Irving Oil construction, Imperial Theatre restoration underway in Saint John

Two major construction projects underway in Saint John promise to dramatically alter the look of the south side of King’s Square.

As Irving Oil broke ground Monday for its new head office, the neighbouring Imperial Theatre was getting a facelift.

“No it was not planned. Obviously they planned to start much earlier than this, and this is around when we had planned to start, but it just strangely worked out that we would be on exactly the same day starting construction,” says Lee Bolton, the executive director at the Imperial theatre.

Irving Oil initially planned to start work on its 11-storey building in April, but an appeal was filed by the city’s former heritage planner, stating the building’s plan was over the city’s height restriction by 4 storeys and was set too far back from the sidewalk by 10 feet.

“The building is going to be built to the same sort of standards and same design as was shared with the community on Feb. 17 when we hosted a large launch event right here on the site,” says Andy Carson, public affairs director for Irving Oil. “The exterior, the size, everything is in accordance to what we shared with the community on that day.”

Irving Oil says, since the announcement and subsequent delay, it has seen a lot of community support for the project.

“Just goes to show you that people need to change the conversation in terms of thinking about development responsibly and thinking about the greater good for progress for our community,” says Saint John resident Jason Stephen.

Project managers from both the Irving Oil headquarters site and the Imperial Theatre are working closely together to ensure the work goes smoothly on both sites.

Scaffolding started going up at the Imperial Theatre Monday, as work begins to restore the façade of the 103-year-old building.

“The joy of being a registered historic building is that we’re going to work very hard to make it look the same, which is not that easy with this building because we have this cream brick which is of a size and colour and density that is no longer made, so we’re busy getting special brick made,” says Bolton.

Work on the Imperial Theatre is expected to take four to six months, while it will take 18 to 24 months for the official opening of Irving Oil’s new headquarters.

With files from CTV Atlantic's Ashley Blackford