Alan Pickersgill - The View From Here

(February 17) - People in Guelph sure do like their old buildings. A couple of weeks ago I wrote about the Loretto Convent. Some people stopped me on the street wanting to know how I could even consider demolishing it. I should make it clear that I am all in favour of keeping the old building in an upright position. The debate over what use is made of it is over. Money has been acquired, plans for its conversion are afoot and work has begun.

We are now in Heritage Week, as good an opportunity as we can get for taking stock of what we have and what we want to keep. Yesterday used to be called Heritage Day. That was because February 15 is the anniversary of the adoption of the Canadian flag. When Ontario declared the third Monday of February as a statutory holiday last year, the Liberals chose to call it Family Day instead. It’s not surprising they turned their backs on Heritage Day. They don’t like being reminded of their dismal record of protecting historic buildings like the Mitchell farm house.

That never to be forgotten old building became a symbol and a rallying cry. Whenever a stone structure is about to be turned into a pile of rubble, the call goes out. We reach for our placards and mill about, chanting “Remember the Mitchell!” And so we should. It’s worth being careful when deciding the future of our past. Once it is torn down, it doesn’t come back. That’s another lesson we learned from the Mitchell house. Be very, very skeptical when a developer promises to number and store all the stones so a building can be reassembled somewhere else. In fact, be more than skeptical. Don’t believe it. It isn’t going to happen.

Which gets us back to the convent. It has been saved, and it will become the new civic museum. The diocese wanted to demolish it. The upkeep was too expensive. The public wanted to save it. We saw the beauty of the shell, but not the asbestos, lead, mould and other toxic material inside. The museum needed a bigger home, and the convent needed an occupant. A host of needs converged and the convent building became a suitable answer for all of them.

It wasn’t a win-win. What we have up on Catholic Hill is far from a marriage made in heaven. The museum was never the best possible use for the convent building, but it quickly became the only possible use.

There is another aspect of preservation to which we need to pay equal attention. Our natural heritage. The rivers and forests and wetlands. The hills and valleys. The rivers. All these features define our geography and our culture. Whether we deal with a physical building or an open landscape, we have to balance what we have with what we want. We want our city to be a healthy place for our children. It also has to be a welcoming place for the new families who will move here.

The city is developing an environmental inventory. It will map the significant, and the sensitive, environmental features within the city. It should, and will, be used as a guide for future development of areas such as Hanlon Creek. The business park had a long gestation period. It has been studied, and studied again. The city needs it. It might help preserve another part of Guelph’s disappearing heritage –having a job to go to. The buildings will go on top of land that once gave life to trees and other vegetation and animals. There is wetland down there that needs preserving just as much as the finest farmhouse or the classiest convent.

An understanding of the ecological features of our urban landscape is essential to measuring the impact of growth. Development isn’t always bad. Uncontrolled development is. Guelph isn’t breaking new ground. We are moving back to reclaim the Smart Guelph commitment to social, environmental and economic health.

As we move through Heritage Week, give a lot of thought to our limestone buildings and our farmhouses. Also think about our landscape. Any city that can get excited about an unheated cobbler’s shed ought to get downright passionate about the fish in Hanlon Creek.

# posted by Alan Pickersgill @ 5:01 PM