10 Rideau Street, at the corner of Rideau and Sussex, beside the Rideau Centre. (Darren Brown, OBJ)

Proponents behind a proposed Ottawa 'Innovation Hub' are sizing up office space at 10 Rideau St., at Colonel By Drive, as a potential home, according to a senior city official.

The Innovation Hub initiative, led by The Ottawa Partnership (TOP), is preparing a business plan to bring entrepreneurs, researchers, public officials and professional service providers together in a single location.

10 Rideau St. is one option being considered by officials, who have said they want the centre to be downtown where entrepreneurs can immerse themselves in a vibrant and creative environment.

Officials had previously investigated occupying the former downtown Ottawa train station, now a federal government conference centre, as the hub's launch pad. But that location at 1 Nicholas St. was ruled out after architects concluded it would take more than $90 million to upgrade the facility.

The office space under consideration at 10 Rideau St. is a highly visible downtown property, located above the Elephant and Castle Restaurant attached to the Rideau Centre.

The property features 45,500 square feet of office space, according to a lease listing published by DTZ Barnicke. The asking rent is $22 per square foot, plus an additional $18 per square foot for operating costs.

Built in 1916 by C. Jackson Booth, the son of lumber baron J.R. Booth, the building served as Ottawa's temporary city hall in the 1930s and was expropriated by the federal government in 1965, according to the property listing. It also housed the National Capital Commission at one point and received a heritage designation in 1979.

After acquiring the building in 1981, Viking Rideau Corp. completely renovated the structure. The provincial government was the sole tenant for the past 25 years.

City economic development manager Ian Duff referred questions about the status of the Innovation Hub to TOP, an economic development board comprised of public- and private-sector leaders.

TOP chairperson Chris Henderson was out of town late last week and could not be reached for comment.

An official with the Ottawa Centre for Research and Innovation, however, said the economic development agency is finalizing the Innovation Hub proposal with Ontario's Ministry of Research and Innovation and is unable to comment on the hub's status.

In a presentation last April, Mr. Henderson said it's time for Queen's Park to fund Ottawa's innovation centre like it has for other Ontario municipalities. He pointed to similar investments in Toronto, where the MaRS facilities have received $90 million, and Kingston, where a partnership led by Queen's University has received $28 million.

He said the business community cannot let the proposal get bogged down in government red tape.

"We need to push this forward like we did the Congress Centre," he said at the time.

During his presentation to TOP members, Mr. Henderson said the Innovation Hub would lead to better collaboration between private and public organizations in Ottawa, which are spending hundreds of millions of dollars on R&D.

The new facility would not focus on a single technology; rather, it would encourage entrepreneurs from sectors as diverse as life sciences, software and telecommunications to work together to uncover new business opportunities.

In addition to office space, the hub will congregate professional services – legal, intellectual property, accounting, finance – into one location.

It's likely that entrepreneurs and their business plans would be vetted by a committee before securing space in the hub. Entrepreneurs would pay for operating expenses during their stay.

"We're good at turning money into research in Ottawa," said Mr. Henderson at the time.

"We need to be better at turning research into money."