National Gallery - Grain Silos in Eastern Waterfront?
ANALYSIS: PORTRAIT GALLERY OF CANADA
Gallery plan gets lost in the (lack of) details
The Harper government's request for proposals from developers raises a number of key questions
KATE TAYLOR
If the federal government gets the private sector to build a new national portrait gallery, it will be a first - but that is one gigantic "if."
This week, the Conservative government issued a request for proposals (RFP) from private developers to build a home in one of nine Canadian cities for the Portrait Gallery of Canada. The gallery, an arm of Library and Archives Canada, currently only exists as a virtual institution, with its impressive collection of famous Canadian faces hidden away in a warehouse in Gatineau, Que.
Sources in the private, non-profit and public sectors who develop cultural facilities say the plan might prove interesting, but it lacks important details.
They wonder what's in it for a developer, why cities themselves have not been invited to compete and whether the government really understands the expensive technical requirements of an art museum.
"If it's just a way to get it done, it's ill-conceived," said Alfredo Romano of Castlepoint Realty, the developer that is currently building a condo tower attached to Toronto's Sony Centre for the Performing Arts (formerly the Hummingbird Centre). "In so far as it might invite creativity, it's a good thing, but maybe the RFP doesn't go far enough."
The Conservatives had previously cancelled plans to house the gallery in the former U.S. embassy building on Ottawa's Wellington Street across from Parliament and halted construction there after $11-million had already been spent. Last week, the government announced that developers would be invited to compete for the contract to build the gallery in one of nine cities: Halifax, Quebec City, Montreal, Ottawa-Gatineau, Toronto, Winnipeg, Calgary, Edmonton and Vancouver.
This week's RFP provided scant details of how the scheme would work: The developers are required to show community and private-sector support, and to provide their own high-profile site that would attract tourists. No square footage nor budget is attached to the request, which says the government expects to either lease or buy back the building from the developer who would remain the manager of the site. The deadline for proposals is less than three months away - Feb. 13, 2008.
The opposition in Ottawa and the national arts community have been vociferously critical of the plan to move the gallery out of the nation's capital and have pointed out that the Portrait Gallery does not yet exist as an independent institution that can raise money from the private sector. Developers in the cultural field, however, don't dismiss the idea out of hand, but they do warn that the government needs to be sure the competitors know what it is they are getting into. They also wonder why the call for proposals didn't go directly to municipal governments, which are more likely to control potential sites for the gallery and usually take the lead on such projects.
"There's a lot of homework for people to do here," said Tim Jones, head of Artscape, a non-profit developer of artists' spaces in Toronto. "At the end of the day, you have to make sure a national cultural institution is well served."
First of all, developers say no one will be interested in building a stand-alone gallery for the government in exchange for the rent.
"That's just privatization of a public facility," Romano said. "I couldn't see a lot of interest from most developers."
What might interest some developers is placing the Portrait Gallery in a larger development, where they can leverage the cachet attached to the cultural institution. For example, the film festivals in both Toronto and Vancouver are involved in projects where they share their premises with condo towers, lending their share of Hollywood glamour to the developments.
Vancouver is the real specialist in this field; since the 1990s, the city has often requested that developers team up with cultural groups if they are going to get their approvals, sometimes asking them to pay for a cultural facility in their building in exchange for added density. This formula, however, only builds small and medium-sized facilities: There is only so much density you can add to a site.
Also, these deals which take months, not weeks, to broker, are initiated by the city, not the developer, while larger cultural institutions in Canada have always been built by the public sector on public land. That's why Gail Lord, president of Lord Cultural Resources and a consultant in the field, feels the government has the RFP process turned around backwards.
"Every city has a development agency that has brown-field sites," she said, referring to the old industrial sites that cities are eager to redevelop. "Developers don't typically bring in a government partner.... This is an opportunity for the federal government to reach out to cities. It should be cities competing for this wonderful thing, and they would bring in developers."
Lord also points out that the kind of mixed-use project that might attract a private developer is a tricky fit for an art museum because of its technical requirements for safe, dry and climate-controlled space. For example, you cannot locate art storage underneath any kind of plumbing, because of the risk of leaks, she said.
Still, Romano for one speculated he might be interested in exploring the idea of incorporating the Portrait Gallery into a Toronto site Castlepoint Realty owns - the grain silos on the eastern waterfront at Parliament and Queens Quay.
"The Toronto waterfront becomes an obvious candidate," Romano said. But realistically, Toronto is unlikely to get a project that has been touted by Minister of Canadian Heritage Josée Verner as an exercise in decentralization.
The more likely bet is still Calgary. A Conservative plan to move the gallery to the Bow development in downtown Calgary, right next door to Prime Minister Stephen Harper's riding, fell through earlier this year, and the building's chief tenant, the energy company EnCana, says it is now in negotiations with other arts groups to find an occupant for space in the building designated for cultural use. There are several other large developments just now breaking ground in the booming city, however, and municipal interest in the project runs high. Indeed, some cultural observers see the RFP as nothing more than political cover for ensuring a move to Calgary.
Vancouver may be in the running too: Vancouver Mayor Sam Sullivan is enthusiastic about the idea while Edmonton, Montreal and Quebec City say they are looking at it. City Hall sources in Halifax and Toronto say their municipalities have all but ruled out participation, while the RFP isn't even on the radar in Winnipeg and Ottawa - the city that has already been snubbed once.
Louroz
