A portion of the former Guelph Correctional Centre on York Road could soon be torn down due to soil contamination.
Infrastructure Ontario (IO), which manages provincially-owned assets on behalf of the government, plans to demolish the powerhouse and chimney, as well as above ground portions of associated service tunnels, followed by remediation work.
Coal and natural gas used during the centre’s operation has left petroleum hydrocarbons, generally known as PHCs, in the soil, posing potential health and safety concerns with prolonged exposure.
The plan was presented to Heritage Guelph on Tuesday afternoon, though the committee offered no comments in support or opposition to demolition and passed no motions in relation to it.
“The purpose of what we’re doing now is to ensure future use of the building,” said Miranda Bunton of IO. “Even if the future of it is not known now, we’re trying to prepare it as best we can.”
While each of those features is on the municipal registry of heritage properties, they’re not specifically identified in an Ontario Heritage Act designation city council approved last year for the York Road property. They are, however, identified as heritage attributes within the Ontario Reformatory Heritage Conservation District boundary, though that process isn’t complete and is not in force.
Despite any protections in place, as provincially-owned land the only approval required for demolition is that of the Ministry of Citizenship and Multiculturalism.
In order to remove the contaminated soil, the committee heard a four-metre wide slope must be dug on all sides of the area to be taken out.
The demolition plan comes with a $2 million price tag, David Addington of IO told the committee, and the cost to retain the features while removing contaminated soil sits closer to $5 million.
Even if the latter approach was taken, the committee heard the structures might not survive the process.
The powerhouse was built at the same time as the correctional centre itself, in 1910, with additions in 1916 and 1934, according to the IO presentation, with the chimney added between 1916 and 1934. It was also lowered in height from 150 feet tall to about 100 feet tall in the late 1990s or early 2000s.
The service tunnel was constructed just prior to the centre’s opening in 1915.
Soil remediation and removal efforts began in 2019. Underground fuel storage tanks were removed in the early 1990s.