Elevation Place near completion
After breaking ground in April of last year, construction of Canmore’s state-of-the-art Elevation Place on Railway Avenue, is now 70 per cent complete and will be finished this November.
Both project manager Pat Griffith and Gary Buxton, interim general manger of municipal infrastructure for the Town of Canmore, agree that despite being roughly six weeks off schedule, the 77,000 square foot facility, which cost an estimated $39 million, will be open to the public in December with programs to commence after the new year.
“We’re using the summer weather to get the exterior completed so that we can get our final plantings in before the fall,” Griffith said, regarding what the roughly 160 workers on site are concentrating on at this stage of the project. He also said completion of the pool is a big priority.
According to Buxton, the pool was a few centimetres short of its official length when originally built, however, the error has been fixed without causing a delay in scheduling.
“It’s been checked and it’s been surveyed. It’s all the right length now,” Buxton confirmed.
With hundreds of thousands of different parts and around 50 subcontractors, the number of setbacks for a building of this size has been few, Griffith pointed out, which has made Graham Construction, the main contractor, confident it will be completed near the end of fall.
Not only will the facility contain top quality recreational uses and multipurpose community spaces, a great deal of work has been put in to make the building environmentally friendly using the LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) certification program.
“There’s geothermal and water recycling,” Buxton explained. “Overall, the building is LEED gold. The civic centre is LEED silver.
“We wanted it be to as green as possible,” he continued. “We wanted to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, reduce energy consumption and reduce water use.”
Once Elevation Place opens its doors to the public, Buxton emphasized the town’s desire to extend the services provided for visitors to Canmore to come and enjoy.
“We’re really going to be marketing it to the visiting community and working with the hotels to make sure we not only get Canmore residents in, but we’re getting visitors in as well,” he said.
The facility is being funded through the province’s Municipal Sustainability Initiative (MSI) and will feature an aquatic centre with an eight-lane pool, a zero beach leisure pool, a lazy river, water slides, a steam room, a 25-person hot tub and amenities such as locker rooms and viewing areas.
In addition to the aquatic centre, Elevation Place will also boast an over 7,000 sq. ft. climbing wall, a new community library, a community space for the Canmore Arts & Artisans Guild (CAAG), a community atrium with a performance stage and multiple bike and stroller parking areas.
It is also, says the Town, designed to function as a venue for large gatherings or competitions, a gateway to more lasting relationship in the community, and a place for neighbours and friends to extend their daily interactions.
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