The Quebec City Planning and Conservation Commission (CUCQ), which the Marchand administration asked to look into different scenarios relating to the future of the old amphitheater, has not yet submitted its report.
Scheduled for December 20, the expected submission of the opinion supposed to guide the team of the mayor of Quebec in its decision on the future of the Colisée will instead be done on January 20.
“Following the CUCQ’s request, we granted them a period of one month to submit their report,” Bruno Marchand’s office said in writing.
The reasons justifying this postponement of a few weeks have not been revealed by the City.
Last November, the Marchand administration entrusted the CUCQ with a mandate to analyze the heritage value of the old arena. In Quebec, this body is responsible for “controlling the location and architecture of buildings, land development and related work” in certain sectors.
Decision expected
In the case of the Coliseum, the executive committee asked it to decide on two scenarios, namely its partial or complete demolition. Its maintenance could also be recommended, if the two hypotheses are rejected by the CUCQ.
The opinion of the Planning Commission is, however, not prescriptive, but will serve to inform the reflection of elected officials.
Firstly, an “analysis grid” is expected. The report to be submitted by Monday will therefore not contain any firm verdict, but rather a list of “criteria” to guide the executive committee.
It will ultimately be up to elected officials to decide what will become of the Colosseum.
And this decision will be at the heart of the future, while the Marchand administration also seeks to decide on the future vocation of the entire northeast portion of the ExpoCité site, where the Colisée still sits.
-After a public consultation, it is now juggling two remaining options, namely the consolidation of the ExpoCité center as an “exhibition center and emblematic entertainment venue” or the creation of a mixed site including housing and events. .
2025, year to decide?
The mayor of Quebec has always maintained his position. Even as a candidate for mayor in 2021, Bruno Marchand has never hidden his preference for the disappearance of the 15,000-seat building, unused since its closure in 2015. Putting it back in order would be expensive, he said. – he has often insisted since taking office.
During the electoral campaign, Bruno Marchand carried this vision for the site, namely new housing bordered by a refrigerated ice rink under the preserved framework of the Coliseum. (provided by Québec forte et proud/Québec forte et proud)
Last October, his advisor Mélissa Coulombe-Leduc, president of the ExpoCité commission, explained that Quebec found itself in a “pretty good” situation between what it would cost to bring it down or hand it over to the standards.
However, to date, neither the demolition nor the upgrading of the infrastructure have been costed, as reported The Sun last month. The projected bill of 17 million for the demolition, in the air since 2021, has never been updated.
Deemed “premature” at this stage of the process, the financial analysis of the different scenarios for the Colisée is not part of the mandate entrusted to the CUCQ.
The entire project being “very complex”, major work on the site would be “difficult to carry out” this year, said the director of ExpoCité, Catherine Chénier, in December.
After years of seeing the future of the Coliseum being questioned, the Marchand administration has given itself until November to put an end to the indecision.
“We would like, by the end of the mandate, to be fixed on a clear scenario. Let us move on and be in realization mode, rather than in eternal reflection,” he shared with Soleil elected Mélissa Coulombe-Leduc, in October.
