THUNDER BAY – Steady progress is now being made at the site of a long-awaited addition to the city.
Since construction began at the site of the new Thunder Bay Art Gallery, progress has been steady and executive director Matthew Hills said that much of that progress is due to the dedication of the construction team and local expertise.
“We’re in the midst of winter and, despite that, the project is proceeding and doing really well thanks to Tom Jones Construction, Colliers Project Leaders, and the team we have from Thunder Bay constructing this new art gallery for the city,” said Hills.
“We’re 18 per cent towards completion, so, progress is being made, the footprint of the overall gallery is completed and we’re really excited with how things are progressing, even in spite of the challenging temperatures.”
With the project still expected to be completed by the end of 2025 or the start of 2026, the art gallery’s capital campaign is still in full swing.
Hills said that the campaign has seen a lot of success with provincial and federal support, but they’re looking to the community for that last little bit to make it over the finish line.
“We’re significantly close. We’re still in the early stages of the campaign and it’s going quite well but we still have a lot of work to do to get us over that finish line,” he said.
“But it’s going really well - mostly thanks to the support of our community. So, we’re extremely grateful but also aware that there’s work to be done.”
Hills said that residents should see the building start to take shape by late fall and he’s excited for the art gallery to be able to do more programming in the downtown area.
“We’re already doing that, in many ways you’ll see the presence of the art gallery shift down here,” he said.
“We’ve also been doing financial studies at this stage and we know that the economic impact of the gallery on an ongoing basis, even for the city of Thunder Bay, is $4.5 million on an annual basis. So, our economic impact will shape our profile here.”
