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Portage Avenue:
Dreams of Castles
in the Sky

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Page 7, Part 2

REVITALIZATION
PORTAGE PLACE
NAR: While it happened gradually, by the mid-1980s the decline of Portage Ave alarmed civic officials. Confronting the same story as in most North American cities. Suburban malls had eaten away the business of the downtown stores. To offset the decline, a new downtown shopping mall, named Portage Place, was built, through a public-private partnership.

CHERYL MAZUR, PORTAGE PLACE MANAGER
Portage Place is a four level shopping centre. It was built in 1987 by Cadillac Fairview in conjunction with the 3 levels of govt. It has over 125 retail stores and office and houses the only Imax theatre, Arts theatre the Globe and Prairie Theatre Exchange in Winnipeg.

NAR: Did Portage Place cause the death of Eaton's?

CHERYL MAZUR
Portage Place did not kill Eaton's whatsoever. Eaton's, as you know struggled a long time, as it was passed down in the families. And it I believe it could have kept on going if someone in the family could have run it better. Portage Place actually was great supporter of Eaton's.

INVESTORS
NAR: Anchoring the West End of the Portage Place redevelopment is the Investors tower.

ARTHUR MAURO, INVESTORS GROUP
I joined Investors in 1976. At the time we were considering the redevelopment of the head office. The problem of Portage Ave and the redevelopment of Portage Ave. As someone had said, the north side of Portage Ave reminded them of downtown Beirut; there were so many empty buildings and derelict buildings.

Maybe the best contribution that Investors could make was that we would anchor the West End of the commercial aspect of Portage Ave by developing our head office here on Portage Avenue. My feeling was that if there were one symbol of western Canada it was the grain elevator. The roofline and everything is intended to be symbolic of what I think Kipling once referred to as Castles of Commerce: the grain elevator.

The colours were intended to be earth brown and green again seeking that aspect of the attachment to the land. The windows and the glass is plainly reflective of the big sky country of air and light. But maybe it was my vision that resulted in the sculpture. That's what has been captured there. It is a prairie boy's vision. He's looking out and he's looking up and looking to the future.

NAR: One hundred and forty years earlier another man had looked at the emerging prairie landscape and saw Portage Avenue's future. Henry McKenny. Establishing the first business at Portage and Main.

McKenny arrived in 1859 on the Anson Northup, the first steamboat to reach the Red River Colony from Georgetown Minnesota. McKenny bought a storehouse from Andrew McDermot and in 1862 converted it into the first hotel called the Royal. The die was cast. Buildings sprang up in a few short years, the corner was booming.

Once the corners were built up by the end of WW1, the corner stayed pretty much the same. Through WW2, through the 50s. and 60s, No new buildings. The famous corner of portage and main had seen no sense of modern times. But it was not for lack of trying.

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