This ongoing series from Barrie Historical Archive curator Deb Exel shows old photos from the collection and one from the present day, as well as the story behind them.
View from Heritage Park
Heritage Park’s development began in the early 1990s, but Barrie’s shoreline has been ‘developing’ for almost 200 years.
Even before Barrie was surveyed about 1833, word of Crown land being released drew settlers to the area. The earliest of these pioneers built their primitive log homes in or near what is now Memorial Square and to the east toward Dunlop and Mulcaster streets.
Gradually, wharfs, stores and log hotels would emerge as the small settlement grew into a community.
The railway would not come to Allandale until the 1850s, with its tracks later encircling the bay close to the water’s edge.
Commercial and industrial operations dominated the lakeshore and the land close to it. Consider just a few of the many businesses over the years that were on or near the bay — sawmill, Fairview Brewery and Barrie Brewing Company, mills, ice house, Barrie railway station, tanneries, fuel company, car washes, dairies and marinas. The waterfront was not the community recreational and parkland area it is today.
But in the late 1950s, clamouring for a waterfront park increased. This triggered the arrival of fill – loads of it! – resulting in the official opening of Centennial Park on July 1, 1967.
There was more to come. In 1968, waterfront land was expropriated to widen Lakeshore Drive. Properties between Bayfield and Mulcaster streets were impacted, including Delaney and Carley’s Boats. Once again, landfill was used to create more waterfront real estate and Heritage Park was built on the newly reclaimed land.
‘Then’ you would have stood on Carley’s dock to get this ‘Now’ view of the Ross Block, Brown Seed Company building, and the backs of the Boys Block buildings as seen these days from the eastern end of Heritage Park.
This aerial photo shows just how far the shoreline was extended to build the Heritage Park we enjoy today.
