Calgary Event Centre | 36.85m | 11s | CSEC | HOK

Do you support the proposal for the new arena?

  • Yes

    Votes: 88 64.7%
  • No

    Votes: 39 28.7%
  • Maybe

    Votes: 9 6.6%

  • Total voters
    136
They probably haven't even designed it yet, and we won't see anything for a year or two. I just hope they don't go for some spaceship design the contractors can't properly build, pretty much what happened in Edmonton.
 
They probably haven't even designed it yet, and we won't see anything for a year or two. I just hope they don't go for some spaceship design the contractors can't properly build, pretty much what happened in Edmonton.
They came to love the design so much, that when they swapped out all of the fancy materials for cheaper stuff ... well need we say more? Edmonton also removed their streetfront retail to save money, because who needs street activation!
 
A basic, functional, classy box with all effort being placed on outward activation and inward future-proofing. This should be the last arena the city ever builds. Take a page of the Air Canada (now Scotiabank Arena) Centre in Toronto. With a perfect location and good basic design the thing can be endlessly renovated. The goal should be the same here. We already have many flashy, non-functional structures in our city, what we need is getting the basics right.
 
Agreed with the Sprint Center, love the look of that building. The more glass on the outside the better. In addition, we need to have street front retail, public plazas/gathering spots, and some type of nice water feature or fountain that can be used for skating in the winter. I'd prefer a slightly modern design but it needs to be classy (not the spaceship in Edmonton) with lots of glass and possibly exposed wood like the library.
 
A quick google search and it looks like the Sprint Center was $276 Usd to build so well within our budget. It's a shame that the Saddledome has to be torn down, between losing that and the ski jumps at COP I feel that the city is losing some really iconic infrastructure.
 
They came to love the design so much, that when they swapped out all of the fancy materials for cheaper stuff ... well need we say more? Edmonton also removed their streetfront retail to save money, because who needs street activation!

They did? That seems extremely short sighted and frankly does not make any sense for the present day.
 
They probably haven't even designed it yet, and we won't see anything for a year or two. I just hope they don't go for some spaceship design the contractors can't properly build, pretty much what happened in Edmonton.
Considering they're gonna be looking for public feedback on the design this January (<2 months away) and will have a completed proposal by April, we will most definitely be seeing something much sooner than that.
Something like the Sprint Center would be perfect. Love the exposed wood idea. Good news also is that they did mention they want a public gathering space, quoting 'Jurassic Park' in Toronto as their inspiration for it.
Any word on if they're actually gonna use the Rossetti Bowl design?
 
They came to love the design so much, that when they swapped out all of the fancy materials for cheaper stuff ... well need we say more? Edmonton also removed their streetfront retail to save money, because who needs street activation!
The more I see the Rogers Place the less I like it. The novelty has worn off quickly, and I hope with Calgary's new arena, they build in nice street frontage, and also something with a bit more glass and open feel, and not so closed off like Edmonton's.
 
Rogers Place looks like a Galaxy Class Starship parked in the middle of downtown Edmonton, just with shittier cladding and a more megalithically imposing presence,
 
Glad to hear that I'm not the only one who's not a fan of Rogers Arena. I was until I saw it in person and realized thought to myself, we can do better. We need an arena that interacts with its surroundings better, rather than a large metallic hockey puck.
 
Ten years of negotiation and the Flames end up with everything they wanted. The city is paying the majority of construction to own a building with no resale value and the Flames have a 35 year, lucrative management contract. I'm not sold on the site. It's surrounded by convention space. It's not very lively.

Rogers arena looks great .... on the inside. The exterior cladding looks like shit. It's not pedestrian friendly. The carbuncle practice area ruins the trendy design.
 
Ten years of negotiation and the Flames end up with everything they wanted. The city is paying the majority of construction to own a building with no resale value and the Flames have a 35 year, lucrative management contract. I'm not sold on the site. It's surrounded by convention space. It's not very lively.

Rogers arena looks great .... on the inside. The exterior cladding looks like shit. It's not pedestrian friendly. The carbuncle practice area ruins the trendy design.
I would say compared to the Edmonton deal, Calgary's deal is almost flipped. In Edmonton, the net cost to the taxpayers is around 4/5th of the building cost. In Calgary, the net cost is around 1/5th. Probably the best small market arena deal in a generation.

I know it doesn't make people happy who want to spend $0. But only in the best of circumstances in large markets does it make economic sense to do so.
 
It's better than Edmontons. It's not a fifth of the costs to taxpayers. It has taken 10 years and the office market is now in the toilet and residential is weaker than 5 to 10 years ago. The years of feuding wasn't worth a slightly better deal than Edmontons. Edmonton has an arena and good start to the "arena district"

How do you get to 1/5th of the costs? The Flames aren't paying property taxes. They aren't paying rent. They keep the majority of the revenues less a maximum of $3 million a year to the city. The city also gets 250,000 a year from the naming right that could be sold for as much as $10 million a year. That's probably less than the property taxes paid if the Flames owned the building.

That's all i have to say. It's a done deal. Moving on.
 
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