Marina Boulevard firehall, currently under construction, to replace old building on Carnegie Avenue.
Peterborough will receive a grant of $1.2 million plus a loan of $8.1 million — both in federal government funding — to cover the entire $9.3-million construction cost of the city’s new north-end firehall.
The new firehall, Peterborough's first net-zero building, is still under construction on municipal property at 100 Marina Boulevard (at Water Street, in the city’s north end).
It is expected to open in late fall.
The announcement of the grant ($1,226,080) and loan ($8,173,910) were made inside the new firehall on Wednesday afternoon (Jan. 24).
“It's on budget, on schedule,” Mayor Jeff Leal said of the project at the announcement.
The new firehall will replace the aging north-end Fire Station No. 2 at 1558 Carnegie Ave. Leal said it’s not been decided yet exactly how the city might repurpose that property.
The funding announced Wednesday comes from the Green Municipal Fund, a $1.6-billion program funded by the Government of Canada and administered by the Federation of Canadian Municipalities.
Whitby MP Ryan Turnbull, parliamentary secretary for innovation, science and industry, was in Peterborough Wednesday and announced the funding. Turnbull was speaking on behalf of Energy and Natural Resources Minister Jonathan Wilkinson (the MP for North Vancouver).
He said Canadian cities and towns “are on the front line of the fight against climate change.”
“The project announced today is a great example of that,” he said.
Also at the announcement were Coun. Joy Lachica, the city’s chair for environment and climate change, and Coun. Lesley Parnell, the vice-chair for fire services.
The current north-end fire station on Carnegie Avenue was built in 1968. It doesn’t meet the current standards for modern fire stations and the property’s too small to rebuild on.
In 2021, the previous city council voted to build the new firehall at 100 Marina Blvd., which the city has owned for more than 50 years. It was the site of now-demolished Northcrest Arena.
Northcrest Arena was built in 1967. It was closed permanently in 2020 due to structural issues, and demolished by early 2022. Now the property’s getting the new firehall.
The local firm Unity Design Studio (formerly Lett Architects) designed the mass-timber building. JCB Construction Canada is building the firehall for a total cost of $10 million. That includes some costs in addition to the $9.3 million for construction that the city will be expected to cover: demolition costs, for example.
The features that make the new firehall net-zero include ground source heat pumps, rooftop solar panels and a heat-recovery system.
Turnbull noted in his remarks that the green design is expected to save the city more than $24,000 annually in operating costs.