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
Yeah, prioritizing from a smaller pie, and parts of the smaller pie can't be used for things we want (the federal government won't fund sports arenas through their normal infrastructure programs:
"must confirm that the primary rationale for undertaking a sport infrastructure Project is not to serve as a home facility for professional or semi-professional sports teams. " http://www.infrastructure.gc.ca/prog/agreements-ententes/2018/2018-ab-eng.html
 
Does anyone know when the final plan is gonna be shared with the public? They have the date set as Winter 2018 online but theres only 2 weeks left until 2019.
 
Not winter yet either though! Although I consider this to be more winter 2019 coming up but who knows how they are working it.
 
Will be interesting to see how the plan for stampede/Victoria park turns out. The area is certainly in need of some attention and if the expanded BMO centre and possible arena start things I'm all for it. Have to be careful there's still a mix of stuff and not just a newer version of what's already there.
 
CMLC AND CALGARY STAMPEDE PARTNER ON MAJOR DEVELOPMENT OPPORTUNITY IN EAST VICTORIA PARK

Official announcement of CMLC taking control of 30 acres of Stampede land - first priority on securing a hotel, which the Stampede has been trying to land for ages but the investment in BMO Centre makes the location much more attractive to a hotelier. Also of note is discussion of residential use - the previous Stampede Trail plans were almost all commercial with the Stampede retaining control over the property. I think an injection of residential will make for a better, more organic feeling district.
 
Hopefully they don't cannibalize from the already slowing, half-built East Village,
This'll be a different beast than East Village where the focus is heavily on residential and building a neighborhood from scratch. This will be more about expanding the BMO centre and integrating into an entertainment sports venue, and then integrating into the rest of the neighborhood.
 
Heard on the News wednesday night that a funding agreement has been reached by the city for a new Arena. They allude to a 3rd partner and that the deal has to be agreed to by CSEC.
 
Heard on the News wednesday night that a funding agreement has been reached by the city for a new Arena. They allude to a 3rd partner and that the deal has to be agreed to by CSEC.
The 'agreement' is the city's negotiating framework, which now goes to full council for discussion.

Hopefully the position doesn't leak too much. Hopefully it passes. Then we will see within a month whether the position is even worth talknig about from CSEC's perspective. If discussions last longer, it means things are going well imo.
 
It will be tough to replace the dome, although both Montreal and Toronto replaces very iconic arenas with bland boxes, I sure hope that does not happen here as well. Saddledome is as much a part of the skyline as the Calgary tower as far as being iconic and something g that identifies Calgary as Calgary. Seems like the new rink will likely be hidden within a sea of towers though and not stand out to the extent that the saddledome always has.

In the next breath though I suppose if they can create that much better if a fan experience at events with bigger and better concourses, not missing the boat with regards to bathroom facilities I suppose the exterior won’t be as important.

I will miss the dome though, always have fun going there.
 
I'm fairly sure the new arena will be nicer inside, and have all of the new bells and whistles, but won't be as architecturally interesting as the Saddledome. I was up in Edmonton for the Sharks game a couple of weeks ago, and was kind of underwhelmed by exterior Rogers Place design. The inside is great, but the outside, when you stop and take a good look at it, is rather average, and will look dated soon.
 
I'm fairly sure the new arena will be nicer inside, and have all of the new bells and whistles, but won't be as architecturally interesting as the Saddledome. I was up in Edmonton for the Sharks game a couple of weeks ago, and was kind of underwhelmed by exterior Rogers Place design. The inside is great, but the outside, when you stop and take a good look at it, is rather average, and will look dated soon.
The quality of the finishing of the exterior is kinda shoddy on Rogers as well.
 
It will be tough to replace the dome, although both Montreal and Toronto replaces very iconic arenas with bland boxes, I sure hope that does not happen here as well. Saddledome is as much a part of the skyline as the Calgary tower as far as being iconic and something g that identifies Calgary as Calgary. Seems like the new rink will likely be hidden within a sea of towers though and not stand out to the extent that the saddledome always has.

In the next breath though I suppose if they can create that much better if a fan experience at events with bigger and better concourses, not missing the boat with regards to bathroom facilities I suppose the exterior won’t be as important.

I will miss the dome though, always have fun going there.

It's a good question you are hitting on. To what extent does it matter how "iconic" a stadium structure is?

Montreal, Toronto, Vancouver and Winnipeg have all designed functional boxes with little architectural flourish (some of this by choice, some of it by era of design). All are clean and modern looking, all are very well attended and popular destinations for sports and concerts, all are about as centrally located as they can be. Edmonton's terribly old Rexall Place IIRC had substantially larger annual attendance than the Saddledome (most often attributed to the Saddledome's roof limitations for tier 1 concert tours). Ottawa's arena is often criticized by it's location choice, cited as the trigger for their new central location.

So if I could propose a theory of arenas based on this 4 sentence analysis of Canadian arena design:
  1. Must be as centrally located as possible
  2. Must be as multi-functional as possible
  3. Must avoid mistakes that ruin the environment around it (more important due to #1)
  4. Must avoid mistakes that ruin the ability to do #2 (e.g. Saddledome's roof)
I think there is a risk in focusing and trying "too hard" through aesthetic design alone. Tastes change of the lifespan of a building and can look dated even if you really think you nailed it in 2019. Guessing what will be iconic is a dangerous game that architects and designers the world over fall into. What is critical is the location and interaction to the surroundings. Even an ugly or boring building in the right location will out-perform a well designed one in a terrible spot.

Thank goodness that the location is already chosen and modestly improves on the current Saddledome's. With CMLC's involvement - and their thorough understanding of the importance of maximizing location and function potential, demonstrated by their underpass/access projects in the works and their "district approach" to Victoria Park - we are really shaping up to have a good arena project regardless of what it will look like.

I don't want to say design and aesthetics are not important - just that all other cities seem to have booming concert, sport and event scenes with highly utilized facilities that aren't notably iconic but are just done well, integrated into prime locations. "Nicer" looking and more "Instagram friendly" should be absolute goals, but should never come before the location (as in Ottawa's case) and function (as in the Saddledome's case).
 

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