After some controversial decisions about recent school projects on city outskirts, Education Minister Dominic Cardy says he's looking forward to bringing municipalities into the conversation about where to build new schools.

Cardy was being interviewed about a new elementary school project in the Killarney Lake area announced in the recent capital budget.

But he made an example of a project that will be needed in downtown Fredericton in the next couple of years.

Cardy said the province and the city should look at sharing infrastructure such as a performance stage when it's time to replace George Street Middle School.

"Rather than building a whole new Playhouse-style set up inside a new school … you can share the resources and make the Playhouse even bigger and better," he said.

Taking advantage of cultural, sports assets

Then the school would require a smaller footprint, said Cardy.

In larger urban centres in Canada and elsewhere, he said, students use public transport to get to school and places like museums.

"We've tended to focus school on the school buildings," he said. "We should be making sure that our teachers have the ability to take students out.

"We've got incredible cultural, community and sport-based assets, which we could easily be working to include with the school system."

The minimum size required for school properties is one of the things Moncton city council is asking the province to reconsider.

It has been lobbying for more clout in the school site selection process, which it describes as "top-down," following consecutive decisions that relocated existing schools and disrupted established neighbourhoods.