As summer is near its beginning, there's no better time for the City of Barrie to its new, state-of-the-art greenhouse, located at its operations centre.
The new greenhouse is part of the city's initiative to improve the look of public spaces while doing it in an environmentally friendly manner.
"These greenhouses support a bunch of different things around the city," said Barrie Mayor Alex Nuttall. "Everything from our planters that you see in downtown and throughout the city centre, right through to what you see planted on our waterfront. They are a big piece of the beauty of this city."
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This project is part of the city's operations centre redevelopment, which is a multi-year project that will also yield a new salt storage building, a new storage building, and other infrastructure improvements.
Construction started back in August and finished earlier this month. It's replacing the nearly 50-year-old greenhouse which will be demolished later this month and cost.
The new greenhouse cost $4.5 million of the $28.2 million approved for phase one of the redevelopment project. While those are large numbers, the city is confident this will save money long-term.
"Approximately 50 years ago the city built the original greenhouse but as the years passed we outgrew the space," said Nuttall "In this new space, we expect to potentially grow up to 25% more plants annually than we did with our old greenhouse facilities. Also, growing our own plants offers substantial savings to the city... approximately $350,000 a year is saved by having this facility here."
"This greenhouse, will allow us to save money on actually not having to purchase new flowers and other horticultural products every year, said Ward 3 councillor Ann-Marie Kungl. "We can overwinter them. So we can just continue to build on beautifying our city.
Kungl is also the chair of the city's committee on the Communities in Bloom competition, which awarded Barrie an international award, as well as the Green Cities Award and recognition for its waterfront strategic plan.
"It has to do a lot with the way our staff have been bringing leading research, technology, and innovation into how we design new capital projects," she said. "This is one big, beautiful capital project we've been waiting for for quite a long time."
The plants grown in the greenhouse will be replanted throughout the city with much of them being used along Kempenfelt Bay, at recreation centres, and over 60 parks throughout the city.
GREENHOUSE FEATURES
- 14,000 square feet of growing space
- Climate-controlled zones that have their own automated heating, ventilation, solar shades, and irrigation systems
- Roll-top benches and options that can accommodate 220 hanging baskets to maximize vertical space.
- Optimal light transmission, LED fixtures, a solar shade system, a collection system for reuse of water, and heating systems that could change over to electric in future phases
