Pillars of the community
Climate change is threatening the ice rinks that bring us together
The morning after Toronto was buried under 50 centimetres of snow, my phone pinged: “We’re looking for all hands-on deck at noon today for rink shovelling.”
By midday, the natural ice rink at Leslie Grove Park in the city’s east end looked like a 16th-century Bruegel painting: dozens of parents and tweens pushing shovels across the ice surface, kids jumping in the resulting snowbanks and a half dozen neighbourhood dogs zipping back and forth across the newly revealed ice. An hour later, a game of shinny organically took shape on one half of the rink, while younger kids made wobbly circles around the other.
This scene played out in some version at each of the city’s 53 approved natural ice rinks, all of them made and maintained by teams of neighbourhood volunteers who show up every single night to scrape, shovel and flood the ice using the winter water hookup and
You feel compelled to be a part of it, I don’t know how to describe it.
JOËL CAMPBELL SORAUREN HOSERS RINK
hose provided by the city’s Natural Ice Rink Program.
If you remember endless days like this from your youth, it’s not just nostalgia painting your memories rose-coloured or, in this case, white. Since the 1980s, when natural rinks stayed consistently frozen from the Christmas holidays through March break, Toronto has lost one third of its high-probability skating days, or those with an average temperature of -5 C, according to Robert McLeman, a professor of environmental studies at Wilfrid Laurier University.
McLeman, who also manages the RinkWatch project to collect ice condition data across Canada, says the group’s climate model projects Toronto will lose another 25 per cent of its viable skating days in the next 40 years.
With natural rink season now lasting only from early January until late February, with one or two thaws in the middle, it’s not just the ice that we risk losing, but the culture and community of making, maintaining and playing on it together.
“The flooding experience for the parents is almost as important or more important than the actual skating experience,” McLeman said. “Being out there at minus 15 degrees at midnight, flooding the (rink). It’s a quiet time you get to yourself. You’re doing something tangible and visible for your family and friends and your neighbours.”
Doing something for the kids in the community is exactly what brought the first-year Leslie Grove “Dad Brigade” out at 9:15 on a crisp, clear January night. After a quick greeting and a few notes on the afternoon’s shinny, the crew began to clear efficient swaths back and forth across the ice, readying it to receive the thin layer of water that would freeze into a smooth surface for the next day’s skaters.
“How many weeks do you think we have left?” asked Christine Gosse, the brigade’s lone mom who, like the others, wanted to keep the rink going as long as weather allowed.
“Strangely, looking at the forecast and seeing negatives has been really nice,” said neighbourhood dad Robert Orlofsky. “Knowing that this is taking us through this difficult period, that it is actually making it fun and exciting and something to look forward to …”
He trailed off as the others nodded in agreement.
Across town at Sorauren Avenue Park, Wednesday night flooding captain Joël Campbell was joined by four or five members of the 50strong Sorauren Hosers Rink Crew.
Campbell admitted it’s a lot of work to keep the rink up and running. But he said it’s worth it for the three-year-old who is just learning to skate; the kids who take their skates to school so they can head straight to the rink after the bell rings; the early morning exercisers and the “rink rats” who start waiting before Christmas for the ice to open and stay at least three hours every day once it does. The Hosers, like many rink volunteers, are also in it for the unique joy and pride of working together to create a resource for the community.
“I love the flooding part,” said Campbell. “You feel compelled to be a part of it, I don’t know how to describe it.”
According to a RinkWatch study, Toronto is losing winter faster than the other original six NHL cities, including Boston, Chicago, Detroit, Montreal and New York. Toronto — anecdotally the artificial outdoor rink capital of the world — already has more than 50 refrigerated rinks and is planning to open at least five more in the coming decades.
While artificial rinks nearly guarantee skating from late November to March, there are trade-offs. At almost $4 million to design and construct a new rink and around $2.6 million for a skate trail, artificial rinks cost more to build and maintain than natural ones. That includes the financial and ecological burden of running giant compressors 24 hours a day to keep the ice chilled.
In terms of skating experience, natural rink enthusiasts argue that refrigerated rinks can’t achieve the harder ice, imperfect surface conditions and unlimited ice time that hockey coaches recommend for developing skills.
“It’s better than nothing,” McLeman conceded, adding that Canadians without outdoor rinks are like Texans without rodeos. “Life would go on, but they wouldn’t feel quite so Texan as they once did.”
One thing artificial rinks can never replicate is the “all hands on deck” community feel and the shared pursuit of the perfect surface for the neighbourhood kids to enjoy. Gosse said she even saw a teenager pick up a shovel to clear the ice after school last Tuesday. That’s real magic.