Sometimes one has to stop and pull the threads together to see the larger pattern in the quilt that represents Thompson's future. Do that and what you will see are many things that auger well for the self-proclaimed Hub of the North.
It's easy enough to get mired in the problems and setbacks that are bound to happen along the way. That's why it is so often rightly said that the devil is in the details. Part of our self-proclaimed job here is to act as a public watchdog and critique projects and developments along the way. At least that's how we like to think of our high-minded purpose. Others might say we like to throw cold water on things or rain on the parade.
While the city has some very serious problems - violent crime is still too much a feature of our daily life, our early 1960's infrastructure (just look at the number of water breaks now year-round) is a shambles and the supply of affordable rental housing remains a pressing challenge - there is also much reason for optimism.
Both private and public sector investors are voting for Thompson with their pocketbooks and that's a very big thing indeed. One doesn't have to look far outside of Thompson to much of the rest of Canada or the United States to see the very opposite.
The projects vary in scale, but consider the following as illustrations of what is on the near horizon for Thompson:
The new University College of the North (UCN) campus in Thompson. Yes, the construction is several years late getting under way. True, the Red Sangster Ball Field will have to be moved. And true, questions have been raised lately about the possible impact of student housing on the nearby Thompson Zoo. Those are the details. But the fact remains, as both Steve Ashton, Thompson NDP MLA and now minister of infrastructure and transportation minister, and Mayor Tim Johnston both point out, this will be the biggest public sector project ever undertaken in Thompson's history, dating back to 1956. At minimum it will be no less than $33 million and, as Johnston has said, the price tag for the entire project, including housing, could be more than $100 million. That is one very big investment in Thompson's future;
The Thompson Regional Airport Authority is building a new $15 million terminal on the other side of the existing main runway, along with other business development, at the Thompson Airport. The airport's plans for expansion have created interest in the aircraft industry from businesses considering relocating there. The airport authority would like to build the new terminal but plans to keep the existing airport building because it anticipates sufficient leasing opportunities for both buildings by next year. The current terminal is about 11,000 square feet, and the airport authority wants to increase that to about five times that area, based on what the airlines need for office space, and for freight movements;
While the Thompson Regional Community Centre has been scaled way back from the $22-million project it was first envisioned as - even at half that amount it is one very refurbished and spiffed up C.A. Nesbitt Arena as it enters Phase Three;
CMF Holdings, a group of local investors that include CJR Consulting, is building a 6,500-square-foot conference centre on city-owned land they lease on Jasper Drive on the Burntwood River. The centre is expected to open next May;
Wuskwatim Power Limited Partnership, a legal entity comprised of Manitoba Hydro and the Nisichawayasihk Cree Nation (NCN), continue to develop the 200-MW Wuskwatim Generating Station at Taskinigup Falls on the Burntwood River, located in the Nelson House Resource Management Area, 45 kilometres southwest of Thompson and 35 kilometres southeast of Nelson House. Manitoba Hydro is providing construction and management services to WPLP, in accordance with the project development agreement signed in June 2006. A general partner, 5022649 Manitoba Ltd., which is a wholly-owned Manitoba Hydro subsidiary governed by a board of directors, which consists of four Manitoba Hydro and two NCN representatives, carries out the business affairs of the Wuskwatim Power Limited Partnership. The $1.6-billion project is on track to come online in 2011;
Cold weather testing. The new $40-million Canadian Environmental Test Research and Education Center (CanETREC) and Global Aerospace Centre for Icing and Environmental Research Inc. (GlacIer) are being constructed out at Ospwagan Lake for aerospace engine cold weather testing beginning as early as next October. Among the automobile cold weather testers who have been using Thompson for years, Ford, which operates a cold chamber in a former aircraft hangar at the Thompson Airport, along with a specially built track near the Norplex Pool, as its Thompson Extreme Cold Weather Test Facility, will be back this winter, as will Honda Canada Inc. in its subleased space from CMF Holdings at the old heliport facility of the former Canadian Helicopters Ltd. Burntwood Sea Plane Base site on Jasper Drive;
And, of course, there is Vale Inco's Manitoba Operations. While Vale Inco slowed down this year the $750-million capital projects expansion of its mining, milling, smelting and refining operations here begun last year and aimed at boosting production by about 36 percent over the next decade, the key word is slowed down. It didn't kill them. The company spent about $258 million in Thompson in 2008 on capital projects.
