Posted Nov 27, 2007, 12:18 PM
|
|
It's Hammer Time
|
|
Join Date: Mar 2004
Location: Hamilton
Posts: 19,881
|
|
Work begins on $15m reno to transform ex-Camco site
November 27, 2007
Wade Hemsworth
The Hamilton Spectator
(Nov 27, 2007)
The old brick building and the field of gravel that have been the public's picture of McMaster Innovation Park are about to change dramatically.
Work has begun on $15-million worth of renovations to the former Camco building on Longwood Road South, where MIP president Zachary Douglas has lined up the first eight tenants who will occupy one-third of the building's 120,000 square feet.
The first of those tenants, as yet unnamed, is expected to be moving in by April, starting in motion a 10- to 15-year plan for the park, where ultimately, the university expects to see as many as 3,000 occupants and 1.7 million square feet of office, laboratory and meeting space.
The renovation of the red brick building is to be complete by the end of 2008, with new offices, wet and dry labs, conference space, fitness facilities and food concessions. The rear annex of the building will centre on an open atrium that forms the hub of the northeast corner of the park.
Before that work is done, construction for the park's key tenant, the federal government materials laboratory, CANMET, will be under way next door to the south, with groundbreaking expected in the autumn of 2008. That building is expected to be complete by 2010 and become home to 100 top federal scientists.
"I'm quite pleased in the sense that things are starting to happen," said Mo Elbestawi, the university's vice-president responsible for research.
Within the next month, Douglas also expects to finalize plans by a local hotelier to build a long-stay hotel at the MIP, immediately north of the brick building overlooking Highway 403.
|