Stadiums & Arenas of Canada, Part 3

[esquire]

Originally Posted by Dalreg

Don't bet against Saskatoon and it's new arena. A lot of work is being done behind the scenes that we know nothing about. Don't be surprised that when the new arena is built downtown it will be at least as big if not bigger with a hell of a lot more bells and whistles than the old girl.

Kind of an unwritten status in Saskatchewan. Regina gets the football stadium and Saskatoon gets the arena. lol.

Regina has a team that needs a 33,000 seat stadium. Saskatoon doesn't have anything that needs more than about 12,000 seats. Quebec stood a realistic shot at landing a NHL team when it built Centre Videotron to NHL standards but that will not be in the cards for Saskatoon. So it will be interesting to see if Saskatoon goes big and builds a full-scale NHL arena even without any prospect of landing an actual NHL team.

Originally Posted by craner

I hate having both teams on one sideline as well - just stop it!
If I was in charge of TD stadium in Ottawa my first priority would be improved field lighting. It’s currently so dark for night games - at least on TV.

I have always found that to be peculiar for a stadium that had a major overhaul not that long ago... it is really, really dark in there compared to most venues. How hard could it be to add a few lights to the place?!

And on this Edmonton Omniplex thing, I have no problem with multipurpose stadiums for field sports... I think they are fine and the main reason they have been eliminated is because NFL and MLB owners did not want to share with each other. But I think it would have been a much more awkward fit for hockey and football... there is something to be said for going with the tried and tested. Omniplex was basically an experimental concept and based on what's known, it's hard to imagine it working out for the long haul.

[Airboy]

Another Edmonton Concept. My father was involved with this and the Omniplex.
One idea was to use the waste heat from the power plant to heat this building.
We had a lot of very progressive thinkers back then. Some that went of to do great things elsewhere.
[IMG]Dad scan 1 by [url=https://www.flickr.com/photos/[/url], on Flickr[/IMG]

[IMG]scan0751024_1 by [url=https://www.flickr.com/photos/[/url], on Flickr[/IMG]

[thewave46]

I am honestly kind of glad Toronto didn't get stadium ambition until the 1980s, given the proposals of the era. Ugh.

Sure, Toronto missed the neo-classic renaissance in baseball of the 1990s and 2000s but Skydome's utility will probably exist for decades into the future, no expensive new 'trendy' stadium required.

I am still overpaying for a stadium once. I feel no compulsion of mimic the State of Georgia/City of Atlanta and build venues at 20-year intervals.

[ericmacm]

Originally Posted by esquire

Regina has a team that needs a 33,000 seat stadium. Saskatoon doesn't have anything that needs more than about 12,000 seats. Quebec stood a realistic shot at landing a NHL team when it built Centre Videotron to NHL standards but that will not be in the cards for Saskatoon. So it will be interesting to see if Saskatoon goes big and builds a full-scale NHL arena even without any prospect of landing an actual NHL team.

As has been previously mentioned, SaskTel expanded to 15,000 gradually instead of being built for the purpose to attract an NHL team, so a higher seat capacity for a new arena is still justified even if the NHL is not planning on coming there anytime soon. The original NHL relocation proposal called for an 18,000 seat stadium, which ultimately panned out to only 7,800 upon original construction after the Blues relocation plan died.

Even Regina is now considering a capacity of around 10,000 in its new arena, up from about 6,500 at Brandt. Moderately larger arena sizes are starting to get viable in our smaller cities.

[TorontoDrew]

Originally Posted by thewave46

I am honestly kind of glad Toronto didn't get stadium ambition until the 1980s, given the proposals of the era. Ugh.

Sure, Toronto missed the neo-classic renaissance in baseball of the 1990s and 2000s but Skydome's utility will probably exist for decades into the future, no expensive new 'trendy' stadium required.

I am still overpaying for a stadium once. I feel no compulsion of mimic the State of Georgia/City of Atlanta and build venues at 20-year intervals.

Agreed, Wrigley Field is such a shitty venue not to mention the smallest stadium in the major leagues but Chicago never abandoned it. Maybe in 70 years the Skydome will be loved by all just like Wrigley.

[esquire]

Originally Posted by ericmacm

As has been previously mentioned, SaskTel expanded to 15,000 gradually instead of being built for the purpose to attract an NHL team, so a higher seat capacity for a new arena is still justified even if the NHL is not planning on coming there anytime soon. The original NHL relocation proposal called for an 18,000 seat stadium, which ultimately panned out to only 7,800 upon original construction after the Blues relocation plan died.

SaskTel Centre has a structure big enough to accommodate 16,000+ seats, which was pretty well the standard NHL size in the era when it was conceived and built (mid to late 80s). The idea at the time was that they'd add all of the seating as it was necessary.

Over the years they gradually filled in the spaces in the seating bowl that were originally incomplete so as to boost capacity, but even to this day there are some areas that have not been filled in as you can see in this seating diagram:



It would seem odd to me if Saskatoon built a rink bigger than SaskTel Centre given that there is no obvious need that would justify the additional cost of building a venue with 15,000+ seats, but I guess stranger things have happened.

You mentioned Regina as well... if anything, Regina seems like the Saskatchewan city that could use a new arena more than Saskatoon. They've done a bit to doll up the Brandt Centre over the years and it looks decent inside, looks more like a 'city' venue than the rural barn it used to look like inside, but it's still fairly small and it's getting old.

[EpicPonyTime]

Originally Posted by esquire

It would seem odd to me if Saskatoon built a rink bigger than SaskTel Centre given that there is no obvious need that would justify the additional cost of building a venue with 15,000+ seats, but I guess stranger things have happened.

I don't think that's ever been in the cards, to be honest. The only people who I've seen call for an NHL arena are the (I don't want to say morons) 650 CKOM commenters who think Saskatoon is currently an NHL city. Hamilton and Quebec City have both proven it's a mistake for Canadian cities to build in anticipation of the NHL, and they both had much better chances than Saskatoon will ever have.

As far as I know, the plan has always been to build in the 15K range, similar to what Sask Place is now. 15-16K has been proven to be the perfect size for the city since it is big enough for major concerts, comfortably hosts the Rush and Blades, and realistically allows Saskatoon to bid as the primary host for events like the World Juniors.

[esquire]

^ The only thing in that list that would really need 15,000 seats in the sense that the events probably wouldn't happen without the seats is the World Juniors. Every other event could use the seats on occasion, but would probably happen either way... the NLL for instance has several teams in 11,000-ish capacity buildings.

Realistically the Blades don't need more than 6,000 seats tops. I actually find it a bit strange that the Blades are not better supported considering their lengthy history.

[MalcolmTucker]

Does Lacrosse publish attendance? I think they're the head Saskatoon tenant now.

[WhipperSnapper]

Originally Posted by EpicPonyTime

I think it's reasonable to expect the next arena will be of better quality; at least MTS Centre or better. It's not going to be a NHL-caliber arena, either, but I don't necessarily think it has to be to be world class. Saskatoon is looking to use its next arena as the centre of its downtown entertainment district, so I think they will take the time to do it right.

ugh

[Dalreg]

Esquire you obviously have something against Saskatoon building a 15k+ arena. Good thing you aren't making the decision. By your thinking Winnipeg should never have built a 15k arena as the Manitoba Moose, the main tenant of the arena when it was built never averaged more than 7500 per season. Guess Winnipeg over built. How about Quebec City. They are no where near averaging sellouts for it's teams?

Face it Saskatoon will build as big or bigger as the current arena.

[esquire]

Originally Posted by Dalreg

Esquire you obviously have something against Saskatoon building a 15k+ arena. Good thing you aren't making the decision. By your thinking Winnipeg should never have built a 15k arena as the Manitoba Moose, the main tenant of the arena when it was built never averaged more than 7500 per season. Guess Winnipeg over built. How about Quebec City. They are no where near averaging sellouts for it's teams?

Face it Saskatoon will build as big or bigger as the current arena.

Haha, you are right. I didn't see the point in Winnipeg building a 15,000 seat arena as it seemed way too big for the AHL but also too small for the NHL in case that ever became a realistic prospect. But I was wrong about the last part.

Originally MTS Centre was supposed to be around 12,000 seats and some political machinations led to the capacity being expanded. It did not make sense to me at the time, but clearly the wheels were turning back then to get Winnipeg back into the NHL. So in the end those extra 3,000 or so seats were justified, although until the NHL returned a smaller arena would have worked just fine.

Anyway, is that scenario likely to play out for Saskatoon? Probably not. But hey, I've been wrong about it before

[blueandgoldguy]

Originally Posted by EpicPonyTime

The original proposal for what became Sask Place was for a NHL-caliber arena, but that proposal fell through alongside the Blues' relocation. When Sask Place was built, it sat less than 8,000 people. It's capacity has been expanded multiple times since it was built, and this is part of the problem with it. It's clear that, while the amount of seats grew, the concourses and amenities didn't. It wasn't until the most recent expansion that they added a partial upper level concourse. It's never met the standards of the NHL.

I think it's reasonable to expect the next arena will be of better quality; at least MTS Centre or better. It's not going to be a NHL-caliber arena, either, but I don't necessarily think it has to be to be world class. Saskatoon is looking to use its next arena as the centre of its downtown entertainment district, so I think they will take the time to do it right.

If it's at least MTS Centre or better, then it will be an NHL caliber arena, because last time I checked the Jets have been playing in that arena (now called Canada Life Centre) for 11 years. Of course, there has been $60 - $70 million in improvements/renovations to Canada Life Centre over the past decade, but the fact remains the NHL came back to an arena that was 7 years old and only had a few million in upgrades since it's opening in 2004.

Saskatoon had voted on a plan for a $170 million new arena rather than refurbish the old one, prior to COVID hitting the world. IF everything worked out with that, it would have likely not started construction until the mid-2020s....maybe starting in 2024-25. What would that have bought pre-COVID prior to skyrocketing material costs in the construction industry?

Moncton's Avenir Centre cost $113 million, including the plaza and they started construction on that back in 2016. It seats 8800. I would venture that a construction start 8 to 10 years later in Saskatoon for $170 million would build you a 10-12,000 seat arena if something of reasonable quality were to built. It certainly wouldn't match the seating capacity of the current arena.

That's pre-COVID too. What would that $170 million get you with the new realities facing the world...another Avenir Centre? Don't get me wrong, that looks like a great building, and the quality would be an improvement on Sasktel Centre, but unless there are plans to significantly increase the expenditure on the arena (some private cash should be infused into this project), it would be better if Saskatoon stuck with their current arena.

[blueandgoldguy]

Originally Posted by ericmacm

As has been previously mentioned, SaskTel expanded to 15,000 gradually instead of being built for the purpose to attract an NHL team, so a higher seat capacity for a new arena is still justified even if the NHL is not planning on coming there anytime soon. The original NHL relocation proposal called for an 18,000 seat stadium, which ultimately panned out to only 7,800 upon original construction after the Blues relocation plan died.

Even Regina is now considering a capacity of around 10,000 in its new arena, up from about 6,500 at Brandt. Moderately larger arena sizes are starting to get viable in our smaller cities.

Why is a 15,000 seat arena justified?

The whl teams draws around 4-5,000.

The NLL team was seeing it's attendance starting to dip from sellouts/near sellouts in the first few years to 13,000 in 2019 to 12,000 in 2020...all prior to COVID. Those first few years were the result of a good team/novelty. It's likely the team was trending towards a respectable 10,000 per game average long-term...maybe a little less.

Only a handful of concerts sellout and fewer still use a 360 degree configuration. In most cases, the concert layout tarps off 5,000 seats or more beside and behind the stage and even when adding in floor seats, capacity is restricted to around 11 - 12,000.

An ideal seating arrangement would be a full bowl in the lower level and a 3/4s bowl in the upper level...like London's arena, Grand Rapids arena, South Dakota's arena. Those arenas have a similar capacity to Saskatoon's arena for concerts because there are no upper deck seats to be tarped off behind the stage.

This seating configuration would make sense for Saskatoon for a future arena as it would keep costs down, while allowing a large enough capacity for concerts acts that can actually sell 10,000 seats.

[blueandgoldguy]

Originally Posted by TorontoDrew

Agreed, Wrigley Field is such a shitty venue not to mention the smallest stadium in the major leagues but Chicago never abandoned it. Maybe in 70 years the Skydome will be loved by all just like Wrigley.

Wrigley Field had $550 million in renos - over twice as much as Rogers will spend on Skydome. I'm sure the renos will be good and are long overdue to boot, but I don't think they will be great or transformative. They have already stated the upper bowl will barely be touched (one of the worst features of Skydome) and the awful exterior will receive minimal attention.

[blueandgoldguy]

Originally Posted by Dalreg

Esquire you obviously have something against Saskatoon building a 15k+ arena. Good thing you aren't making the decision. By your thinking Winnipeg should never have built a 15k arena as the Manitoba Moose, the main tenant of the arena when it was built never averaged more than 7500 per season. Guess Winnipeg over built. How about Quebec City. They are no where near averaging sellouts for it's teams?

Face it Saskatoon will build as big or bigger as the current arena.

Winnipeg wasn't going to build a 15,000 seat arena. The plan was to build an 11,000-12,000 seat arena for a tidy sum of $94 million in private money on a parking lot across from the Winnipeg Convention Centre. The premier of the province and the mayor of the city convinced Mark Chipman (owner of the Moose) to build a bigger arena and build it on the Eaton's site (which was property owned by David Thompson) in exchange for $13 million from each level of government plus $13 million kicked in by the feds.

The result - a price tag of $133 million and an increase in capacity to over 15,000 seats...and the rest is history.

Right now, the only rumored source of private money for the proposed new arena is the owner of the Rush team. Would he actually put significant money into the project? Remains to be seen, if they in fact, go ahead with a new arena.

[elly63]

Originally Posted by blueandgoldguy

Wrigley Field had $550 million in renos

Saving Wrigley Field

Thanks for the reminder, I forgot to add it to my video collection.

[megadude]

The term "world class" has certainly been over used. It's basically standard language now for politicians or deverlopers and what have you to describe anything above average or above the bare minimum.

I remember an article from an online Halifax news site or something talking about this regarding HFX's bid for Amazon HQ2. The mayor or someone was constantly using the term like "We're a world class city with world class ammenities and and world class talent". Okay, I can't remember the specific examples but it was a ridiculous use of the term over an extended period of time, well before the Amazon thing. It was cringey and the author was pointing out just how cringey it was. That was far from the only example of it being over used. Happens everywhere.

Where it really caught on, as far as I noticed, was how it was used to describe the elite players in soccer. Soccer is a global game and they were describing the top players in the world. Makes sense. Mind you, many pundits were very generous with the use of it there too.

Now, someone builds a two storey stucco apartment building and calls it world class. The term is becoming diluted. I suggest the new term should be "top class". There's no defined place to measure it against. Saying top class can mean regionally, nationally or globally. It's up to the audience to interpret that. And it's a nice and vague way of pumping up your community without coming across as awkward.

[WhipperSnapper]

Originally Posted by Dalreg

Esquire you obviously have something against Saskatoon building a 15k+ arena. Good thing you aren't making the decision. By your thinking Winnipeg should never have built a 15k arena as the Manitoba Moose, the main tenant of the arena when it was built never averaged more than 7500 per season. Guess Winnipeg over built. How about Quebec City. They are no where near averaging sellouts for it's teams?

Face it Saskatoon will build as big or bigger as the current arena.

Saskatoon has no chance at getting an NHL Team. The stars aligned for Winnipeg. It may not for Quebec City. Regardless, Saskatoon is half the size of Quebec and 1/3 the size of Winnipeg. I don't have an opinion on how big to build. Building something twice as big than necessary (expect for once a month event) at 3 to 4 times the cost is probably not a great decision.

The public have gobbled up arenas anchoring new revitalized districts to justify the massive public investment. They aren't necessary in creating an entertainment district as they don't provide a great anchor. It's a massive dead space when not in use. At best, it's in use 3 to 4 hours a day.

[Harley613]

Originally Posted by WhipperSnapper

Saskatoon has no chance at getting an NHL Team. The stars aligned for Winnipeg. It may not for Quebec City. Regardless, Saskatoon is half the size of Quebec and 1/3 the size of Winnipeg. I don't have an opinion on how big to build. Building something twice as big than necessary (expect for once a month event) at 3 to 4 times the cost is probably not a great decision.

The public have gobbled up arenas anchoring new revitalized districts to justify the massive public investment. They aren't necessary in creating an entertainment district as they don't provide a great anchor. It's a massive dead space when not in use. At best, it's in use 3 to 4 hours a day.

Saskatoon has 38% the population of Winnipeg and 40% the population of Quebec City by the latest metro pop stats. (sorry for being pedantic )