Sudbury branches out

With its roots firmly planted in one of the world’s most famous nickel deposits, Sudbury has grown into a strong and vibrant community in Ontario’s North.

The new City of Greater Sudbury was created in January 2001 through the amalgamation of Sudbury, Capreol, Nickel Centre, Valley East, Onaping Falls, Rayside-Balfour, Walden and several unincorporated townships. Its 165,000 citizens enjoy cultural pastimes, recreational opportunities and employment. Thousands of tourists join them each year at a wide variety of attractions and festivals.

No longer do people scoff at the town plunked in the middle of a “moonscape” due to a century of environmental naivety. Many of the signs of this have been repaired through a careful program of regreening and restoration. Sudbury is now a lovely city with 219 clean lakes within its borders.

In 1972, Sudbury created a tree-plant-ing committee that, with a broadened mandate, became the Vegetation Enhancement Technical Advisory Committee in 1978. The results of its efforts are seen throughout the region in a consistently cleaner, greener, more pleasant landscape. The complete story of this regreening effort is told in the book Healing the Landscape/Un paysage en renaissance, published in 2000 as part of the city’s Millennium Project. This is a beautiful photographic record illustrating the marriage of science and art in the successful restoration of a once-devastated area.

Earthcare Sudbury was launched in May 2000 to improve land, water and air quality and ensure continuing economic viability. This new initiative is a partnership of the city and 37 local businesses, agencies, organizations and individuals. Together they created a plan to remove the signs of historic industrial activity, prevent future environmental degradation, and ameliorate climate warming. This is a comprehensive and community-oriented plan that will have positive effects for generations to come.

One popular city project is the boardwalk along the shore of Ramsey Lake from Science North to the rowing club. Ramsey Lake, remarkably clean and attractive, lies in the heart of Sudbury. The lakeshore has become a beautiful meeting place. “Everyone goes there and uses it year-round,” according to Paul Reid, economic development officer for the City of Greater Sudbury. “In my thinking, it is one of our best expenditures of public money.”

Not everyone spends all year outside by a lake. There are numerous indoor diversions as well. Sudbury supports a symphony orchestra and both French and English theatres. An indoor farmers’ market is a recent development and one that has proven popular year-round.

Tourism plays an important part in Sudbury’s economy. For starters, there are numerous festivals throughout the year celebrating snowflakes, blueberries, the Northern Lights, La Nuit sur l’tang, gems and minerals, powerboat championships, garlic, French cinema, fringe theatre and fall colours. The list of attractions includes parks, museums (mining, science and farming to name a few), galleries, a hockey team and harness racing. Nor is there any shortage of recreational opportunities: swimming, boating, skiing, skating, snowmobile and hiking trails, hunting and fishing, for starters. Sudbury is also a desirable destination for ecotourism, meetings, conventions and sports. A number of top-notch hotels and restaurants can accommodate the tastes of thousands of visitors.

Sudburians enjoy a wide range of educational opportunities, too. Laurentian University is a bilingual, degree-granting institution. There are two colleges, Cambrian (English language) and Collge Boral (French language). All offer a wide variety of academic and personal-interest studies. Elementary and secondary schools are administered by the Rainbow District School Board, Conseil des Ecoles Catholiques and the Sudbury English Catholic Board.

One of the most interesting multi-disciplinary experiences in Sudbury is found at Science North. The learning approach is hands-on, whether it be about the northern ecosystem, space exploration, mining, geology, plants, animals and more. Or take a virtual voyage. It is here that the new Dynamic Earth exhibit is under construction.

The Dynamic Earth is a $12.8-million project that will guide visitors through the geology of the Sudbury Basin and the strong connection between the mines and community. It is scheduled to open in 2003 at the Big Nickel mine site. Construction began in June 2001 and will include a modular, 2,000-m2 building to house galleries and visitor services. The exhibit will feature a 20-metre-deep chasm with a glass-sided elevator and an underground tour to learn of the evolution of mining during the Twentieth Century. There will also be walking trails and interpretive stations on the surface.

While Inco Ltd. remains the largest employer in Sudbury (with about 4,700 people on the payroll), the other stalwart mining company, Falconbridge Ltd., is in third place (about 1,800) behind the regional hospital (2,800 workers). Other major employers include the City of Greater Sudbury (1,550), the Rainbow District School Board (1,500), TeleTech (1,200) and Omega District Response (1,000) call centres, and the federal tax services offices (945 regular and 1,200 seasonal employees).

Over 8,000 people are employed in spin-off businesses essential to the mining industry. These are not only small local firms but also large internationally renowned companies. There are firms specializing in project engineering and management, drilling, mining equipment design and manufacture, metal fabrication, underground ventilation, safety and health supplies, computing, conveyors, haulage and research. There are dozens of small speciality shops that have created niche markets for themselves in the mining industry. De Beers Canada has recently expanded its Sudbury exploration office to serve as the hub of operations in its quest for diamonds. The city is also home to the unique, globally acclaimed Sudbury Neutrino Observatory, located at Inco’s Creighton mine. The observatory has already broadened physicists’ understanding of matter and may be expanded.

One of the most exciting new services in Sudbury is the Virtual Reality Laboratory (VRL) opened last September by Mirarco, a non-profit applied research and technical service company formed in 1998 by Laurentian University and the private and public sectors. The VRL required an investment of about $2.5 million and is located in the Willet Green Miller Building on the Laurentian campus.

The VRL is an “immersive collaborative facility”, but what is that? It is a computer-generated, three-dimensional image projected on a spherical, 33-foot screen. The advantage lies in the fact that a group of people can view an image at the same time for a “what you see is what I see” experience. That experience puts all viewers on the same wavelength, and “that wavelength is important,” says start-up director Andrew Dasys.

Consider executives from a major mining company who must approve a multi-million-dollar expansion project. When they all get the same information at the same time and in an easily understood form, they can make their decisions with far more confidence and few misunderstandings. The advantage of seeing material in three dimensions becomes obvious. Moreover, participants can focus on the data much more easily and make more thorough analysis than is possible with conventional presentations, or by shuffling lists of assays and positions on papers.

The VRL is becoming busier as word spreads of its usefulness. Clients supply their own data sets and models for projection. Mirarco staff can facilitate the creation of this information, and confidentiality is unconditionally protected. The data may consist of drill hole information, mine openings, orebody definitions, and so forth. Another application would be to project a crusher station or plant circuit around a person so that line-of-sight can be observed. The VRL also has growing use in hazardous materials planning. With it, the most readily available locations for emergency stations, fire hoses, or
shut-down stations can be determined.

The VRL technology is well-proven in the oil and gas industry, says Dasys, but Mirarco’s expertise lies in adapting it for the mineral exploration and mining industry. Eventually every mining company could have its own VRL; the technology is not terribly expensive. Mirarco would still have a role to play in consulting and designing these facilities. Dasys also points out that the technology has medical applications and Mirarco is looking forward to joint projects with the proposed new medical school at Laurentian University.

Last October, the Chamber of Commerce heard from Scott Hand. As CEO of Inco–the region’s largest employer–he is intimately acquainted with Sudbury. No one could have summed up this city better than Mr. Hand when he called Sudbury “…a company town that grew with the company and kept on growing until it became a city in its own right–and a thriving educational and service centre for an entire region.”

The 550,000 people in the region certainly appreciate that fact.