Keeping Bay’s facade a fine idea if all else fails

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 22/04/2016 (3490 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Some may see the downtown Hudson’s Bay store as the city centre’s big white elephant, with all that empty room.

Others, me included, see the iconic 90-year-old, six-storey building as a historical and architectural treasure, anchoring the western entrance to downtown Portage Avenue that was once Winnipeg’s grand promenade. Our Champs-Élysées. Our La Rambla. Our 5th Avenue.

But, in 1959, the opening of Polo Park Shopping Centre signalled the shift to suburban mall shopping. Then, just three months ago, in her state of the downtown speech, CentreVenture Development Corporation CEO Angela Mathieson alluded to another example of how much has changed since then, such as the Bay’s corporate decision to reduce its retail presence in its downtown store to just two floors.

So it was that after a column about the reimaging of another even older Winnipeg icon — the Arlington Street bridge — a retired provincial civil servant who worked in the downtown, and whose uncle designed its top-floor Paddlewheel restaurant in 1954, sent me an email with an idea for saving the Bay Downtown. Well, saving part of it, anyway.

“Maintain the facades of the Bay on Memorial, Portage and Vaughan,” wrote Randy Clark, “so the look of the building and streetscape do not change; but like Red River College on Princess, and the old Mitchell Copp building on Portage; gut all of the inside, including the old parking garage.”

Then turn the main-floor area into a transit bus terminal.

“It can become the CentrePoint for those coming to the University of Winnipeg, art gallery, the courts, legislative building, Portage Place, convention centre events, MTS Centre activity and True North Square. This does not take into account future needs. Yet, the Bay would visually maintain its grand presence on that corner.”

Clark summed up his vision this way: “Just trying to keep the look, the feel, and think outside the box.”

Intriguing idea. Particularly if all else fails, as seems to be the case so far.

Not so fast, says Brent Bellamy, who’s the board chairman of CentreVenture, an architect and a regular contributor to the Free Press. For him, as he was saying recently, what’s more important than the look is saving the store.

“It’s so important that I’m not prepared to say it’s just about the architecture,” he said. “The whole point of downtown revitalization is to build a neighbourhood for people to live there, to have that urban lifestyle that’s attractive. And the Bay is a huge part of it.”

Bellamy believes once the population of the downtown is strong enough, the Bay will be successful as a retailer.

“And even if you can put 200 people living in there. And a hotel where people are coming and going. And offices. And you’re driving traffic to that building. Then I think the Bay becomes a profitable venture.”

I suggested that in a way, our Bay, and the much-talked-about solutions for its survival, is a microcosm of the entire downtown.

“ It’s a perfect example,” Bellamy said. “You’re exactly right.

“When we’re looking at how do we bring back downtown, we’re looking at things like housing. And so you can’t just have people living there, you have to have the things that support an urban lifestyle, that make it attractive for people to actually live downtown. And those are the kind of things that need to go into the Bay.”

OK, I’m with him on all of that. But the cost of renovating for repurposing appears to have been seen as prohibitive for several organizations that have looked into moving in, including Manitoba Liquor & Lotteries, which also had other issues with the space, including a dearth of windows.

“I was shocked they didn’t take the Bay,” Bellamy said.

According to Bellamy, there’s still a lot of discussion among a lot of important people.

What it might take to save the downtown Bay, I suggested to Bellamy, is creating a consortium of our largest local developers and making it a civic-pride project. He agreed but had something to add.

“I really believe the provincial government is the key one to make it work,” he said.”It’s not just about the government investing $300 million. It’s about bringing those people together.”

Mind you, Bellamy said that a couple of weeks before Manitobans voted in a new provincial government that appears more focused on saving money than spending it. In any event, for Brent Bellamy, when it comes to the Downtown Bay, one thing is certain.

“If we give up on it, it’s never coming back.”

gordon.sinclair@freepress.mb.ca