The Rooms, a $47-million arts-and-cultural complex under construction in St. John's, has divided the community it means to preserve and edify.
"It will be our Sydney Opera House," said visual artist Mary Pratt, who was asked by then Premier Brian Tobin in the spring of 1999 to co-chair a committee on the proposed structure. But actor and activist Greg Malone called it "a Newfie joke in glass, steel and concrete."
The issue is not whether The Rooms, which will unite the provincial art gallery, museum and archives, is needed. The idea for a comprehensive arts centre has been around for decades. The vexing question is the site, on the St. John's city skyline, and over the ruins of Fort Townshend.
"There was a dire need for such a space," assistant Minister of Culture Clyde Granter said. "In the spring of 1999, the government came to a conclusion, and considered many sites. Fort Townshend was quickly revealed as the best."
Reasons included size, availability, and -- being a cannon ball's throw from the Roman Catholic Basilica, whose towers dominate the city skyline -- prominence. "It was accessible to the population and visitors, and in a heritage precinct," Granter said. "It's a star fort, started in the late 1770s," said Peter Pope, an archeologist with Memorial University. "Because we never take care of these things, it's the only surviving 18th-century structure. It would be the oldest in St. John's."
Archeologists knew the old fort ruins were there, and "their presence was considered to add to the appeal over the long term," Granter said, pointing out that The Rooms' plans include a working excavation site and an interpretation centre.
That did not satisfy a quickly assembled protest group of historians, archeologists and community activists, already agitated over recent city developments. They argued that the ruins were more extensive and better-preserved than had been thought, and called for The Rooms to be relocated, or at least shifted slightly.
The committee, who had consulted with the community throughout the process of selecting a site and design, was surprised at the outburst. They feared that delaying construction would mean shelving it entirely as other government projects took priority. Pratt said: "$47-million, which wouldn't outfit a room at the Guggenheim, is an enormous sum for us."
Architect Philip Pratt was startled by the scale of the controversy. "We were aware of the archeological presence and incorporated it into planning from day one. We discussed it at all presentations."
Did the outcry provoke any thoughts of changing the site? "One likes to think one approaches all things with an open mind, but in reality it was difficult to move at that point, and in the approach we were taking we felt no need. To move it would have been to build it in a different way, not necessarily a better way," Philip Pratt said.
Malone feels Fort Townshend would deepen the city's claim to be North America's oldest city, and give it added aesthetic value. "Usually it's cause for champagne corks popping, to find a quite well preserved fort from the 1700s," he said. The Rooms will not adequately protect the ruins, he feels. "Any reasonable compromise has been rejected. You can't destroy the fort and interpret it at the same time. The egos involved want the skyline, and they will maul history to get it."
Neither does Malone find The Rooms' blueprints inspiring. "I know it's from the traditional rooms, and I love the ochre sheds and the pitched roofs and the gardens, but they're small. If you take Snoopy's doghouse and blow it up 100 times, it's still Snoopy's doghouse, not Notre Dame."
"Rooms" is a common vernacular term in Newfoundland for the wooden sheds fishermen use to store their gear. Philip Pratt explained The Rooms' design "is very much an abstraction of Newfoundland vernacular forms, abstracted in scale and material." Its three buildings will be composed of wheat-coloured masonry and red metal roofs, and linked by blue/green reflecting glass. "Three is a dynamic and stable grouping," he said. "It's derivative of the past, present and future, as are the museum, archives and art gallery. It maintains the identity of the three institutions."
As of now, The Rooms are under full construction and slated to open mid-to-late 2003. "For me, the real loss is a very real feature of pre-[1846]St. John's," archeologist Pope said. "When you think of St. John's, you think Victorian architecture, 1895. Not much predates that . . . Here is something to help us imagine this, and I don't understand why they won't move it [The Rooms]100 yards. [Fort Townshend's]grand battery overlooked the harbour, Philip Pratt wants The Rooms to overlook the harbour, and the two needs are in conflict."
"It's an unfortunate fiasco surrounding a desperately needed building," Malone said.
"All the archeologists that are provincially qualified that I know of don't think building on top of that structure is a good idea," Pope said. "I still feel we were asleep at the switch a bit. It's too bad the fort is not somewhere else, because there's nothing wrong with the idea of The Rooms. But this city is bad at protecting pieces of the past, [which is]what makes a city great."