Proposed Waterfront Stage [UPDATED]

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• Squint a little, folks and you may see vestiges of the ill-fated Cleary Guest House circa 1957...all that blocky architectural massing and slab like cantilevered horizontal planes. My fear is that history will repeat itself and, come say 2045, the rallying cry will be: "remove that ugly view-spoiling monstrosity from our pristine riverfront!"

• Andrew, you should be receiving an email from our office with all of the amphitheatre images for your use. It was not our intention to avoid sending them to you!!

  Regardless, thank you for providing the link to our web site and feel free to update the images of the TD bank building anytime since it now near completion and the comments posted to date are based on initial perceptions and not the finished product. We would welcome your thoughts. Jerry

• Now there is a gentleman above (Kavs).

  I too hope they still have bike rentals and snack bar. We are under-utilizing or riverfront to the point of uselessness.

• yeah wow, that was good of you Kavs. Also nice to see the arcitects seem to regularly watch the site and know what we're thinking! I'm not a giant fan of modern architecture,but this is certainly a nice looking structure, and would be a fantastic asset! i think more use of brick than all that concrete would make it more paletable...to me anyhow.
  It would tie in great with the marina, which we should be starting NOW since Detroit has already got their new customs office and cruise ship/ferry docking facilities on the go, we'll "miss the boat" when promotion time comes to sell these cities as a joint destination.
  another thing that i think should be done is turn the Spirit of Windsor around. Poor girl is eternally driving towards a wall of earth. if she was pointed more in the direction of the loading ramps, that'll give people more of an indication of what those ramps are. i saw someone on "flickr" telling the world they're left over machines that were used to install the sea walls!

  Merry Chrismahaunakwanza everyone!!!

• Aaron, I agree that the Spirit of Windsor would look better if it could be turned around but that wouldbe a costly thing to do. Its restoration is almost complete and could not have been done without the benefit of a Trillium grant and local contributions. We have worked on the old girl for the past two summers (all volunteer through The Southern Ontario Locomotive Restoration Society - Windsor Chapter) and we hope to complete the project next spring.
  Personally, I would like more exhibits along the river front reminding visitors of the railway past of this site. The arrival of the railroad in 1854 was perhaps the most important development that contributed to the city's rise and subsequent growth.

• Thanks Kavs, and thanks to Stephen Berrill at ADA who sent me a copy of the renderings. I will post updated photos tomorrow.

• JBM - i probly won't be able to respond for a few days, but does this restoration include boiler work? would she ever run again or is this more crucial body work to keep her in one peice?
  i'm sure it would take a rather large crane at 150000 bucks an hour to do the job of turning her as well. i would like a replica of the train station built in it's original position and place the SoW next to it...turn it into a rail museum.

• I, for one, hate it. Spending $2mil to build a new stage to demolish the other one makes no sense. Hart Plaza, just across the river, has 3 stages. Why cculdn't they have added this design on the other side of the old one or in one of the riverfront parking lots further down the river so we could have at least two stages. Or make a stage underground like Hart Plaza. Or even have a stage coming from each side of this new one. Think big Windsor! Construct something big enough to attract those 5 million+ Metro Detroit residents to Windsor like they do at Hart Plaza. Demolishing the old stage is such a waste and a waste of my taxpayer dollars. Whoever agreed to this will lose my vote at election time.

• i don't know david. i think having two stages trying to compete with the casino, and heart plaza for that matter, or eachother, won't work well. One of the 2 will rarely be used and will quickly fall into disrepair. i do like the idea of having 2, one at either end of the park. the bridge would be an amazing back drop for an outdoor concert! and if i remember the stories right, they did have outdoor concerts by the bridge back in the summers of love.

  keeping the old stage however, would look cheap as hell trying to integrate it into something new. it's a shelter for valets or metal detectors or whatever it was. it looked stupid infront of the casino, it looks stupid as a stage. not picking a fight here, but something (ie: history)tells me if they said they were going to merge the old with the new, right off the bat, you'd be the first to scream about how cheap the city is for re-using such a hiddeous POS. as far as going underground......almost all of that parkland is reclaimed. i'm not sure how far down we could go. Heart plaza is set back quite a bit from the river which is probly what makes that possible.

  i also think that it isn't necessary to have a sea of concrete around this thing. i can't remember the last outdoor concert i went to and wanted to spread my blanket out on the tarmac. leave it as grass, the heat coming off that would turn people away i would think. we have a parks department that is more than capable of keeping it lush and green no matter how many asses plop down on it.

• Why would I be the first to scream? It doesn't sound like me. A bandshell is a profit center. The city charges rent to use it. At least, that's what I've been told from all the organizers I've talked to. What did Red Bull spend to rent that whole strip with part of the airport? $125,000? Detroit Electronic Music festival rents Hart Plaza, had 80,000 in attendance at the last one, charged $20 a head or $45 for the weekend, used all three bandshells and paid rent. Hoedown uses all three bandshells at Hart Plaza. The Windsor's Bluesfest was $20 a head. Epicure Festival wasn't free to get in, even though the restaurants paid the city rent for the space to set up their booths. Most events there charge admission, which is used to pay the city rent plus they charge private operators rent for space to set up their booths. The more bandshells you have, the further you expand the total space of the plaza, the higher occupancy you can have, the more rent you can charge and you can offer better value to the admission paying attendees.

  The city can charge different rates for the bandshells, with the onion one at a much lower rate or they can rent the newer one at a higher rate or they can rent both to offer more value for people's admission. The cost to rent the Onion bandshell obviously wouldn't be the same as the new one because, as you said, "it looks cheap as hell." Likewise, the rents would be cheaper for the cheaper looking one. You could also hold two different events on the same weekend. By knocking down the original bandshell instead of expanding Festival plaza to the parking lot behind it with a second bandshell, the city just threw taxpayer money down the toilet. At least, the city is getting some kind of return on previously spent taxpayer dollars. Think big! What's the return on previously spent taxpayer dollars on a demolished bandshell? Zip!

  If we must spend taxpayer dollars, let's make Festival plaza bigger and better to hold larger events that will be able to charge higher rents.