From Kingston Whig Standard
by Floyd Patterson
A congenial face in a tall figure, Mayor Mark Gerretsen quickly rebooted to serious concern about CN treating Kingston's railway heritage like landfill trash, when he spoke last week to a senior federal agency in Kingston, the Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada.
In Ontario, this board rarely meets outside Ottawa. To most it is faceless and mysterious doing its decision-making in camera, but chairman Dr. Richard Alway, commissioner Dr. Harold Kalman, secretary Dr. Larry Ostola, and three other board officials set up a hearing in Bellevue House on the objections to CN Rail's controversial announcement it wants an Order In Council from Ottawa to let it demolish two thirds of the Grand Trunk station complex at 810 Montreal St.
The historic sites board, having designated the railway station, in its own 12-page report several years ago, as "... a critical facility in the history of railways in Canada," may explain the unadvertised meeting in Kingston. Objectors were told by e-mail when and where to consult with the monuments board. >Before the meeting board officials toured the site.
Built in 1855, the Old Grand Trunk Railway Station on Montreal Street is a birthplace of Kingston's "cultural history" to Mayor Gerretsen, but is a maintenance headache to its owner, CN. The company has refused to repair its roof after a 1996 fire, and now plans to rip down, and truck to the dump, the breezeway and the 1895 brick baggage building that are part of the designated heritage complex. It was the elegant administrative headquarters of the first mainline construction, Brockville to Oshawa leg, and linked us to our far-flung nation.
The Heritage Railway Stations Protection Act disallows demolition or structural changes of stations, but permission for emergency repairs can be given under the Act. CN used that to stabilize the walls of the limestone building with steel. It disposed of fire debris to landfill, covered the elegant windows and doors with paneling, and stored in a bin the Victorian brackets that had held up the mansard roof.
This work has left the historic Georgian building looking like a haunting skeleton, an ugly ruin. At a court hearing in August CN will oppose the city's property standards order to replace the mansard roof.
To the mayor, CN is coming across as a troubling end runner. He and the city council have unanimously demanded that CN fulfil its legal obligation as the owner of a heritage building, and have filed objections to CN's plan to demolish the breezeway and the baggage building.CNsays these 1937 and 1895 additions are not part of the heritage designation.
Not so, says Cynthia Beach, the city's commissioner of sustainability and growth, Peter Gower, chair of the Municipal Heritage Committee, and Helen Finley of the Frontenac Heritage Foundation's watch committee. John Duerkop, another objector, pointed out that a review of the site's heritage designation may require CN to include the earthen trackway along the west side of the station in its heritage designation. While an ineffective tarp failed to prevent vandals and weather from ravaging the building, CN had no luck trying to sell the property
Gerretsen noted the station's location along one of the gateways to downtown Kingston, that it is designated by all three levels of government, and is part of Kingston's cultural and historical development: "... CN should not be allowed to demolish portions of the building through the application process, or all of the building, by not following through with conservation of the building through replacement of the roof and the application of long term conservation practices."
The mayor said the railway company's trying to sell the property, while "allowing the designated features to deteriorate to the point where they can be removed as debris and disposed of in a landfill... is a classic case of demolition by neglect."
He listed the city's requirements for CN's care of the railway station:
1) Restore the mansard roof of the building as the removal of this structure in the application for alteration only accelerates the decay of remaining structure.
2) Restore and replace any heritage features on the building and where the materials have been dumped in a legal landfill, restore as close as possible to the original features using similar materials as stated in the national standards.
3) Stabilize the chimneys as recent alterations to the building have now left these structures vulnerable.
4) Use proper stone masonry repair, as described by Public Works Heritage Conservation Specialists, to halt the rapid deterioration that will result from the recent alteration.
5) A detailed report should be provided by CN describing the work that has been completed under the emergency repairs as there appears to have been damage done by the equipment removing debris to the north end of the stone building.
Chairman Alway said the board must make its recommendations on the issue to the Minister of Environment by July 31. The minister's decision has no deadline.
Floyd Patterson is a former city councillor.
