Two-rink facility opens in southeast

A $33-million, 80,000-square-foot recreation facility with two multipurpose ice rinks opened Tuesday in Calgary’s southeast.

Canlan Ice Sports will operate the city-owned Great Plains Recreation Facility at 76th Avenue and 57th Street S.E., marking the North American company’s first operation in Calgary and its fourth partnership with a municipal government.

Before Tuesday afternoon’s key handover at the new facility, Mayor Naheed Nenshi said the partnership between the city and Canlan will be closely monitored.

“(It’s) a new model for the City of Calgary, which is to work with a private sector partner to try to deliver the services at a lower cost and higher efficiency,” he said.

“We’ll be watching this one very carefully to see if this is a model we want to replicate in the future.”

There was previously no rink in the southeast where the facility is located, and the new facility is welcome news in a city that’s long suffered from a lack of ice, according to the mayor.

“We are forever balancing off the needs of different sport groups,” he said. “We need soccer, we need cricket. Ice is among the most difficult things to manage because of its cost both to build and to operate. We have a shortage. We always have.”

The new facility boasts two multi-purpose ice rinks, seating for about 600 spectators, dryland training space, change rooms, food and drink services, and a pro shop.

The facility was paid for by the city and the provincial government through the Municipal Sustainability Initiative.

The facility will “give Calgarians a place closer to home to practise their figure skating and hockey, and to play sledge hockey and ringette,” Municipal Affairs Minister Danielle Larivee said in a news release.