After a long wait, it appears the Progressive Conservative government is ready to take the next step toward the development of Ontario Place.

The prime piece of government-owned real estate west of Toronto's downtown has been underutilized for years, although an award-winning park now adorns the eastern portion of the land. And Premier Doug Ford has made it clear that developing the area is a personal priority for him.

The effort to do so was delayed when the pandemic hit. But now, according to a report from the Globe and Mail, the government has selected three companies to form the bid to revitalize the 63-hectare site, with more details expected in the coming weeks.

Those companies include European spa company Therme, Quebec's Écorécréo and an expanded role for event company Live Nation.

The office of Tourism Minister Lisa MacLeod did not respond to a request for comment, but we will update this story when they do.

Here's how Ontario Place has reached this point.

Historic context

Ontario Place quietly celebrated its fiftieth anniversary earlier this year, marking the moment when former Premier Bill Davis shepherded in the site, the province's response to Expo 67. The futuristic architecture included the likes of the Cinesphere, the geodesic dome that was the world's first permanent IMAX theatre. And it also included the famed pods designed by architect Eb Zeidler. The following year the site included the Children's Village, which revolutionized the idea of what playgrounds could be.

While Ontario Place initially had a focus on public space, over time the emphasis shifted to an amusement park culture, in part to recoup costs on the site. While the site had some success in the 1970s and '80s, concerns mounted in the 1990s and 2000s as revenue declined amid increased competition from other attractions like Canada's Wonderland. Attendance fell from a peak of 3 million annual visitors to a fraction, decades later.

In 2012, with the Dalton McGuinty government mindful of deficits, the province closed down Ontario Place attractions to save money — about $20 million annually — and announced a panel that would look at revitalizing the site.

The Liberal government appointed former PC Leader John Tory to chair that panel, which laid out a suite of options for the site. Among them was a focus on arts, culture and diversity for uses at the site. While saying there shouldn't be a "wall of condos" on the site, a nod to concerns about development blocking other prime Toronto waterfront land, Tory said he thought there should be a residential component to the site in part to offset costs for other public amenities.

But there was public pushback to that latter idea, which was then abandoned by the government. However, the Liberal government did build out Trillium Park and the William G. Davis Trail, 7.5 acres of parkland along the eastern portion of the site.

And in the meantime, the Liberal government slowly made progress on bids for the rest of the site.

The PC government pivots, sees a blank slate

Although the bids to revitalize Ontario Place were in the late stages under the Liberals, with detailed plans in the works, the new PC government in 2018 chose to hit the reset button to follow its own path.

That included appointing PC insider Jim Ginou, a friend of the premier, to chair the Ontario Place board. Ginou, who passed away in November 2019, immediately called the state of Ontario Place "disgraceful" and said that the site was in "complete disrepair."

That kind of thinking was echoed by Tourism Minister Michael Tibollo. In a private meeting with stakeholders, he illustrated the state of Ontario Place in dystonic terms, comparing the experience of walking through it to a Fellini film.

The Ford government made clear that it saw Ontario Place as a blank slate, and the premier initially refused to rule out a casino, among other options. (Ford and his late brother Rob had pursued a casino when they were at Toronto City Hall, but lost the vote on the issue in a 2013 meeting.) They also said that tearing down the Cinesphere and pods were up for grabs, and changing the parkland could be done too, provided the acreage stayed the same.

But just like there was community pushback around the time of the Tory panel, there was here too. Local groups organized their own consultation meetings in the absence of any government outreach — the process to date has been almost entirely based on closed-door considerations.

And those concerns centred on getting back to Ontario Place's roots as a site that prioritized public space, preserving its built heritage and avoiding a sell-off to private interests.

PCs retreat on the issue, somewhat

As time went on the PC government, perhaps mindful of public backlash, issued constraints on its blank-slate vision of Ontario Place. It would not have condos on the site, the government vowed, and after months of speculation about a casino it ruled that use out too.

The government would also not subsidize a pro sports stadium on the site, the premier promised, spiking speculation that it could be a future site for an NFL stadium.

And after some more time, it also pledged to preserve the Cinesphere and pods, which had become a significant issue for local opposition. However, the government did not heed calls to open up the process to public input, despite calls from community group Waterfront for All, the NDP and the editorial board of the Toronto Star.

If the trio of companies goes through with the project then it will mean Ontario Place will have a focus on an outdoors element, with possible uses for all seasons and with a greater emphasis on programming for adults. The Toronto area does not have a European-style spa on the scale that Therme operates, and there would be a mix of private and public uses.

In this, it is somewhat akin to the types of uses discussed under the previous Liberal government, although it had more of a public focus, including a possible student campus. But it does symbolize Ontario Place coming back to similar ideas it has pondered for decades, even 50 years after it was first envisioned.

In ‘complete disrepair’: A brief political history of Ontario Place development

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