SP!RE
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Architectural genocide.
Demolition began before noon
June 08, 2010
JOHN BURMAN
BRANTFORD – In the end, there were few to protest the demolition of 41 derelict but beautiful buildings along Colborne Street today.
At exactly 10:48 a.m. a giant excavator from Stoney Creek began chewing away at the western end of the block Brantford city council voted less than 12 hours before to demolish.
Promised protests to halt the demolition never materialized.
The curious outnumbered conservationists by a good four to one among the no more than two dozen spectators standing in the sun on the opposite side of the street.
A huge cloud of grey brown dust rose over the doomed block as the excavator bit into the rear upper corner of the four-storey building that once housed City Signs.
“Get ’er done,” yelled a man on a power wheelchair, punctuating his words with short blasts on its tiny electric horn.
The demolition started barely 12 hours after city council voted 8-3 Monday night to demolish the stretch of 41 derelict buildings on the south side of Colborne Street - some which pre-date Confederation - to make way for as yet undetermined development.
The city’s call to a demolition company went out Tuesday morning and workers were on site within hours.
Supporters of knocking the stretch of downtown buildings call them an eyesore, left vacant and decaying.
“These buildings are in a terrible, terrible shape . . . they need to go,” Councillor Mark Littell said after the vote.
Critics say Brantford is wiping out a part of the province's history.
“These buildings were part of the birth of commerce and industry in Ontario,” said Lloyd Alter of the Architectural Conservancy of Ontario. “They should be preserved.”
Alter said in an email today he is still hoping Ontario’s Ministry of Tourism and Culture will step in and halt the process for review
With files from Spectator wire services