Jan 10, 2005. 06:33 AM
...
Royson James
Will aquarium plan float?

ROYSON JAMES

City officials will today announce plans to land a major aquarium in Toronto: an attraction that could boost tourism, help invigorate Ontario Place and the Ex, and end years of skepticism about such a project.

"The clear indication from the private sector is that it's doable," says Deputy Mayor Joe Pantalone, who's overseeing the project as head of the board of governors for Exhibition Place.

The city is to call for expressions of interest to put a medium to large aquarium on the lakeshore, between Ontario Place and Exhibition Place, about at the foot of Dufferin St.

Toronto, which owns the 4.63- hectare site, would provide the land on a 99-year lease, and the private sector would build and operate the attraction.

Deadline for submissions is Feb. 25. The city hopes to have a partner by the end of the year. Then it could take two years to get all the approvals in place.

Drawings and other such details won't be ready until the city finds a partner, but the aquarium is supposed to meet standards that call for it to be a "landmark building and become one of the city's most exciting attractions."

Toronto is one of the few large North American cities without a major aquarium. In the U.S., you can find major ones within a 200-kilometre radius of each other. Chicago's Shedd Aquarium is a behemoth. Its current addition alone is 150,000 square feet, bigger than the planned total area of Toronto's aquarium.

Preliminary study estimates the city can support an aquarium between 75,000 and 125,000 square feet, with flexibility to expand. This would cost between $55 million and $97 million to build, attract between 1 million and 1.4 million visitors, and yield an operating surplus of between $6 million and $11 million. Such an aquarium would employ between 160 and 275 full-time workers.

The city would provide "favourable lease terms," parking for as many as 600 vehicles, transit and road improvements in the area.

Diane Young, general manager of Exhibition Place, which oversees the spectacular waterfront site of historic buildings, gardens, Ricoh Coliseum and the National Trade Centre, says it's time again for Toronto to try and land an aquarium. "There seems to be a love affair from developers on aquariums," Young said in an interview. "Right now, there seems to be a feeling that aquariums are pretty good at turning a profit."

For example, a medium-sized city like Chattanooga, Tenn., is drawing about a million visitors to its aquarium and is now building a second one, Young says.

"That's the kind of aggressiveness we have noticed with respect to (aquariums)."

Ripley's, which runs several aquariums in the U.S., is interested in investing in Toronto, even though an aquarium is being planned for Niagara Falls, Pantalone says. And other developers have been expressing interest.

Today's announcement will smoke out the pretenders. The potential partners will then put forward a business case for the attraction. Only then will we know if there is even a chance of this happening.

Pantalone has been around for most of the other failed proposals to build a Toronto aquarium, but he says indications are different this time.

"People will be amazed by the responses we are going to get," Pantalone says.

Amazed? Quite likely. For about 20 years, Torontonians have heard similar claims and watched them sink for lack of money, want of a site or other complications.

From the time in 1985 that Harbourfront announced that Maple Leaf Quay would be home to a $40 million aquarium, the plans sink only to surface somewhere else around Toronto. The Eaton Centre had one proposal in 1996 . Scarborough had a 1995 plan for $90 million. Etobicoke gave Seaquarium an interest loan of $500,000 in 1998, only to see plans drown.

The CBC had a deal in 1997 to locate a giant one in the basement of the Broadcast Centre at Front and John. Didn't work. Ontario Place got in on the act, first with David Crombie in 1993 and general manager Max Beck in 1997. Neither held water.

But forces are now "aligned in a much more strategic and positive way for the good of Toronto," claims a study, to be released today.

The study, conducted by Exhibition Place to support what is being called the "Aquarium Opportunity," claims a "fresh political reality": friendly government at Queen's Park, a new city administration and a new Prime Minister who understands the importance of cities.

As well, the effects of SARS on the local tourism industry have spurred many in the city to add new attractions to boost Toronto's fortunes.

"Thus, the situation for the development of an aquarium in Toronto is considerably improved over what it had been previously," the report says.

A Great Lakes city with a huge population should be able to support a major aquarium. That may be, but the proposal will rise or fall on the economics. Does it sell? Will it make money?

Ripley's and others will get a chance to respond. Their predecessors have never backed up their talk with action. Now, they have a secure site. The city government is behind the plan. Toronto is starving for tourists. Aquariums are doing well elsewhere.

If it doesn't work here and now, it probably never will.

Royson James usually appears Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Email: rjames@thestar.ca

Additional articles by Royson James

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I don't quite understand this facination with "aquariums". Or the idea that certain "tourist" draws are mandatory or something...trust me...if we look at whatever Chattanooga is doing...we should be doing the opposite...not the same.

Building an aquarium just for the sake of it is stupid. The city should be spending money and attracting private money on things to make the city better for people who live here...not tourists per say. What do we want to become...New York?






KGB

I think it has the potential to be a success, as long as it's not on a shoe-string budget. A well designed aquarium with spectacular fish (and not spectacular in the Lake Ontario sense, which is "How spectacular, they actually survive in that water!") will bring in lots of people, but it has to be done well.

when I saw this article in the newspaper, I knew ARE BE was going to copy it...

This certainly has potential...but as mentioned on UT, it should have a research/educational component...otherwise it just doesn't seem legit.

I think it'd be nice to have an aquarium. It makes sense as a part of Toronto reorienting itself to the Lake. Maybe U of T or York could set up some sort of Marine Biology department in conjunction with this.

A marine biology department would be nice but kind of useless at Uof T and York.

Forget trying to scam some kind of "research" facility out of this...it's pure touristy crap "because everybody's doing it" reasons. This is something a lame PR firm would come up with.






KGB

Another cinderblock and glass cheap- out on the lake! Great....

Forget trying to scam some kind of "research" facility out of this...it's pure touristy crap "because everybody's doing it" reasons. This is something a lame PR firm would come up with.






KGB


I don't know if I would rule that out yet...some local insitutution might want to get in on the action.

UofT has lots to spend.

What's the going rate for a cheap hitman these days? I'd be willing to chip in a few bucks.






KGB

Why create an aquarium in Toronto when Niagara Falls is going to build the biggest aquarium in Canada?

Seems kinda pointless.

Because we have weenies sitting around dreaming this crap up. The city should get rid of these people and hire people that have real vision and inovation. It's not like we don't have them...tap into some of that genius we have like mau or Jacobs or something...lots of talented urban thinkers who could come up with something more origional than a fuking "aquarium"....that's like....a joke.






KGB

What's wrong, KGB? Do you not like fishies?

If you're going to put it anywhere, put it at the zoo. The zoo is in the business of taking care of animals, there's a 'ready to go' administration, etc.

ENTIRELY FORESEEABLE PROBLEMS:
1, grand scale crap 'cheap out' building at a prime waterfront location;
2, freaking nobody goes
3, school kids forced to go, but need a '70% off' special to get the schools in
4, this does not address the tourism problem one bit, as the feds fastidiously avoid pushing Toronto, (not Quebec enough, not enough mountains)
5, aquarium goes broke, city forced to pick up the tab or subsidize the thing
6, thing gets big- time politicized, as,
a) on the one hand, lefties want to turn the aquarium into a Center for the Promotion of the Hatred of Americans and Global Warming Indoctrination Center,
b) whereas the right wingers - recognizing that the aquarium is a financial sinkhole - want to lease the thing out to McDonald's, so that McFish Burger Guy, or whatever that character is, teaches the kids about how McDonald's - like all companies - is committed to responsible grand - scale rape of the sea.
7, Big, bankrupt, aquarium -- no fish. Great.

This does seem more like a thing that would fit better in Niagara. They could almost certianly put something better in that would seem feasible, especially for the area. SARS has still gotten everyone by the throat, thinking that we need these attractions just to bring in tourism. Thast no sliver of land either, why dont they put in something that NO ONE ELSE has. Any ideas?

Jan. 11, 2005. 01:00 AM...
Aquarium developer sets sights on Toronto — again
Ripley's says it's interested

Had '97 deal with Ontario Place

LESLIE FERENC
STAFF REPORTER

They cut bait a few years ago after the plug was pulled on plans to build an aquarium at Ontario Place, but officials at Ripley's Entertainment say they're still interested in such a venture in Toronto.

The facility will have to be top-notch, in the right location and with all its ducks in a row including good public transit to make sure people can get to it easily, company president Robert Masterson said.

"We are interested in Toronto and want to investigate the (proposed) site," Masterson confirmed yesterday.

But it's a project that must be done right, he said, because if not, "it's a pit into which you can throw a lot of money."

It costs more than $30,000 a day to run an aquarium that's open to the public and $28,000 a day to maintain if the facility is closed, he noted. "You're responsible for the lives of the creatures and making sure they're cared for properly," said Masterson.

"It's very expensive."

Toronto is fishing for a partner to build an aquarium that would be a city landmark along the waterfront. Developers have until Feb. 25 to say if they're interested in coming up with bright ideas for the facility, which could rise up on the 4.63 hectares of city-owned land at the foot of Dufferin St., between Ontario Place and the Exhibition.

About 50 companies including Ripley's, which is part of the Canadian-owned Jim Pattison Group out of B.C., and a British firm are being canvassed, said Deputy Mayor Joe Pantalone, who is spearheading the project as chair of Exhibition Place.

Attached to the invitation will be the city's most recent study, which found that such an attraction could make money.

According to the study, the city can support an aquarium between 75,000 and 125,000 square feet, which would cost between $55 million and $97 million to build. It's estimated more than 1 million people would visit annually and that it could have an operating surplus of as much as $11 million.

"We're not just floating a balloon," said Pantalone, adding that the city would prefer the aquarium to be non-profit but "we don't have the money."

Through a public-private partnership, the city would put up the site, provide parking, transit and road improvements, and a developer would build and operate the facility, he said.

Ripley's Entertainment, which had been talking about an aquarium with Ontario Place in 1997, has already built two such attractions in the United States. The Ripley's Aquarium is an 87,000-square-foot facility in Myrtle Beach, built in 1997 for $42 million (U.S.). Ripley's Aquarium of the Smokeys was opened in 2001 in Gatlinburg, Tenn., at a cost of $50 million. Construction is under way for a $200 million hotel and Ripley's aquarium in Niagara Falls, Ont. set to open next year.

Because of its location and the population of the Golden Horseshoe alone — some 6 million people — Toronto could keep an aquarium going and profitable, Masterson said.

But Masterson figured it would cost more than $100 million to build an aquarium in Toronto, saying the scope of the operation would have to be bigger than those Ripley's operates in smaller U.S. cities.

"Toronto is Canada's biggest city and the aquarium needs to be something that will fit with the city's other world-class facilities," he added.

The Vancouver Aquarium and Marine Centre, the largest in Canada, opened in 1956 in Stanley Park. It's a non-profit operation, with all its capital being generated by contributions from public and private donors.

"Everything we earn goes back into the facility and enhancing our organization," said Marie Dickens, senior vice-president of aquarium business operations.

The aquarium, which has grown to a 120,000-square-foot facility, attracts 900,000 people a year, half of them tourists.


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They've been trying to get an aquarium built down there for 2 decades. Not quite sure anything will help O.P. become a success, short of selling it to the private sector.

P.S. Great place for students to work in the summer.

I always thought an urban planning interpretive centre would be pretty cool. The tourist part would be like a planatarium, with huge interactive CG models of cities, that explore demographics, traffic patterns, crime... like SimCity materialized.

The R+D part would be dedicated to studying what I call 'city physics', the science of predicting/forecasting the reaction of social patterns to the alteration of the built form.

I agree with KGB somewhat, though one could view an aquarium as an asset for locals, much like the Zoo.

I don't quite understand this facination with "aquariums". Or the idea that certain "tourist" draws are mandatory or something...trust me...if we look at whatever Chattanooga is doing...we should be doing the opposite...not the same.

Building an aquarium just for the sake of it is stupid. The city should be spending money and attracting private money on things to make the city better for people who live here...not tourists per say. What do we want to become...New York?






KGB

Hear hear for KGB.

I went to the zoo for the first time in years (decades? ) this summer...that is one great zoo.

But Toronto got it's great zoo because it planned it from the begining to be what it is...unique and the best one they could plan....not some off-the-shelf list of tourist ideas for the sake of putting something somewhere to try and boost tourist dollars.

It's like Toronto is forgetting to be unique and innovative in it's approach to things, which the city has done well by. So....we'll have the franchised aquarium and the required Gehry building....how terribly unique.






KGB

Stick the aquarium at the zoo.

Leave the waterfront for something other than a certain boondogle.

The Waterfront has enough boondogles as it is, but how about the aquarium not get built at all and instead some residential condos so the waterfront can become a neighbourhood instead of the industiral wasteland its been for ages.

^I actually like aquariums but I can see his point.

Jan. 24, 2005. 06:44 AM
GTA COLUMNISTS ...
Aquarium dilemma
It's a tough business, U.S. experts say
And local proposal lacks key elements

PETER GORRIE
FEATURE WRITER

How do you turn several thousand fish into one white elephant?

It's not a magician's trick.

Instead, it's the almost inevitable result if a public aquarium, such as the one proposed for Toronto's Exhibition Place, is built in the wrong place and in the wrong way.

Presto! A bright and shimmering attraction is transformed into a lumbering burden that has a ravenous appetite for cash and leaves piles of unsavoury problems in its wake.

Although Toronto's project is at the very early stages — private-sector proponents have until Feb. 25 to express interest — some aquarium experts suggest it's heading for trouble.

Aquariums are expensive to build and very costly to operate, they say. And, in the current climate where competition for entertainment spending is intense, they require certain things to succeed.

Three elements are key, says Deb Fassnacht, executive vice-president of the Shedd Aquarium in Chicago and a student of the industry.

They need to be part of a critical mass of attractions. They can't be saddled with debt. And they must have "something charismatic" to attract the large numbers of paying customers they require to stay afloat.

The proposed Toronto aquarium appears to be missing at least two of those essentials; the third is uncertain.

The 4.63-hectare site is tucked away at the west end of Exhibition Place, a barren expanse that for most of the year is devoid of people. The main nearby attractions are tired, summer-only Ontario Place, the cavernous National Trade Centre, a small casino and a dinner theatre.

As for charismatic attractions, it won't include the most popular : whales, dolphins and other marine mammals.

"There are restrictions: no mammals in this aquarium," says Councillor Joe Pantalone, who, as chair of Exhibition Place, is spearheading the project. "Mammals are biologically our cousins and it would be completely inappropriate" to bring them in, he says.

"We don't have whales and dolphins in our aquariums," says Bob Masterson, president of Ripley Entertainment Inc. of Orlando, Fla., which operates two aquariums in U.S. cities, is building two others and is expected to be a leading candidate to construct Toronto's.

That policy will avoid conflict with powerful animal rights activists, who are vowing to fight any attempt to include whales, dolphins or other marine mammals in the project.

"We've put them on notice: it would spark a massive controversy if they attempt to bring in any mammals," says Julie Woodyer, campaigns director for Zoocheck Canada, in Toronto. "It won't just be us. It will be massive. There will be groups from right around the world lobbying the city for this not to be allowed to happen."

Excluding marine mammals will, however, make it more difficult to attract crowds of visitors, particularly at the high admission prices aquariums must charge to cover their costs.

"You have to have ... sharks or marine mammals or something," Fassnacht says.

Critics argue that marine mammals are intelligent, social and need far more space than they get in any enclosure. Studies have shown they live only half as long in captivity as they do in the wild, says Michael O'Sullivan, executive director of the Toronto-based Humane Society of Canada.

"The problem is the miseducation of the public, that it's okay to take these highly intelligent, social animals from their families at a young age, put them in concrete boxes and force them to do silly pet tricks," says Annelise Sorg, president of the Vancouver-based Coalition for No Whales in Captivity, which helped persuade that city's aquarium to stop housing killer whales.

Ripley's Masterson says they aren't essential: "We've been successful without them."

But Fassnacht says the big mammals play an important role in aquariums.

The Shedd, like most others in the U.S., is a non-profit operation with an educational and political mission: to inspire visitors to care about Earth's oceans, lakes and rivers, and the creatures that inhabit them.

It wants its animals to "connect people to the living world, and no animal in the building does a better job of that than whales and dolphins. People see these animals and they're completely wowed," Fassnacht says.

As long as they get top-quality care and aren't forced into doing circus stunts, "they become ambassadors for the wild," argues Peter Chermayeff of Chermayeff, Sollogub and Poole Inc., a Boston architectural firm that specializes in aquarium design and development.

"They make people care more. When you care, you become another voice for habitat protection."

Most U.S. aquariums, whether for profit or non-profit, display dolphins, whales or both, and all have some sort of marine mammals. That includes two of the "big three": Shedd and Baltimore National.

The third, Monterey Bay, on a spectacular Pacific coast site, has none in captivity, but visitors can see them from the aquarium's deck, cavorting in the animal-rich open ocean.

It's possible to succeed without marine mammals, as a freshwater aquarium in Chattanooga, Tenn., is proving.

It showcases freshwater marine life from habitats stretching from the Appalachian Mountains to the Gulf of Mexico. Visitors can see, for example, how brook trout hide in river eddies then come out into the current to feed, says Chermayeff, whose firm designed it.

People enjoy learning about environments that seem familiar but that they don't really know, he says.

Peterson and others point out that aquariums, like any other attraction, must constantly offer new and exciting exhibits.

Monterey welcomed about 2.5 million visitors in its first year, then watched as attendance slowly and steadily eroded. The aquarium began a program of special exhibitions, which are changed regularly, and brought in a charismatic attraction: the only white shark in captivity. Annual attendance now averages about 1.8 million.

But anything — even jellyfish or seahorses — can draw visitors if it's done right, Peterson says.

Backers of Toronto's proposed aquarium say it will attract tourists and boost the city's western waterfront. But industry observers have doubts about how much business such a stand-alone project can bring in.

More crucial than having mammals, they say, is that aquariums be part of a critical mass of attractions or, at the very least, be on sites where other development can happen.

"You can't be confident of success standing alone unless you're very, very good," Chermayeff says.

It's far better, he says, to have "synergies" with other attractions or features. The ideal is to create a location where visitors, rather than coming just to see the aquarium, will spend an entire day or even stay overnight.

That suggests that Toronto's proposed site — a considerable distance from downtown, hemmed in by roads and railway tracks, and with only a couple of small, all-year attractions nearby — presents a challenge.

At Exhibition Place, "there is some planning of some other adjacent development to be considered," Chermayeff says, cautiously.

Experience across North America shows that whether or not aquariums display whales and dolphins, they rarely succeed on their own, says John Holer, who owns and operates Marineland, on 400 hectares in Niagara Falls. At first an aquarium may look successful, he says, but people visit only once or twice: "They don't want to come back and see the same thing."

Marineland includes rides, restaurants and other attractions, and is undergoing another expansion, Holer says. And it's in Niagara Falls, which is already a tourist mecca.

The Shedd Aquarium — which is the world's largest indoor aquarium and attracts about 2 million people a year — is close to downtown Chicago, next to a planetarium and the world-famous Field Museum. The Art Institute of Chicago is nearby.

The Baltimore National was part of an extensive downtown waterfront redevelopment. Monterey Bay is on a main tourist route between Los Angeles and San Francisco. Atlanta is getting a massive new aquarium, but it's being built along with a Coca-Cola museum.

The Chattanooga aquarium went up in a derelict industrial district, but it's just nine blocks from the small city's downtown and was surrounded by developable land. Before long, it attracted three new hotels, several dozen stores and restaurants and other attractions, and helped to revive what is now known as the "Environmental City."

"It helps if everything around you is being developed according to plan," Peterson says.

All of Ripley's aquariums are near the company's museums and other features, says spokesperson Tim O'Brien.

Ripley this week broke ground on a $200 million project in Niagara Falls that will eventually include an aquarium, but only after a hotel and all-year water park are completed.

Aquariums in Tampa, Fla., Camden, N.J., and Long Beach, Calif., ran into financial trouble because development didn't follow them as quickly as expected.

Financial prospects are difficult to assess, experts say.

Most U.S. aquariums are non-profit organizations or publicly owned, and were built with large grants from generous donors or government-backed financing. A few, including Shedd, get part of their operating budget from the host city.

Toronto's plan is a rare attempt to build an aquarium without government financing, apart from favourable terms for a 99-year lease on the property and transit improvements. City officials say they've contacted about 50 potential builders, but only four private companies operate large marine exhibits in North America.

City officials expect it would attract at least a million visitors each year, for an annual operating profit of up to $11 million.

Masterson estimates it would cost more than $100 million to build and $30,000 a day to operate.

Simple arithmetic using these numbers suggests tickets would have to cost an average of about $20, just to cover operating costs and the forecast profit. More would probably be needed to repay the construction investment.

The main thing, the experts say, is to do an aquarium well.

"You have to have a very clear vision of what you're planning to do" as well as "a really conservative financial plan," Peterson says.

Despite the potential problems, Chermayeff — who was involved in some of the previous attempts to launch a Toronto aquarium — is optimistic.

"Toronto will respond to a world-class aquarium very well," he says. "It's a great place for this to happen."

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I actually like aquariums

Me too. I've had plans for years to build my own in home version, but haven't been able to get the funds together for something decent.

I would probably get an annual membership to a city one.

OK, but if the goal of this aquarium is to attract tourists, will it do so?
Three elements are key, says Deb Fassnacht, executive vice-president of the Shedd Aquarium in Chicago and a student of the industry.

They need to be part of a critical mass of attractions. They can't be saddled with debt. And they must have "something charismatic" to attract the large numbers of paying customers they require to stay afloat.

The proposed Toronto aquarium appears to be missing at least two of those essentials; the third is uncertain.
Star atricle.