January 22, 2010

PATKAU ARCHITECTS AND KEARNS MANCINI ARCHITECTS

The Fort York Visitors Centre is expected to move to the working drawings stage in May.

Design

$18-million Fort York visitor centre first stage in site revitalization

PATRICIA WILLIAMS

staff writer

Construction of a new visitor centre at the Fort York national historic site in Toronto has moved a step closer to reality following the selection of a winning design.

Scheduled for completion in 2012, the estimated $18 million centre is considered key to the planned revitalization of the entire 43-acre site, which houses Canada’s largest collection of 1812-era military structures.

Construction is expected to get underway in the spring of next year.

The winning design was submitted by Patkau Architects Inc. of Vancouver with Kearns Mancini Architects Inc. of Toronto. The centre would form a new steel “escarpment,” which re-establishes “the original sense of a defensive site.”

The project will be designed to comply with the city’s latest green development standard.

Kearns Mancini said verification of the program and schematic design will be done over the next two months by the two firms, which are working together as associated architects.

There will be some “tweaking” of the conceptual design, the Toronto firm said.

Work is expected to get under way on working drawings in May. While a date has not been set for groundbreaking, the intent at the moment is to call tenders in November and award the construction contract in December.

The centre will be designed to orient visitors and show them how best to interpret what they will see on the site through the presentation of an audio-visual program, exhibits and other media.

The facility will be equipped with washrooms, a gift shop, food service, multi-purpose rooms and other services to enhance visitors’ experiences. Space will be made available for community meetings.

The city said the building of the centre will facilitate “a much needed change” in how Fort York is perceived as a public resource.

Located outside the walls of the existing seven-acre museum, but within the national historic site, the centre will “reframe” the fort, to include the adjacent urban landscape.

“The centre will be the hub connecting visitors to the experience and content of the entire site as well as to the surrounding neighbourhoods and the city.”

Several projects near or bordering the site will complement the revitalization. These include a pedestrian and cycling bridge that will span the railway tracks to the north, joining Fort York to the downtown, the new June Callwood Park to the south and the city’s first multimedia public art commission, Watertable, which opened in 2009 under the Gardiner Expressway.

The federal government has approved a grant of up to $4 million to help construct the centre, while the city has committed $5.3 million. The Fort York Foundation will launch a fundraising campaign.

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