December 7, 2009

BARR RYDER ARCHITECTS AND INTERIOR DESIGNERS

The MacDonald Island Park Redevelopment project will cost $170 million.

Municipal infrastructure

Western Canada’s largest recreation centre being built near Fort McMurray, Alberta

Richard Gilbert

staff writer

Western Canada’s largest recreation facility is under construction near Fort McMurray, but the project has run into some serious delays and cost escalation.

The development is happening in the Regional Municipality of Wood Buffalo (RMWB), which includes Fort McMurray and the surrounding area.

As the population increased during the oil boom, demand for recreational facilities exceeded capacity.

To alleviate this situation, two new leisure centres began construction in Fort McMurray early in 2006.

The Syncrude Sport & Wellness Centre facility was finished on budget and on time and has been in use for two years.

The MacDonald Island Park Redevelopment project is being completed years behind schedule and millions of dollars over budget.

“That project is our Olympic Village,” said Wayne Prins, Christian Labour Association of Canada regional director for Fort McMurray.

“The Syncrude Sport and Wellness Centre was a little smaller, but started at the same time as MacDonald Island. The publicly funded project has turned out to be a bottomless pit.”

As a result of the scope creep and cost escalation, the new MacDonald Island Park facility has turned into an extremely ambitious project.

The facility, which was scheduled for completion at the end of October is still under construction.

It will include: an aquatics facility with two swimming pools, inner-tube river, splash park and two water slides; an NHL-sized arena; public library; two field houses; running track; climbing wall; fitness facility; children’s playground and child minding area.

The Olympic-size swimming pool and aquatics park are scheduled to open early in 2010.

“The recreation centre got bigger with the library and pool pieced together after the rink,” said RMWB Mayor Melissa Blake.

“We should have had the design work done in advance.”

The municipal council approved four separate increases to the budget, which started at $52 million and climbed to about $170 million.

“The increase is related to the increased scope, such as the expanded aquatics centre plus cost increases, primarily driven by detail designs,” said a RMWB council report.

“This increase was in response to errors and omissions in the previous budget submission, plus cost increases driven by inflation and detail designs.”

Mayor Blake agreed with the findings of the report.

“The rink was originally tendered and was one of the first things we wanted to do,” she said.

“The scope of the project increased as we went along and the cost increased as well.”

Another factor that led to construction cost escalation was the push to get it started.

“The process of getting the drawings together was hurried,” said Bernie La Fleche, construction administrator with Barr Ryder Architects and Interior Designers.

“At the time, Fort McMurray was going crazy and everyone was concerned the project would suffer from construction cost escalation. We decided to move ahead as quickly as possible, which meant the drawings were not as complete as they could have been.”

He said the detailed drawings for the project were handed out in eighteen phases, which always had a certain amount of overlap.

However, when each phase began, there was not always enough information for the next phase.

For La Fleche, the biggest challenge was to co-ordinate all the phases and get the project out the door, while trying to avoid an inflationary cycle driven by the economic boom.

“The best way to put out any project is to have a complete set of drawings,” he said.

In sharp contrast, the Syncrude Sport & Wellness Centre was opened to the public in September of 2007.

The $36 million, 140,000 sq. feet facility was completed under budget and on time.

The facility has two indoor fields, a field house, a three-court hardwood gym, cardiovascular and strength fitness centres, dance and aerobic studios, children’s indoor playground, as well as child-minding services.

The field house incorporates a gymnasium and surfaces for sports such as indoor soccer, lacrosse, tennis, basketball, volleyball and seating for 1500 to host major regional and national events.

A running track, located on the second floor of the field house, provides recreational leisure running, competitive running and sprinting.

For more about Fort McMurray’s construction industry keep reading the Journal of Commerce for Richard Gilbert’s upcoming three part series.

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