Avon Crest

After 60 years of providing care Stratford’s original hospital, now known as Avon Crest, closed in 1950 with the opening of the Stratford General Hospital located across the street. Avon Crest then operated as a convalescent facility from 1955 to 1990. Outpatient services and administrative offices resided in the building until 2018 when they were also moved to Stratford General Hospital leaving the Avon Crest building vacant.

Increasing maintenance costs associated with a building constructed in 1889 has made the continued operation of the building unaffordable. The limited funding the Huron Perth Healthcare Alliance (HPHA) receives is directed to providing healthcare services and not restoration of vacant buildings.

HPHA envisions the Avon Crest site as a future healthcare asset for the community and hopes to achieve this by maintaining ownership of the land with future development by a third party. In February 2020 a Request for Solutions was issued that aimed to identify qualified groups interested in partnering with the HPHA to develop the property in a manner that would both respect the heritage significance of the building in future development and bring significant value to the community’s health and wellness system. No interested parties provided submissions to this request.

HPHA proceeded to obtain an estimate for the redevelopment/restoration of the main Avon Crest building, excluding additions, to restore the building to its 1900s exterior along with making the interior compliant with current year building codes as well as functional for commercial activities. The order of magnitude estimate was approximately $24 million.

In response to concerns from the community HPHA commissioned an environmental study on the potential greenhouse gas impact of demolition of the building. The report indicates that the greenhouse gases emitted by demolition will be approximately half of the gases the building emits annually.