The federal government plans to demolish most of the historic Sir John Carling building, located in the Central Experimental Farm, in 2010 and is currently seeking contractors to move portions of Agriculture Canada out of the decrepit building.

Officials with Public Works and Government Services Canada said they plan to issue a request for proposals in July 2009 to demolish the 11-storey tower and two-floor east annex. The west annex, or Cafeteria Building, will remain standing and become a visitors' center.

The 431,245-square-foot Sir John Carling Building, named after the former agriculture minister who established the Central Experimental Farm in 1886, was first occupied in 1967 and currently serves as the headquarters for Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, as well as housing the minister's office.

Some of the 1,240 employees currently working at the Sir John Carling building have already been relocated to the department's new headquarters at Nortel's former Skyline Campus at Merivale and Baseline roads, a process expected to be completed by fall 2009.

In spring 2003, the federal government announced it was buying the eight-building Skyline Campus for $91.2 million to house Agriculture Canada and two related agencies.

"Analysis undertaken by (Public Works and Government Services Canada) ... indicated that the purchase of the Skyline Campus was the most cost-effective alternative," said spokesperson Lucie Brosseau in an e-mail.

"It was good value then and remains so today based on that analysis."
Slightly more than a decade ago, the government spent $646,000 retrofitting the Agriculture Canada building's heating, ventilation and air conditioning system, according to the general contractor for the project, Kanata-based X-L-Air Energy Services Ltd. Public Works says the functional performance of the building was in 1998 deemed "poor" as building systems reached the end of their life cycles and the pre-cast cladding of the building envelope deteriorated.

In August 2007, Public Works said it would sell nine office complexes, including the Skyline Campus and the Thomas D'Arcy McGee Building at 90 Sparks St., to private Vancouver developer Larco Investments Ltd. for $1.64 billion and lease the properties back for 25 years.

Public Works is currently looking for bidders to relocate Agriculture Canada's main library collections to its new location, according to a notice posted on the online tendering web site, MERX.

Deconstruction and site remediation work for the Sir John Carling Building is planned for 2010, government officials said.

The Sir John Carling building is designated as a "recognized" heritage structure. Public Works will work with the federal government's heritage building office to determine which features will need to be preserved and recorded.

As the sole surviving aspect of the architects' original design, the Cafeteria Building will remain to provide the most substantial record of the building, officials said.