Hamilton’s Discovery Centre a heated topic at city meeting

Hamilton’s Discovery Centre on Pier 8 has had a hard time finding itself any sort of permanent plan since it opened in 2004. A recent public meeting didn’t make it any easier to figure out either.

The 19,000-square-foot-building operated as a tourism building for its first few years and shut down in 2010 due to low community participation, later opening up again in 2012 as Sarcoa; a high-end restaurant with a great view. Sarcoa closed its doors last summer in 2017 with a heavy debt that the City of Hamilton decided to buy out a few months ago to try and sell on their own.

The issue at this week’s heated public meeting was whether or not the waterfront building will remain in the public’s hands. “What to do with the Discovery Centre” was bumped to the top of the meeting’s agenda at the request of Graham Crawford. Crawford hopes to see the building remain “in public hands for public use” and is currently leading an online campaign with that goal in mind.

What happened to the Discovery Centre? According to this description of the Waterfront in today's Community Update from @FredEisenberger, it no longer exists. No mention of it at a all. Have they already sold it @JasonFarrHamOnt? We need some answers. #savethediscovery pic.twitter.com/kKVYBrjS5J

— Graham Crawford (@gcrawfordHamOnt) March 29, 2018

Some concerns raised at the meeting were why talks of what to do with the building took so long to begin; considering there is currently a redeveloping of the west harbour being planned that the centre has not been a part of. Also discussed: why isn’t the City of Hamilton in dialogue with the community to see what they want, and can the centre be torn down?

Chris Phillips, waterfront point person, did say that the building is not up for sale and that the reason the centre has not been discussed at previous meetings yet is because it’s only been since late January that council decided to buy out the long-term lease for the centre and its parking lot with the Hamilton Waterfront Trust for $3 million.

Ward 2 Councillor Jason Farr said, “I don’t want to see anything other than an institutional designation,” adding that he has no interest in tearing down the building. The request-for-proposals deadline is April 4, 2018 and public presentations from developers will be available online from April 6 to 17.

Let us know below what you would like to see take up a home inside the Hamilton Discovery Centre.

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• architechure
• building
• city planning
• crawford
• discovery centre
• farr
• Hamilton
• HamOnt
• infrastructure
• pier
• reshaping
• restructure
• waterfront