The preferred Southland Museum redevelopment will cost about $66 million and should result in the museum being reopened from 2023 to 2024, according to a report presented in 2019.
The Walker report "Reinventing the Southland Museum", produced by Tim Walker Associates, was commissioned by the Southland Museum and Art Gallery Trust board and was officially released to the public last week.
In the report, an emphasis is put on the board and council not seeing the project as "getting back to where we were" referencing when the museum was closed in 2018 due to earthquake concerns.
Instead, governance should look at the opportunities a "future-focused, reinvented museum will offer", the report said.
"The significant redevelopment of a regional museum occurs infrequently.
"It is important therefore to ensure that the opportunity is taken to ‘reinvent’ the museum, to ensure all aspects of the redevelopment are purposefully future-fit."
The report looked at four costing approaches: doing nothing; upgrading the pyramid with or without a glazed extension on the north face; demolishing the pyramid and replacing it with a new two-level building; demolishing the pyramid and relocating the museum to an existing commercial building near the city centre.
It recommends upgrading the pyramid with a north-facing glazed extension which includes a children’s discovery centre, larger tuatarium and spaces for events and activites.
That is estimated to cost about $66 million by 2023.
Suggested funding streams would be the Ministry for Culture, Heritage and Taonga, New Zealand Lotteries Commission, Provincial Growth Fund, Community Trust of Southland, Invercargill Licensing Trust, ratepayer funding and sponsorship.
The report was released just a few days after the Invercargill City Council approved transferring governance of the museum activity from the gallery trust board to the council.
Deputy mayor and trust chairwoman Toni Biddle said any further consideration of the report was on hold for the time being because of the Covid-19 situation.
