Lethbridge & District Exhibition | |
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Exhibition facility | |
Area | 61-acre (25 ha) |
Owner | City of Lethbridge |
Manager | Board of Governors of Lethbridge & District Exhibition |
Location | Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada |
Location of Exhibition Grounds in Lethbridge | |
Coordinates: 49°41′20″N112°47′13″W / 49.689°N 112.787°W | |
Website | https://www.agrifoodhub.ca/ |
The Lethbridge & District Exhibition (LDE) is a not-for-profit corporation that operates the exhibition complex and fair grounds in Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada. It was established in 1897 as the Lethbridge & District Agricultural Society.
The Lethbridge & District Exhibition was first organized by a group of farmers, ranchers, and citizens to promote agriculture and commerce in the area.
In 1912, the City of Lethbridge hosted the World Dry Farming Congress at the exhibition grounds, which were expanded significantly for that event, and included a streetcar line from the CPR station.
In March 2021, construction began on the Exhibition Grounds for a new exhibition hall. The project cost $70.5 Million and was jointly funded by the Government of Alberta’s recovery program, City of Lethbridge, and the Government of Canada. The new Agri-food Hub and Trade Centre opened to the public on August 8, 2023.
Following the completion of the Agri-food Hub and Trade Centre, it was revealed that there had been significant financial mismanagement of the new building project, including non-compliant expenses and contracting works, resulting in a budget deficit of $6.4 Million per year. Subsequently, the City of Lethbridge removed the CEO and Board of Governors and assumed responsibility operating the exhibition. [1]
Permanent structures at the site include a 10,664 m2 (114,787 ft2) pavilion complex (main, north, west and south pavilions, and Saddle Room), Heritage Hall and a grandstand.
Opened in 2023, the Agri-Food Hub and Trade Centre added an additional 24,898m2 (268,000 ft2) of multipurpose space on the exhibition grounds.
Roughly 950 events are held at the park every year, which attract over 850,000 visitors and provide $81 million in economic benefit to the city. [2] By far, the largest event held at the park is Whoop-Up Days, an annual summer fair. Other annual events include Ag Expo, the Home & Garden Show, a weekly Farmers' Market, Country Christmas Craft Show, and Family Fest.
Exhibition Park is governed by a board of directors consisting of members of the community, including a president, two vice presidents, a past president, and a member each from the City of Lethbridge council and the County of Lethbridge council. The 2006 board of directors consisted of 14 persons.
In the 2005 budget, Exhibition Park had annual revenue of roughly $2.3 million and annual expenditures of about $2.1 million.
The 1967 International and Universal Exposition, commonly known as Expo 67, was a general exhibition from April 28 to October 29, 1967. It was a category one world's fair held in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. It is considered to be one of the most successful World's Fairs of the 20th century with the most attendees to that date and 62 nations participating. It also set the single-day attendance record for a world's fair, with 569,500 visitors on its third day.
Lethbridge is a city in the province of Alberta, Canada. With a population of 106,550 in the 2023 municipal census, Lethbridge became the fourth Alberta city to surpass 100,000 people. The nearby Canadian Rocky Mountains contribute to the city's warm summers, mild winters, and windy climate. Lethbridge lies approximately 215 km (134 mi) southeast of Calgary on the Oldman River and 105 km (65 mi) northwest of the Canada–United States border at the Sweetgrass–Coutts Border Crossing.
The Canadian National Exhibition (CNE), also known as The Exhibition or The Ex, is an annual fair that takes place at Exhibition Place in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, on the third Friday of August leading up to and including Labour Day, the first Monday in September. With approximately 1.6 million visitors each year, the CNE is Canada's largest annual community event and one of the top fairs in North America.
Exhibition Place is a publicly owned mixed-use district in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, located by the shoreline of Lake Ontario, just west of downtown. The 197-acre (80 ha) site includes exhibit, trade, and banquet centres, theatre and music buildings, monuments, parkland, sports facilities, and a number of civic, provincial, and national historic sites. The district's facilities are used year-round for exhibitions, trade shows, public and private functions, and sporting events.
The Pacific National Exhibition (PNE) is a nonprofit organization that operates an annual 15-day summer fair, 12-day winter fair, a seasonal amusement park, and indoor arenas in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. The PNE fair is held at Hastings Park, beginning in mid-to-late August and ending in early September, usually Labour Day, and in mid-December until Christmas.
The University of Lethbridge is a public comprehensive and research university located in Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada, with a second campus in Calgary, Alberta.
Fort Whoop-Up was the nickname given to a whisky trading post, originally Fort Hamilton, near what is now Lethbridge, Alberta. During the late 19th century, the post served as a centre for trading activities, including the illegal whisky trade. The sale of whisky was outlawed but, due to the lack of law enforcement in the region prior to 1874, many whisky traders had settled in the area and taken to charging unusually high prices for their goods.
The Kingston Memorial Centre is a 3,300-seat multi-purpose arena located at 303 York Street in Kingston, Ontario, Canada. Opened in 1951, the Kingston Community Memorial Health and Recreation Centre was designed as a community sports and entertainment centre that would become a "living memorial" in remembrance of Kingstonians who gave their life in both world wars and the Korean War. The Memorial Centre lands and facilities include a war memorial, a large ice pad in the arena building, a new outdoor aquatic centre, agricultural barns, softball diamonds, a cinder track, off leash dog park and a linear park at the east, north and west perimeter of the property. Just east of the arena building was the International Hockey Hall of Fame (IHHOF) museum building at 277 York St. In July 2012, Kingston City Council approved the relocation of the collection on a short-term basis to the Invista Centre on Gardiners Road in Kingston. The existing building was found to have costly repair issues related to moisture penetration. It was demolished after the IHHOF moved to the Invista Centre in Kingston's west end.
Ottawa SuperEX was an eleven-day annual exhibition that took place every August at Lansdowne Park in Ottawa, Ontario. The exhibition provided exhibits, entertainment and amusements indoors in the buildings on site and outdoors on the grounds. The Central Canada Exhibition Association operated a fair annually from 1888 until 2010, except during World War II. The fair was on hiatus due to plans to redevelop Lansdowne Park and the Association continued to work towards finding opportunities to bring back SuperEX. It was announced in December 2015 that the Ottawa SuperEX board had disbanded a year earlier and the Ex would not be returning.
Markham Fair is one of Canada's oldest country fairs, an annual event established in 1844. It is located in Markham, Ontario and hosted by the Markham and East York Agricultural Society. With over 700 volunteers working on more than 70 committees, Markham Fair is the largest community-based volunteer organization in Canada. The fair and fairgrounds are owned by the agricultural society.
The modern history of Lethbridge extends to the mid-19th century, when the area was developed from drift mines opened by Nicholas Sheran in 1874, and the North Western Coal and Navigation Company in 1882. Prior to the development of drift mines in the area, Lethbridge, Alberta was known as Coal Banks, and was part of the territory of the Blackfoot Confederacy. The Confederacy was made up of the Kainai Nation, the Northern Peigan, the Southern Peigan (Blackfeet), and the Siksika Nation.
The Oldman River valley parks system is a continuous collection of eight urban parks in the Oldman River valley of Lethbridge, Alberta, 100 metres (330 ft) below the prairie level. The parks were created in the 1980s as part of the city's Urban Parks Project. Today they are a combined 16 square kilometres (6.2 sq mi) in size and comprise one of the largest urban park systems in North America, and the third largest in Canada.
India Trade Promotion Organisation (ITPO), headquartered at Pragati Maidan, is the nodal agency of the Government of India under aegis of the Ministry of Commerce and Industry (India) for promoting country's external trade. ITPO is a Mini-Ratna Category-1 Central Public Sector Enterprise (CPSE) with 100 percent shareholding of Government of India.
Whoop-Up Days is an annual 5-day exhibition and rodeo held in Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada organized by the Lethbridge & District Exhibition.
The Galt Museum & Archives Akaisamitohkanao’pa is the primary museum in Lethbridge, Alberta, Canada, and is the largest museum in the province south of Calgary. In 2006, the museum cared for a growing collection of over 20,000 artifacts and 300,000 archival documents and photographs record the history of Lethbridge and southern Alberta. It attracts over 50,000 visitors every year.
The economy of Lethbridge is central to the commercial, distribution, financial and industrial sectors of the southern Alberta economy. Lethbridge has a trading area population of 250,000. The city was founded in 1885 as a result of local coal mining and later was buoyed by local farming and ranching. Toward the end of the twentieth century, the local economy started diversifying by focusing more on service-based industries.
Brno Exhibition Center is a convention centre based in Brno, Czech Republic. It was established in 1928. The centre occupies a site on 667,000 square metres (7,180,000 sq ft) and provides a total net exhibition area of 125,496 square metres (1,350,830 sq ft) including open-air space and exhibition halls with an exhibition area of 61,479 square metres (661,750 sq ft). The centre has 15 exhibition halls with a visitor capacity of 25,000–30,000 a day. The number of visitors per year grew to 780,000 in 2017.
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