New venue announced for rock show while Magnetic Hill sits empty 2 years in a row

A concert promoter announces a Labour Day Rockfest in Moncton, with mostly Canadian nostalgia acts lining the bill, while the Magnetic HIll concert site sits empty for the second summer in a row.

Deputy Mayor Charles Leger calls the unused concert site disappointing

Tori Weldon · CBC News · Posted: Aug 02, 2017 3:12 PM EDT | Last Updated: August 2, 2017

A crowd of people with one man in a cowboy hat. — The Magnetic Hill concert site in Moncton has hosted mega-concerts, including U2 and the Rolling Stones, but no concerts have been announced since AC/DC played in 2015. (CBC)

A promoter in Moncton announced the lineup for Labour Day Rockfest on Wednesday. Emery Bourque is hoping 10,000 people fill the River Glen Amphitheatre on the outskirts of Moncton in early September.

But a 20-minute drive north, the Magnetic Hill concert site sits empty for the second year in a row.

At the concert announcement on Wednesday, Deputy Mayor Charles Leger said city council needs to come up with a plan for the empty site.

"It's always a disappointment that we haven't been able to bring anything to the hill."

Labour Day Rockfest promoter Emery Bourque, says he briefly considered the Magnetic Hill site for his concert but decided it 'would probably be too big.' (Tori Weldon/CBC)

Leger said the U.S. dollar and a lack of big names that can pull in the crowds needed to fill Magnetic Hill make booking bands complicated.

Since 2003, Magnetic Hill, once called the concert hub of the Maritimes, has hosted shows by the Rolling Stones, Bon Jovi, the Eagles, AC/DC, U2, Nickleback and Bruce Springsteen, among others.

According to Isabelle LeBlanc, communication director with the City of Moncton, maintaining the site during a year when there is no event costs about $30,000.

"If we take 2016 as an example, the cost was $32,000 for the year."

Australian rockers AC/DC played Magnetic Hill twice since the city developed the site. Maintaining Magnetic Hill costs the municipality about $30,000 a year when no concerts are planned. (Getty Images)

Promoter Bourque, owner of Embou Productions, said he briefly considered the Magnetic Hill site for Labour Day Rockfest.

"We know that now if I took a concert of this size and took it over there you would lose the atmosphere," he said.

"The site would probably be too big."

Headlining the Labour Day festival is Canadian singer Burton Cummings, the former Guess Who frontman. Also in the lineup are other Canadian superstars from decades past, Sass Jordan, Gowan and Stampeders. Nazareth, the Scottish 1970s power balladeers, round out the bill.

The City of Moncton has resisted revealing the cost of bringing in acts that can fill the Magnetic Hill site, which hasn't seen a concert since AC/DC two years ago. (CBC)

The concert will be held at Solomon Gardens, an untested concert site between the Salisbury Road and the Petitcodiac River normally used as a wedding venue.

But Bourque said the 100-acre site is a natural amphitheatre and perfectly suited to the thousands of people he is hoping will show up.

"If someone were to ask you to design a perfect concert site, this is what you'd come up with."

The Magnetic Hill concert site last hosted Australian rockers AC/DC in 2015. The site also sat empty in 2013 and 2014.

People who live in Moncton have never been told how much it costs to bring in the big acts that can fill the site. The city has consistently refused to make financial details public.