The science center, in itinerant mode only?

Since the final closure of its original location – a building by the famous architect Raymond Moriyama – certain exhibitions of the Ontario Center of Sciences are walking, like a traveling exhibition of works of art. However, when closed in June 2024, the provincial government announced to study the possibility of finding a temporary location for these interactive exhibitions.

However, during a press briefing in connection with Ontario Place two weeks ago, the Minister of Infrastructure Kinga Surma suggested that these famous exhibitions will continue to occupy ephemeral locations.

This is a solution that satisfies very few stakeholders in the thorny file. And what will happen to the famous building?

Find a temporary place

June 21, 2024, in a press release (new window)the Ontario government announced the closure of the Ontario Sciences Center, which was then on the road Don Millsin the neighborhood North York.

In order for families, students and young people to continue to have access to scientific educational programs and activities and to take advantage of it, Infrastructure Ontario will launch a request for proposals in order to find a temporary place for the Ontario Science Center, while continuing its steps in order to build a new permanent home in place of Ontario, whose opening could be done in 2028. spare, like mobile, ephemeral and virtual experienceswe said.

And in the said request for proposals (new window)the government required the temporary center to open its doors no later than January 2026.

Since then, more news. The management of the Center des Sciences has indeed created ephemeral exhibitions, for example at the shopping center Sherway Gardens de Etobicoke and Harbourfront Centrebut the idea of a provisional center does not seem to have succeeded.

Journalists therefore asked Ms. Surma questions on this subject two weeks ago.

There is no decision that has been made-will we focus on the permanent location or continue the ephemeral exhibitions? – But we have an opportunity to send exhibitions everywhere in Ontario. Several municipalities and organizations that have mean their interest and want to host certain exhibitions. […] But the two ephemeral exhibitions are a successshe replied.

A great moment of uncertainty

Pour Floyd Ruskinthese ephemeral exhibitions, It is nothing compared to what was done in the past. This represents the organization Save Ontario Science Centre, which fights for a significant reinvestment in order to allow the reopening of the center in the building on the road Don Mills.

It’s a great moment of uncertainty with a lot of broken promisesis laments the scientific educator at the Ontario Science Center and representative of the Ontario Public Service Syndicate, Martin Fischer.

He hoped for the opening of a temporary center.

What to do with the original location?

M. Ruskinhe remembers visiting the museum on several occasions with his daughter several years ago.

It is a whole generation of young people who are deprived of this establishment because of the government’s choices.

Mr. Fischer says he agrees with Mr. Ruskin. Most of us visited the center in our youth, it is normal that we wanted to keep it aliveadds the educator.

According to Mr. Fischer, the Science Center received around 500,000 young people each year.

The site of the old science center – the building as well as the land – is also the subject of discussions between the city, the province, is that the Nature Protection Office of Toronto and the Region (TRCA), confirms a press attaché in the city of Toronto, Kate Lear. No decision has yet been madeshe adds.

For several Ontarians, it is a significant place of their childhood which is disappearing before their eyes, according to Mr. Ruskin.

The government must offer an investment idea for the site which will be enticing for the communitysuggests the CEO of the Canada Urban Institute, Mary Rowe.

The best thing to do is to build housing, but above all to install other cultural arrangements that are equivalent to the old science center, she believes.

This is what allows these districts to come to life, thanks to a set of commercial, recreational and cultural facilities.

A lack of investment?

Gold Rowe, The center would never have to close its doors if the governments had invested better in the renovation of the building.

At the time, the government had justified the closure of the Center des Sciences as well: The building of the Ontario Sciences Center present[e] serious structural problems likely to materialize next winter.

But Mrs. Rowe explains that this situation is not unique. If we do not take care of the infrastructure properly, obviously that the argument that these establishments are not worth saved then arises.

It is a situation which, according to her, could have been avoided. According to the CEO, It is always preferable to invest in assets that already exist rather than building constantly again.

The Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Ontario Games, which took over from the file at the end of last June, indicates for its part that it continues to work with the Center des sciences in order to find a temporary location while waiting for the center to be permanently reopening instead of Ontario.

In latest news, the opening of the new permanent location of the center was scheduled for 2029, according to the auditor general.

For his part, Prime Minister Doug Ford said during the press briefing two weeks ago: We are going to build an ultra -modern science center, unrivaled to the country. It will offer more exhibition spaces, more possibilities for scientific discovery and will allow more children to attend a modern scientific center. And it will be much better located.

And Minister Surma said: We are on the market, we are looking for an entrepreneur for the project.

According to information from Magali Lévesque, Rozenn Nicolle and Cédric Lizotte