The Great Canadian Mine Show, a mobile arcade that allows visitors to experience mining vicariously through interactive technology, owes its creditors $150,000.
The debt is being shouldered by the Elliot Lake Centre, a non-profit organization created by the federal government as a home for the performing arts.
“Obviously the mining industry didn’t feel they could continue to support [the Show],” says Peter Harris, a retired principal and volunteer chairman of the Elliot Lake Centre. “The shortfall in funding is a serious problem.”
The Centre has about $5 million in art, but art is a difficult asset to liquidate and the institution is required to receive market value for any items it sells.
The Great Canadian Mine Show began in the spring of 2001, to coincide with Provincial Mining Week. During the past year, the Show travelled 76,000 km and introduced 40,000 visitors (mostly children) to a bevy of electronic gadgets and interactive displays housed in a giant tractor trailer.
Today, that trailer sits in a parking lot in Sudbury, Ont., and can be bought for $450,000, complete with the truck to haul it away.
“We hope to be able to sell it intact as a for-profit venture,” says Lisa Murray, the Show’s co-ordinator.
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