Saying goodbye to Queen Street Y

09/10/2005

BY Susan Gamble
EXPOSITOR STAFF / BRANTFORD



A downtown institution prepares to move to a temporary new home.

There’s a mattress in the foyer of the YM-YWCA on Queen Street. In the nearby workout room, a collection of water cooler stands against one wall. In a niche off the main lobby, the vending machine stands empty and lathing shows on the wall where a chunk of plaster has fallen.

In a sense, the Y already seems abandoned Friday- the last day of business. But everywhere you look people are busy – either engaged in packing and carting or in a last-minute scramble for one more game, one more sit-up or one last workout.

In the gym, six sweaty guys are playing hard for the last points of a last basketball game. Off to the side are stacks of wooden chairs, barrels of hockey sticks and a stack of blue gym mats leaning against one wall.

Several of the guys grew up playing at the Y.

One of the sweaty men is developer Steve Charest who hates to miss his regular lunchtime pickup game.

“It hasn’t sunk it yet,” said Charest, wiping his forehead. “You walk around and see the boxes and stuff in the halls and the cookies and coffee out and everybody saying goodbye – the visuals are there but it’s not registering.”

In the day-care area, Jane Althouse and Maria Timpener are ripping down some notices posted on the door and packing away the last of the toys after a final babysitting session that ended at 11:30 a.m. on Friday.

“There’s a lot of emotion today,” said Althouse who’s been working in day care since 1993. “This is family.”

She stands at the old piano, which is – along with dozens of other Y items to be auctioned off next week.

“This piano is special and it has nice new keys,” she said and laughed. “I remember when we got them – they cost $441.”

She plays Sleeping Bunnies, a lullaby that she’s played for year for her little chargers at nap-time.

“That’s going to make me cry,” said Timpener, the director of child care.

There are two things that are making this goodbye bearable for the women: one is the unswerving belief that once you’re part of the Y, you never really leave it, and the other is the heavenly thought of going to a better place.

That’s the new – although temporary – Y building just blocks away on Clarence Street.

The plan is to settle in the transitional site at the old Work Wear building for several years while work progresses on a $12-million facility on Market Street South.

Meanwhile, the Y’s entering a sort of temporary limbo: selling off the equipment and furnishings of the last decade; packing up the few things that will be transported to the new accommodations, finalizing the fast moving project that is taking shape on Clarence; organizing the arrival of thousands of dollars in equipment and preparing for a new opening.

Those are details keeping the Y’s new CEO, Nancy Romanenko, hoping.

This week, the almost 100-year-old building will be turned over to a project called Y Homes which, in a $9.8 million project, will expand and renovate the old place into 50 affordable and student housing units.

“Tonight we empty the pool, the auction is Monday, the movers are here Tuesday and Wednesday, the closing date is Thursday and then we’re totally focused on the new site,” said Romanenko.

Not that she hasn’t already been focusing quite a bit on the new place. Romanenko nips down to the site several times a day to help make decisions about where the ceramic tile should end and the locations of lights switches.

There isn’t a firm re-opening date for the Y – the contractors are working as fast as possible to ensure the public can be in place before the end of the month but a proposed date of Sept. 19 doesn’t look too likely. Romanenko said it will likely be sometime during the last weeks of the month.

Down at the new site, tradesmen working with a process called Dryvit are finalizing the shape of a layer of Styrofoam on the exterior of the building. The foam helps insulate the building and is topped with mesh netting, concrete and a fine stucco.

Everyone liked the elegant look so much that it’s been incorporated into the 6,000 square-foot strength and conditioning area where the other great attribute is a huge wall of windows.

“It’s going to be just awesome in here,” raved Romanenko.

Next week, $300,000 worth of modern equipment arrives, including 10 stylish treadmills that will be set up at the windows.

In the studio, dance, fitness and spin classes will be offered and nearby will be the well-appointed play area for kids, including kid-sized climbing wall.

“We’re working hard to make sure this is an appealing place for families, youths, adults, seniors and students,” Romanenko said.

Outside, as the workers smooth the Styrofoam shell, creating a flurry of white “snow” that falls around them, Steve Charest – freshly showered and changed – surveys the 18,300 square-foot project with delight.

Charest isn’t just a member of the Y and its board, he’s the developer behind the project which combines two of his passions: renovating brownfield sites and the Y.

“I love this project. It gives back to the community at no cost to the community,” said Charest enthusiastically. He’s not so enthusiastic about the city’s response to the idea.

“This is going to be a signature brownfield restoration for the province and the city didn’t embrace it.”

Regardless, it’s Charest’s way of “colouring outside the lines” and thinking of creative solutions.

In a few years, the new Y will become the old Y as the organization moves again, this time next to the Earl Haig Fun Park location that will allow a pool and squash court to be added back to the building.