One Niagara –owned by developer Frank Parlato- is the preferred site for the Niagara Experience Center, a planned visitor and orientation center in downtown Niagara Falls, according to Niagara Falls Senior Planner Thomas DeSantis.

The Experience Center is planned to be a themed attraction showing visitors the beauty, majesty and history of Niagara Falls wiith interactive rides and world-class exhibits.

Sites across the downtown area, from John B. Daly Boulevard to the Aquarium of Niagara, were included on the original list of possible sites for the center before One Niagara was selected as preferred.

The next step would include final site decision, and acquisition and design of the facility, according to Experience Center Chairman Paul Dyster.

Funding already committed to the Niagara Experience Center project includes $10 million in state funding committed in March 2002. The initial estimate of the cost of the proposed center is $75 million.

Parlato said he supports a move to build on his property provided state officials promise to aid the city in its overall development plans.

“There’s only one way this will ever be an Experience Center, and that's if the people of Niagara Falls are included in the profit equation,” Parlato said.

One Niagara was the former site of a failed underground aquarium –to be called AquaFalls. It was renamed One Niagara when Parlato purchased it with partner Steve Pigeon in December, 2004.

A 2.27 acre parcel, with a nine story, all-glass building, it bounds the Niagara Falls State Park, and the Rainbow International Bridge, and is across the street from the Rainbow Mall.

Built by the Hooker Chemical Co. in 1981, it is known as the first “green” building in the western world. The building was included in the Guinness Book of World Records in 1987 for the "largest sound and light display"  when it inaugurated the festival of lights on its all- glass exterior overlooking the falls.

In 1999, Hooker’s successor, Occidental Petroleum sold the building to investors who planned the 100,000 square foot AquaFalls aquarium. A one acre- 40 foot hole was blasted out of the dolomite in downtown Niagara Falls to accommodate the project- and that’s where it stopped. Funding plans failed, and for six years the hole remained – a symbol of the city’s failed development plans. Shortly after Pigeon and Parlato bought the property, they scrapped the aquarium plan and began filling the hole,  which is now more than 70% full.

Although the city of Niagara Falls is nearly insolvent, Parlato had harsh words for Albany leaders who he believes have mismanaged the profits from the country’s most popular state park -with millions of annual visitors.

“They do nothing but hijack our profits and make our city broke,” he said.

Experience Center Executive Board Chairman Paul Dyster said he has also been dissatisfied with state agencies’ reinvestment in Niagara Falls.

Still, Dyster believes the real work on the new Experience project will be done by local hands.

“We know that we locals have to do a better job, too,” Dyster said, noting civic and community leaders must put in the effort to work with state officials and push for more reinvestment locally.

Parlato said he expects to make an announcement on upcoming activity at “One Niagara” – including information about the removal of the perimeter fence around the once 40-foot hole on the property – within the next few weeks.

“I think it’s a great idea to have an experience center,” said Parlato “How about the people of Niagara Falls having a new experience – prosperity.”