The House of Commons chamber is one of the most significant spaces within the Centre Block. It's where Parliament resides and works. It holds symbolic and traditional significance to parliamentarians and to Canada. It's one of the most recognized heritage spaces within the building.
The House team has been working with PSPC and their expert design consultants over the summer and during the election break, doing our homework on the Centre Block, notably with regard to the chamber, the galleries, and the lobbies, so that we could be well prepared to start a conversation with parliamentarians on the decisions that will be required with respect to these spaces.
As reported the last time we presented at PROC, the Centre Block chamber requires change. We need to consider the long-term use and investment and focus on the kind of changes and how to do them.
We started with the basic information on the existing chamber, the Fair Representation Act, and the feedback that we have received to date from parliamentarians.
After the opening of the West Block, we met with former members of PROC and we talked to them about their experiences and lessons learned in the West Block. As well, we started to seek some informal input on the Centre Block. We also collected other feedback from parliamentarians in their experience on the West Block and will be using that information as lessons learned moving forward with this project.
We've noted a few common trends from members' feedback so far. One of the most common is that the lobbies are extremely tight in both the Centre Block and West Block, and would not be sufficient for growth. The lobby's proximity to the chamber is vital. The acoustics in the West Block are good. MPs appreciate the paired desks, and the chamber in the West Block feels larger. The five-seater flip chairs in the Centre Block are not well liked. It's very disruptive to pass in front of other members to access seats. The West Block's natural light is well appreciated. It is appreciated that the galleries are being pulled back, but there is a decrease in seating in the gallery, which is not ideal. More private meeting spaces are desirable in close proximity to the lobbies, and circulation is a very important factor on how MPs work in the building.
In doing our homework, we have considered the Fair Representation Act that came into effect in 2015. It indicates that the number of members will grow with time and refers to the Statistics Canada census demographic projections as a source of information for the growth in the number of MPs. If we consider a 100-year life cycle for the rehabilitation of the Centre Block and extrapolate from there, the average would put us at 460 MPs in just under 50 years from now. By the time we return to Centre Block, the projections would put the growth of MPs that we should plan for in the range of 350 to 370 MPs.
Knowing that growth will need to be accommodated for future parliaments, there are a number of considerations to help achieve that. We could change the furniture and the layout. We started to see that when we added the 30 MPs in 2015. There are a number of ways that could be done. We could adjust the procedures and the operations to be more flexible to deal with the growth over time and/or we can increase the size of the chamber.
These considerations emphasize the tension between space, functionality, accessibility and heritage. Key decisions regarding the chamber are required early in the project, during the schematic design phase, so that direction will serve in the structural design that comes first.
We will also need to consider meeting current building code for life safety, look at universal accessibility, and implement technology through the chamber, galleries and lobbies. The current spaces in the Centre Block are insufficient and do not meet the full functional requirements for many of these elements. There are major accessibility limitations in the galleries, as you know, and 338 seats rely on the five-seaters.
There will need to be interventions to the heritage fabric of these spaces to accommodate many of the requirements and make the spaces fully functional for Parliament. What will be important is how we do that. We need to do this in an appropriate manner, respectful and complementary to the original Pearson design, while building a new lasting layer of heritage relevant to our time in the building and in the history of Parliament. We need parliamentarians' input to accomplish this very successfully.
Given the challenge of addressing these issues, we undertook studies of the chamber with all of the basic information so that we would be well prepared to engage with parliamentarians on these issues. We studied many options working from bottom up as to what we need and from top down as to what we can fit.
The options that you see before you are the three options that sifted to the top. They are examples of things that can be done to address the needs.
Option one retains the existing footprint of the chamber and the lobbies. The lobbies would extend down one floor and be over two floors. This would require a new approach to seating, layout and furniture. There would be some accessibility improvements but a reduction of gallery capacity. This option would also allow us to not impact the exterior of the building.
In option two, you see an expanded footprint of the lobbies, retaining the footprint of the chamber. This would accommodate a range of 376 to 420 MPs. This would meet the needs of the larger lobby on one level. It would still be dependent on new furniture and seating layout. There would be some accessibility improvement, but the gallery capacity would still not be as great as it is today. Also, there would be an impact to the exterior of the building, on the west side.
The third option for consideration is an expanded footprint for both the chamber and the lobbies. It would require careful consideration of the heritage intervention and the cost implications. It retains the traditional seating layout of the paired desks, and we could reuse the heritage furniture. The lobbies would be on a single floor, and there could be significant improvements to accessibility, especially in the gallery.
On the next slide, we see the same three options in renderings showing a sectional cut-through of the building—a vertical cut. The renderings are not all equal, because the design is not yet done. They are just concepts and ideas of the size and the space we would be looking at.
In option one, you see the existing chamber and, in yellow, the two-storey gallery, where you would have minimal functions adjacent to the chamber and other functions on the level below.
In option two, you see the existing footprint of the chamber, with the expanded lobbies. They are shown as boxes here, just to be used as ideas. The design is really dependent on the input that we are going to see.
In option three, you see an outline of an expanded chamber and expanded lobbies, with no design done. It's hard to compare apples with apples here. Another thing we see on this slide is a heatmap and some suggested criteria for how to make decisions about the chamber and what the most important priorities are. We will be seeking input from parliamentarians on the priorities for those criteria and how to assess them.
That is essentially the homework we've been working on over the last period of time, so that we can start having informed conversations.
Thank you.