Town revitalization celebrated in Biggar, Sask.

(Hallee Mandryk/CTV News)

The town of Biggar hosted its biggest weekend of the year with Biggar Town and County Fair Days.

“The parade has never been bigger than it was today. The excitement, the entertainment that’s available downtown today, the enthusiasm, you can’t capture it...it’s a spirit,” Jim Rickwood, the mayor of Biggar, said.

Tthe town welcomed an estimated 5,000 people over the weekend to enjoy a parade, fireworks, car show, circus demonstration, and many other activities between Friday and Sunday.

Rickwood shared that the now-annual event started in correlation with a major project that the town is very proud of.

“This weekend is kind of the roundup of our revitalization program. It started about six years ago, and it was about five years ago that we did the revitalization fundraising drive,” Rickwood said.

While part of that revitalization project is still in the works, much of the completed work was available for those enjoying the festivities on Main Street to enjoy.

“We revitalized Main Street, which was completed a couple of years ago. And now we’re completing two parts to bookend Main Street. We’ll have a rest area up at the north end by the highway,” Camille Box, chief administrative officer for the town of Biggar, said.

The Main Street revitalization project cost approximately $5 million.

Like many towns across Saskatchewan, Biggar’s former CN Railway station holds a lot of history and pride for the community. After a lot of hard work, a new replica station serves as the focal point at the end of Main Street. This replica station is also complete with a CN Rail caboose, an outdoor stage and a farmer’s market pavilion.

“We were able to gain ownership of the old CN property and that had been left in a real bad state for many years and we revitalized that. We want to look good and we just want to build on community...we want to extend community,” Rickwood said.

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The mayor added that his community has continued to grow during a time when many have struggled. Rickwood said his community didn’t lose a single business during the COVID-19 pandemic, and Biggar continues to see new residents moving in from across Canada.

“I don’t know if there’s a word to describe it, but satisfaction that we’re not just a community that is surviving or dying, we’re growing,” Rickwood said.

One example of this growth is the new four-storey, 24-unit condominium building set to be built on Main Street. Saturday’s parade was followed by a groundbreaking ceremony for the new building, where the developer and future residents shared their excitement about the project.

“It is a bit unusual to build a building this big in a community the size, but when you’ve got good community supports and good community members and a town that’s willing to work with you, it makes a big difference,” Josh Remai, the CEO of Span West Building Corporation, said.

Remai said one of the major factors behind this project was the desire from community members to remain in Biggar as they age.

“Often what happens is people get a little bit older and their next stop is going to be into a condo or something along those lines, but they’ve got to go to the city to do that. And you’re losing really great community members when that happens. And so this is sort of an idea to bridge that gap along the way,” Remai said.

One of the building’s future residents, Doreen Dubreuil, certainly shares these sentiments.

Dubreuil has lived in the Biggar community for more than six decades after moving to the community to work as a teacher before marrying a farmer and raising three children on a farm southwest of the town.

“I like the small town. I’m not sure I would be comfortable in the city. I don’t mind driving in the city, but as we get older, it’s not going to always be the case, and I can walk uptown quite easily from here, and I’m involved in a lot of things in town, so it’s going to be good to be able to stay here,” Dubreuil said.

Having lived in the community for most of her life, Dubreuil said it has been incredibly positive to see so much effort go into maintaining and growing Biggar. This year’s parade served as an opportunity to highlight both the new and improved Main Street, and the community members who made the project possible.

“It’s just one of pride, absolutely. With all the businesses and all the local groups that that participated, it was really great to see. They always do a really good job of the parade, but this year was even better,” Dubreuil said.

Adding that seeing the final product is something that makes her and many others in the community proud to call Biggar home.

“It’s absolutely beautiful. They’ve done a gorgeous job of revitalizing Main Street and I think we could be the envy of most places in Saskatchewan for a community our size,” Dubreuil said.