Ontario Premier Doug Ford further dug in on his decision to close the science centre and touted his plans to overhaul Ontario Place on Monday, claiming he wants the waterfront attraction to become the country’s top tourist destination.
Speaking at an unrelated event on Monday morning, the premier said he planned to make Ontario Place the country’s best tourist attraction and claimed the Ontario Science Centre’s current location was “a sleepy little neighbourhood.”
Ford said he believed that once the redevelopment of Ontario Place — which includes a revamped music stage, spa and a new home for the science centre — is complete, it will become more popular with tourists than the CN Tower.
“Mark my words, it will be the number one tourist attraction in all of Canada,” Ford said.
“The CN Tower has about 1.2 million people, let’s all agree that’s a pretty good tourist attraction, but with Live Nation, with the bands… we have the waterpark there and still there’s a whole part of Ontario Place that hasn’t been developed. Once they see it, people, their jaws will drop and more and more tourists will come there.”
The premier did not elaborate on which parts of Ontario Place have not yet been developed or if he plans to develop them further.
Internal government documents previously obtained by the Ontario NDP had hinted at a “phase two” for the Ontario Place expansion, which could have included filling a portion of Lake Ontario. A September 2020 document explained, “Phase II contemplates development of a large-scale entertainment, retail and restaurant destination on a portion of the East island and mainland.”
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The infrastructure minister ruled that out earlier in the year, saying that the public vision announced in April 2023 is “what we are building today.”
Ford also appeared to back away from a plan to build underground parking at Ontario Place. The province has already signed an agreement to provide parking spaces near to the spa development.
An auditor general report found in 2023 that the agreement signed by Ontario with Therme — the company building a waterpark and spa at Ontario Place — requires it to build the parking lot within 650 metres of the spa.
The contract between Therme and the Ford government included a “financial penalty” if it failed to keep that promise.
“We haven’t confirmed the underground parking space because it costs so much to build underground,” Ford said. “We’d like to build as much on top without prohibiting the view.”
In pitching his new vision for Ontario Place once again on Monday, Ford took a swipe at a “small percentage” of people who “make a lot of noise” and, according to the premier, don’t want the government to spend money on its legacy project.
“‘We don’t want it, we want to stay antiquated, we want an old wrecked-down Ontario Place that no one’s touched in 10 years and no one uses,’” Ford claimed his detractors were saying.
His comments seemed to be particularly directed at those who have protested the government’s abrupt announcement in June that it planned to permanently close the 55-year-old Ontario Science Centre building, located at Don Mills Road and Eglinton Avenue.
“We’re building a brand-spanking-new, state-of-the-art, more exhibit space and in the right location — not in a sleepy little neighbourhood in the suburbs that no one goes to,” he said.
“This is where all the action is; where the soccer is and the stadium and Live Nation, the Exhibition. It’s just common sense, it’s a no-brainer.”
The current science centre is the final stop on the Ford government’s signature Ontario Line project, which will run down to Exhibition Station, beside Ontario Place. Despite announcing a transit line to service the area during his first term, Ford said the area had few visitors.
Critics were quick to jump on Ford’s swipe at the area, which will be a transit hub for the Eglinton Crosstown LRT and the Ontario Line when they open.
“Thorncliffe Park and Flemingdon Park are not ‘sleepy little neighbourhoods.’ They’re underserved, working-class communities who rely on programming from the Science Centre,” Ontario NDP Leader Marit Stiles said in a social media post.
Local Ontario Liberal MPP Adil Shamji said the area was “an epicentre of housing development at the intersection of two major new transit lines.”
Coun. Josh Matlow said the comments were “absurd” and “way off base.”