By Chad Ingram

You can purchase the former Frost Centre for $1.1 million.

Vacant for a decade, the province, through Crown agency Infrastructure Ontario, has listed the 40-acre property along Highway 35 south of Dorset with CBRE (Coldwell Banker Richard Ellis) Limited Real Estate Brokerage. Located on St. Nora Lake, the property contains some 20 buildings, including a dining hall, dormitories, former educational spaces and various outbuildings.

Initially developed as a training facility for forest rangers, for decades the Leslie M. Frost Natural Resource Centre, operating under the auspices of the Ministry of Natural Resources, served as a location for training, research and environmental and outdoor education. It was closed by the provincial government in 2004, spurring protests and a movement to save the centre. It was revived between 2008 and 2010 as a private environmental education facility known as the Frost Centre Institute, and has been empty since the school’s closure.

The 40 acres that are for sale were severed from a larger, 26,000-hectare parcel of Crown land. The Township of Algonquin Highlands has a long-term agreement with the province for the trails system it operates in the area.