX - The Nova Scotia government says Ottawa will come through with $47-million for a new Halifax convention centre before a January 15th deadline.

Infrastructure Minister Bill Estabrooks says "the deal is going to get done."

The Canadian Taxpayers Federation has said Ottawa should not contribute to the $159-million project when the Nova Scotia government and its municipalities are still carrying deficits.

However, the city and the province have already agreed to spend $56-million each on the centre.

The province and the city have also agreed to share any shortfalls that aren't covered by the revenue generated by the centre's operations.

But the project won't go ahead unless Ottawa pays up, too.
© Copyright (c) CW Media Inc.

[halifaxboyns]

Last night, I was going through the document that Fenwick posted sometime ago from Trade Centre limited on the options for WTCC2 (which included Nova Centre) and Metro Centre 2.

I have to admit - while I like this development and building (it's not perfect but will look pretty impressive); part of me wishes that we could've gotten a new metro centre and then converted the old metro centre into the new WTCC like it had been vissioned in the TCL report - it would've been impressive as well and been a good re-use of the Metro Centre. The only problem is we'd be left with another Phil Pacey '6 stories works' building that didn't work and didn't contribute as much tax revenue. Just day dreaming I guess...but I suspect the feds will contribute the money. I don't really think they take the Taxpayers Federation seriously.