Loveland council to consider IMAX incentive agreement

LOVELAND — The Loveland City Council will consider Tuesday whether to approve an incentive agreement to bring an IMAX theater to the community.

The agreement would provide Metrolux Theaters with a $200,000 cash incentive and waiver of up to $50,000 in combined building permit and construction use taxes to incentivize the $3.5 million theater project.

The IMAX theater with a 70-foot screen would occupy a 7,000-square-foot renovation of the Metrolux 14 theaters at 6085 Sky Pond Drive in the Promenade Shops in Centerra. Two existing theaters would be converted to IMAX use. The new theater would seat 269 people and is projected to draw about 65,000 people over the course of a year to IMAX productions.

IMAX is a proprietary system that originally fed film horizontally through the projector instead of vertically, in order to permit larger images not hindered by the width of the film. IMAX theaters are known for large, curved screens, audience placement closer to the screen and often for displaying films in three-dimensions.

If approved, the city’s economic incentive fund would fund the agreement, leaving about $93,000 in the fund for the remainder of the year. The agreement would have a clawback provision to permit the city to recoup its incentive if the theater were to close within four years.

Construction of the theater would start in early 2021 and be complete in the second quarter, according to information provided to the city council.

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