Ft.St. John Approves Ice Oval

Saturday, June 24, 2006 09:29 PM

Architectural drawing of "Enerplex" the covered ice oval in Ft. St. John

The residents of Ft. St. John have approved the borrowing of $15 million dollars to construct a new ice facility in that city.

Only 12.78 % of the voters turned out to approve the project with a vote of 933 in favour, and 734 opposed out of a possible turn out of out of 13,045 eligible voters in that community.

The project would see the construction of a speed skating ice oval making it the third such oval in Canada. The others are the former Calgary Olympic facility and the facility being built in Richmond BC. Richmond says the facility will be turned into a general ice surface following the 2010 Olympics.

Fort St. John Mayor, Jim Eglinsk,i says “There is a real buzz in the community about the project and that’s just going to increase over the coming months as we move towards the actual construction.”

(diagram at right illustrates floor plan for new facility)

The province has committed $12.5 million dollars towards the project known as the Enerplex; the City is also seeking funding from the federal government.

The city and its officials will sit down in the coming weeks to develop a schedule for the detailed design phase.

It is still very early, but Mayor Eglinski says it is anticipated that the tender for construction would likely start in early 2007 and would take 14 to 16 months to build.

A group of Prince George residents has been attempting to have an outdoor artificial ice facility built near the CN Center. The group that headed to Turin has been advertising it hopes to have such a facility begin construction in 2006. They say the facility would enable Prince George to attract athletes to this city to train for the 2010 Winter Olympics.

What effect the Fort St. John indoor track would have on those plans is not immediately known.

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Posted on Saturday, June 24, 2006 09:29 PM in News by 250 News

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Comments

Posted by: lunarguy on June 24 2006 10:15 PM

I wish FSJ good luck with their oval. They have the opposite problem that we do. For them often during the winter season it is too darn cold to go skating outside whereas we seem to be melting our ice more often than not.

I read and attended the presentation by the ice oval community and while at first glance it seems like a good idea, when you look at the numbers of people who would have to actually use the facility it is much higher than the numbers presently using the existing one and I don�t think we have that large of a base of users to draw upon. The whole using up the City�s gravel and charging for it to help off set the cost of construction as well seemed a bit too creative in the financing.

Unfortunately too much of the infrastructure in PG is failing that I can�t support any new large capital recreational building. Lets get our streets back to a good status !

Posted by: owl on June 25 2006 2:23 AM

It's just another 30 minutes on a plane from Vancouver to FS John rather than 60 minutes to PG.

So, I am a skater and can't practice in Richmond. So now I have two options to pratice in an indoor rink where I know what the conditions will be like - Calgary and FS John, both the same time distance from Vancouver. I do not think an outdoor rink in PG would interest me very much.

It looks like a nice building. It might even be a wooden roof structure from the looks of it.

From a radio report I heard about this I am still not sure whether the Provincial money is a direct grant or a no interest loan and guarantee.

Posted by: owl on June 25 2006 2:29 AM

Just reading the brochure about the complex. Some interesting words.

"The development of the Fort
St. John Enerplex was initiated
in 2003 when the City
recognized the opportunity
to obtain provincial funding
for a pre-Olympic training
facility and went to work
to prepare a proposal to the
Province."

It continues with: "The
effort culminated in March
2006 when MLA Richard
Neufeld presented a cheque
for $12.5 million to the City
of Fort St. John for the Province�s
share of the construction
cost for the Enerplex."

http://www.cityfsj.com/pdf/enerplex_mailer.pdf

Torino must have been fun........
:-(

Posted by: Marty on June 25 2006 8:19 AM

Sorry, but IMHO that is just stupid.
With 2 already in western Canada, they need that like PG needs to build its own private lake that covers the whole downtown bowl so i can fish and waterski here.

Posted by: trusted on June 25 2006 9:07 AM

Well, finally, Marty has come up with a great solution for downtown.
Drown it!!!!
Now that is creative thinking.
It would make for one hell of a tourist attraction.
Maybe the fishing part is a bit far fetched??????
Keep the faith, Marty. Is it not said," Anything is possible?"

Posted by: owl on June 25 2006 10:12 AM

Remember, it is Fort St John. The neighbour is Alberta. Oil-rich Alberta. So, this is probably simply a one upmanship exercise to keep the boys at home.

It's a cultural palace being built to those who worship ice sports.

Reminds me of building an indoor saltwater wave pool overlooking an ocean beach. The epitome of decadence.

Posted by: trusted on June 25 2006 10:49 AM

Hello!!!
And when has the Government presented Prince George with a sizeable cheque for what would be a frivolous venture???
Or even something the city is in great need of???
Somehow, I get this kind of "left out" feeling.
The so called "capital of the north" is in great need of "capital" Even servicing the debt of this city is going to be a burden on the taxpayers for years, and rest assured, the amount of borrowing power still available will be utilized by this Mayor and Council.
Oh well, those of faint heart-take heed!!!
If the city should go bankrupt, the governments of the day will hastily bail us out, and we will be free and clear!!!
Isn't that how it works??? Business people declare bankruptcy, and go right back into operation!!!!
Why can't the city???
Just think--free and clear to start all over.
And all those tax dollars not even spoken for!!!!
Makes for a lot of fun trips-now doesn't it???????
Think we could get a big cheque to drown downtown???
Worth a shot!!

Posted by: owl on June 25 2006 7:06 PM

The Jago whatever soccer indoor hall, 1,000 seats, with track, work out machines and a lousy two handball/squach courts and maybe some washrooms and an elevator. The province came up with some money which I thought was about the same amount. However, the building is being built next to the University and will persumably be part of the UNBC.

Many people are intimidated by entering a University or even a College. So, while they will go to he library downtown, for isntance, they will not go to the College or UNBC library. Some don't even know they can use those facilties even though they are not registered as a student.

A performing arts theatre would have been nice. I think I'll send a letter to Santa Claus.

Posted by: Smooth on June 25 2006 8:56 PM

trusted
you remind me of an old poster who used to hang around here. Kind of a kook, but he/she also used all of the ??? and the !!!. I guess they thought it proved their point more when they didnt really have much of one.

Owl. Your post seems out of character for you. Is someone being intimidated to walk into a University really any kind of reason not to build it there. It likely wouldn't get built otherwise. Get over it and walk in. Perhaps these facilities need to do some promoting.

smooth

Posted by: trusted on June 25 2006 9:45 PM

Smooth, I trust you will accept my apologies for disturbing you with !!! and
??? Must be some type of sign which annoys you.
If not, take note you can ignore my postings simply by looking at the top-whereby you will see, Posted by: amd the name of the person. Hope that helps you.
As for the insult to owl, I would almost guarantee he could walk into any building and not be intimidated.
If that is the limit of your complaints, i think you are in need of help.
There are a couple of issues I suggest you "get over".

Posted by: Smooth on June 25 2006 10:09 PM

Posted by: owl on June 25 2006 10:11 PM

In addition to that, as trusted may or may not know, I come by what I said about intimidation from experiencing those who feel that way.

Post secondary education institutes will, on occasion, provide continuing education courses in hotel meeting rooms rather than on campus just to make sure that people attending are comfortable and are not intimidated by the facilties, even just from the point of view of finding lecture room 3005B. Better still is to provide the courses in their own business settings if the courses have been custimized for the business.

I stand with what I said. The new sportsplex on the hill will be used primarily by an elite that either attends the UNBC or have attended a University or two in the past and are familair with that type of setting.

I think the UNBC and City will need to do some promotion to ensure the entire community realizes they will have access to the facilties.

Posted by: Smooth on June 25 2006 10:38 PM

Posted by: Smooth on June 26 2006 1:43 AM

why do my posts show up twice, almost half an hour apart?

smooth

Posted by: Smooth on June 26 2006 1:51 AM

For clarification, my comment was not intended as an insult to Owl.

In regards to Owl's last post. Why do you say it will be used by the "elite." Curious what makes them elite if it is open to all?

smooth