Weather permitting, Toledo will be getting a high-definition, large-format digital theater to show educational and family-oriented movies at the Imagination Station downtown as soon as summer.
“It's great that we promote science for the younger generation [through that project],” Gary Marck, a Toledo businessman, said. “They need to learn science and the scientific method. We need to make science more popular than football to solve the world's complicated problems.”
Mr. Marck, vice-president of IBC Inc., a Toledo industrial, commercial, and residential property management and development firm, was one of about 40 project donors who attended a biannual meeting of the Toledo Science Society held Sunday at 1 Discovery Way to update the donors on the progress of the project.
Lori Hauser, executive director of the Imagination Station, told the audience that the project – which started six months ago and included the removal of a pedestrian walkway – is on schedule, with the construction expected to be completed by July 1 and the theater to be operational by mid-July, unless the winter gets too harsh and delays the project.
“One of our goals in the coming months is that our roof is completed by February, depending on the weather. This would be a key factor of our staying on schedule,” she said.
The 270-to-300-seat theater is the central part of a $10-million upgrade to the Imagination Station, which also includes new retail and exhibit space and a new entrance.
The theater will feature a 58-by-31-foot screen and a 4K digital laser projection system with 3D capability. It will show eight to 10 educational films per year on a variety of topics as well as live feeds from space centers, other science facilities or museums, and major national and international events, Ms. Hauser said.
So far, a total of $10 million had been raised for the project, with about a half-million dollars left to raise for a new turnaround in front of the theater, which would feature five handicap parking spots.
The first $1 million of that money was solicited by Science Society; the state then matched that money, which was followed by donations from other sponsors, according to Science Society president Bob Savage.
“Our only reason of being in existence is to make sure kids fall in love with science and math,” Mr. Savage said. “We think we can get the kids and their parents excited about all the cool movies we are going to show here.”
The theater is to be called the KeyBank Discovery Theater, with KeyBank being the lead donor to the project at $2 million.
First Published November 18, 2019, 1:35 a.m.
