John Gale doesn’t see himself as any kind of saviour or visionary.
But he wants Kenora to think big.
The former mining executive has been an area cottager for 15 years in one of Ontario’s most stunningly beautiful places and wants this charming northwestern Ontario community to capitalize on its natural beauty.
In a development proposal, Gale is planting a seed in people’s minds as to what can accomplished on a parcel of former industrial lands that can put Kenora on a "world-class" stage.
He is the spokesman for an impressive development group that’s in the final stages of purchasing the town’s abandoned AbitibiBowater properties that will cast Kenora in a new light.
His group is proposing a flurry of business and recreational development for Kenora on a grandiose scale. It is sited on lands vacated by the bankrupt pulp and paper maker who finally shuttered the last remnants of its struggling mill in 2006, putting 360 out of work.
Gale is close to putting the finishing touches on the acquisition of a 500-acre parcel made up of the mostly demolished mill site, a few kilometres of lakefront on the Winnipeg River and Cameron Bay, and a ridge that overlooks Lake of the Woods and the downtown.
There he wants a five-star resort and conference centre, a "world-class" theme park, condos, an RV park, and assisted living units with year-round activities like paddle boats, zip-lines and a luge run winding down the slope.
“It is pretty big, pretty ambitious,” said Gale, who was in the diamond drilling business as one of the founders of Dimatec, a major mining supplier.
“I’ve got two years and a pile of money invested in this.”
In a place that’s becoming a hot spot for upscale living, Gale holds an exclusive purchase agreement from AbitibiBowater and has Aug. 31 circled for when he can start closing the deal.
To join him, Gale has lured in CB Richard-Ellis, one of the world’s biggest commercial real estate firms, and Chartier & Associates, a Winnipeg developer, to help raise the financing for the $930-million attraction that will built in phases over three to seven years.
The staggering job losses in the region’s forest industry and the drying-up of American tourists has turned the city’s marketing focus toward Winnipeggers who have long viewed Kenora as their version of Muskoka.
Tourism has always been big business. About 2,500 local jobs are directly related to tourism which pumps in an estimated $200 million into the community’s economy through sport fishing, campers, day-trippers and cottagers.
Now recreational development has been going decidedly upscale ever since the Qualico Group bought the former Abitibi staff house property on the south side of Tunnel Island and has construction of a $40-million for a 90-unit luxury condo well underway.
“It never really was a big mill town,” said Gale, whose group was in the bidding for that prime piece of property that went for a reported $3.4 million.
However in Kenora, there will always be room for value-added forestry. On the mill site, Gale has mapped out a business and technology park that could be the home for forestry start-up firms, green tech and knowledge-based companies.
Five businesses are lined up, including Wincrief, a local manufacturer of wood modular homes, which would move into a leftover 75,000-square foot warehouse.
Gale is in talks with a lumber company that’s in expansion mode.
Gale said the buy-in from community leaders and the average citizen is key. Kenora already has the ingredients of great vacation spot, and just has to be more professionally organized and marketed, he added.
Part of that may be addressed with the pending construction of the Lake of the Woods Discovery Centre. The $3.1-million tourist information centre is slated to be built on a scenic point at Cameron Bay as tourists enter Kenora from the west. This gateway-type of interpretive centre will be open year-round.
It will be the new home of Heather Paterson, Kenora’s new tourism officer, whose main job is keep Manitobans coming.
With Winnipeg only a two-hour drive away, Kenora is taking part in a pan-Northern tourism initiative, dubbed Escape to Ontario. It’s a collaborative effort of tourism departments and operators from the Manitoba border as far east as Ignace and down to Fort Frances to market their accommodations, adventure activities, festivals and shopping.
“Kenora is Manitoba’s playground but there are a number of people who are not aware of what we have,” said Paterson.
The group has been targeting the Winnipeg market for six months with a mixture of newspaper, radio, TV and web-based advertising, as well as hitting the winter outdoor adventure trade shows in Calgary.
Internet tracking of their website shows monthly web hits in the thousands.
“Our campaign is starting to work,” said Paterson. “Retailers are seeing day-trippers coming from Manitoba, which is something new.”
When they arrive they’ll see a revitalized downtown with storefronts restored to its century-old Victorian Charm thanks to last year’s first phase of the city’s $25-million Big Spruce project.
Wilco Contractors Superior performed the work.
“We’re very happy with the work they did,” said Kenora’s Chief Administrative Officer Bill Preisentanz. “We were very impressed and the engineering people really enjoyed working with them.”
It included the installation of a traffic roundabout on the Trans-Canada Highway leading into the downtown core.
“Half the community won’t admit it, but it’s working,” said Preisentanz.
Construction now shifts to the harbourfront this summer and fall for the $6-million second phase that will involve improvements to a waterfront plaza, boardwalk, wharf and docks for boaters.
All the underground infrastructure was installed last fall. Tenders go out shortly.
As for the Gale group’s development plan, Preisentanz said the city is ready to assist in whatever capacity is required.
“We’re quite prepared to work with him but the big thing is the transfer of the ownership of land from Abitibi.”
Some cottagers who have been in the Kenora area for generations may object to the scale of the development, said Preisentanz, “but this city council has definitely has been pro-active with many trips to Winnipeg and to people who are major business leaders and I think you’ll see the results.”
