City of London purchases former Fairmont Public School

A donated sign proudly displaying the moniker ‘The Home of the Falcons’ stands on the front grass mere feet from hectic traffic on Hamilton Road.

Fairmont Public School closed in 2022, but the site is in flight to become something new entirely after London City Council approved the purchase from Thames Valley District School Board on Tuesday.

“Submitted by the Thames Valley District School Board, the vendor to sell the subject property to the city for the sum of $5,960,000 be accepted subject to the terms and conditions set out in the agreement,” Ward 8 Coun. Steve Lehman said as he read the report from the closed session into public record.

The property is a 5.7 hectare parcel that Ward 1 Coun. Hadleigh McAlister said is badly needed.

“It's the largest property that's been acquired in this ward in many years because there's not really a lot of land. It's developable for housing on this scale in the area,” he said.

The old school has been a target for graffiti and vandalism, but the large park is a favourite of dog walkers and residents in the area who are thrilled at the news.

Caitlyn Hendrickx, a former student at the school, still walks through the site on her way to work.

“Ideally, I wouldn't mind like residential housing or like low income housing for retired like seniors or retirement people, because I would like ideally for the whole back field to be a park or something like that because it's really nice,” she said.

Purchasing land to build residential property has not been a normal practice in modern times, but as McAlister said, the housing crisis calls for new thinking and action.

“Any opportunity that comes our way right now, we're [in] desperate need to acquire land to get housing built. So this is one part of the process, you know, where we can actually add some value to it to get some housing built,” he said.

No plans or scale of any project has been made public at this time, but purchasing the land is the first step.