Ice skating in Hull ‘six months’ away
COUNCILLOR MAINTAINS ARENA WILL REOPEN
THE Hull Arena will reopen – but not for six months.
Pictures released last week showed the popular skating rink in a state of disrepair leading to fears for the future of ice sports in the city amid news that Hull’s replacement venue might be five years away from opening.
A new rink is built in to the plans for the multi-million-pound Albion Square retail, leisure and office complex, but it was revealed on Thursday that it has been hit by delays.
The hold-ups, combined with the fact that the Kingston Street arena has been shut for seven months, led to fears among Hull’s passionate skating community that they would have to continue to travel to Leeds to take part in the sport they love.
Notices put up in March had said it would be closed for “a few weeks”.
However, Councillor David Craker, Hull City Council’s portfolio holder for culture, leisure and tourism, confirmed yesterday that it will reopen.
Speaking to BBC Radio Humberside, he announced that skating would return to Hull Arena, but that it will “take a good while” to install new machinery needed to make it ready to welcome visitors.
“They’ve said six months to us. That’s what the procurement has said it will take to bring everything up to scratch,” he said.
“We’ve been told it’ll take a good while to install the new machinery that is needed to bring European standards.
“There was a picture in the paper last week which made it look derelict, which I was surprised to see. We are investing up to a million pounds to bring it up to standard and hopefully we’ll get it open as soon as possible.
“We want to reassure everybody that it is going to be reopened.”
During his interview with the BBC’S David Burns, Cllr Craker said he was “surprised” to learn that skaters were having to travel to Leeds to practise their sport.
He also admitted being “inundated” with emails over the course of the weekend highlighting its plight.
Ice rinks were given the green light to reopen on August 15 by the it up to
Government in a relaxation lockdown restrictions.
“Reading the emails that people are travelling to Leeds to do their sport surprised me, to be honest. If one town can open their doors I don’t see why we can’t,” he said.
“The reason is it was highlighted at the weekend in an article by the Mail I believe – that’s how it has come to fruition. Over the weekend we were inundated with emails about the ice arena.”
The existing arena would be loss-making if not for an annual subsidy of around £200,000 from the local authority to help it balance the books, it was revealed at a council scrutiny meeting on Thursday.
Explaining her frustration at the of
situation last week, one skater said: “Updates from Hull Arena on its Facebook page have been few and the page hasn’t been updated since the original lockdown closure.
“The responses to people asking is ‘we don’t have a reopening date yet’. But that’s not a fair answer.
“Ice rinks have been able to open for over seven weeks now, yet Hull is still shut. The junior ice hockey team are having to travel to Leeds weekly to access ice time.
“Figure skaters can not get ice time at other rinks, many don’t have access to the transport needed to get to other arenas.
“The city’s ice hockey teams and figure skaters, as well as hobby skaters, are losing out.”