Dear editor:
It’s hard to comprehend how the Niagara-on-the-Lake municipal heritage committee could recognize the negative impact of the Shaw Festival’s Royal George construction project on the historical character of the neighbourhood around the theatre, but still approve the demolition of two adjacent heritage houses on Victoria Street.
Particularly, when the primary reason for the demolition is to create better access to the theatre construction site.
The contrast between the committee’s decision and the efforts of the Swedish town of Kiruna to preserve its 113-year-old church is striking.
When it was clear that the expansion of its iron ore mine was putting the town at risk, residents voted to relocate the town to a new site three kilometres away.
They also initiated a 10-year planning process to preserve their historic 113-year-old church.
It came to fruition in early August 2025, when the church was raised off its foundations and hoisted onto a specially built apparatus with 224 wheels.
It was then rolled five kilometres to its new location over two days.
The Shaw Festival says that it would be impossible to lift the Royal George Theatre off its foundations. I don’t buy it.
If Kiruna can move its 672-tonne church five kilometres, surely the festival could lift the Royal George and move it back 20 yards from Queen Street to allow the construction of a new lobby and replace the theatre’s foundations.
But the festival’s 10-year planning process for the George, beginning with its acquisition of Angie Strauss’ Victoria Street home, has always been about demolishing and rebuilding the theatre, not about preserving it as an important part of Niagara-on-the-Lake’s heritage.
When the festival’s plans come to fruition, a phony wall will stand in the place of the Royal George’s existing façade, and the streetscape of both Victoria and Queen streets will, in my view, be negatively changed.
The historic feel and character of our town will be diminished, and a building that marks an important time in Niagara-on-the-Lake’s past — when troops trained here before being shipped off to war — will be forever lost.
Shame on the festival for planning this destruction and shame on the Niagara-on-the-Lake municipal heritage committee for not only supporting it but also setting a precedent that will make it difficult to decline similar demolition requests in the future.
Terry Davis
NOTL
