Asbestos in old police HQ adds to demolition costs

The need to remove asbestos fromWinnipeg's old police headquarters has negated much of the savings from a demolition contract that came in under budget.

Rakowski Cartage & Wrecking is in the process of taking apart the Public Safety Building on Princess, a six-storey structure on Princess Street,which served as the home of the Winnipeg Police Service prior to the city's decision to move intolarger headquarters on Graham Avenue.

The city expected to spend $9.7 million to demolish the PSBbefore Rakowski won the contract with a bid of $6.8 million plus GST.

Workers have since found asbestos throughout the building, as well as within the shuttered underground tunnel to city hall, according to a report to city council's property committee.

It will cost another $1.5 million to demolish the building. No more cash is required from the city to do the work, as the additional costs fall within the contingencies built into the old $9.7-million budget.

The PSB was built in 1965 as part of an ensemble of downtown brutalist structures that also included city hall, the Centennial Concert Hall and the Manitoba Museum.

• Cost of demolishing old police HQ, parkade on the rise again

Faced with a $21-million tab for repairing the crumbling Tyndall-stone cladding on the building, city council voted in 2009 to purchase the former Canada Post tower and warehouse on Graham Avenue and convert the new property into a police headquarters.

That purchase-and-renovation job wound up costing $214 million. That figure does not including the ongoing cost of repairs to the new police HQ, the cost of operatingthe mostly empty Canada Post office tower on Graham Avenue or the cost of demolishing the PSB and adjoining Civic Centre Parkade.

A five-year RCMPinvestigation into the construction project ended in 2019 without any charges.

City council voted to demolish the PSBpartly because of the cost and partly because the city had no ability to move any office staff into the Princess Street building.The city has signed long-term office leases in a number of privately owned buildings.

• No charges laid after 5-year investigation into Winnipeg police HQ construction

The city could not sell the PSB because of an 1875 caveat on the land that compels the site be reserved for some form of public use.

• Mixed-use development touted for Public Safety Building, Civic Centre Parkade site

Downtown development agency CentreVenture plans to redevelop the site intoenclosed public market that will pay homage to itsoriginal use. Office, retail and residential units are planned for the land below the old parkade, which was not subject to the caveat.