Building a new Ontario Science Centre at a redeveloped Ontario Place would save the province about $250-million over 50-years; mainly because it would be half the size.

 

 

 

That’s one finding of the business case by Infrastructure Ontario whose President and CEO Michael Lindsay says previous governments also considered a move to the waterfront and commissioned analyses which came to similar conclusions.

The business case also found that the government expects to save about $8.2-million per-year with relocation ”due primarily to a smaller building with significantly reduced maintenance and operating costs.”

Status quo is just not an option.

”It is in operational crisis due to a failing structure with mounting critical building maintenance costs, long term trend in declining attendance, declining revenues, and stagnant operating subsidies,” according to Infrastructure Ontario’s report.

NDP Leader Marit Stiles counters that successive governments have failed to properly maintain the Science Centre that opened in Don Mills in 1969, while also criticizing the business case as being based on ”shaky 50-year guesstimates.”