With a couple extra days off between games, leave it to the Ottawa Senators to make sure we have lots of things to talk about.
On Monday they fired the head coach, on Tuesday they introduced the new guy and today, they are talking about moving their rink downtown. Never a dull moment around these parts.
Although the process remains in the very early stages, an article posted in the Ottawa Citizen website last night suggests that the Ottawa Senators are looking at LeBreton Flats as a potential location for a new arena. According to the article, Senators Sports and Entertainment Group are seriously considering submitting a proposal to the National Capital Commission sometime in the next month or so. Now obviously this is a long term type thing but certainly encouraging that the Senators are at least giving it some consideration.
Like many things in this city of ours, this would be anything but a straightforward process, with a number of hurdles to clear along the way. Combine that with all the recent renovations and upgrades to the Canadian Tire Centre and we are likely looking at an 8-10 year timeline for this process. And that’s if things go smoothly. With that said, the possibility of a centrally located rink, driving business to the Downtown Core, is certainly something that long time residents (most of them anyway) would certainly be excited abut.
For years, fans have complained about the location of the rink. It makes getting to and from the game trickier than it would be in most cities and apparently, discourages a lot of would be hockey fans from regularly attending NHL games. A question I’ve heard probably 500 times since starting this site is, “Why didn’t the Senators build the rink at LeBreton Flats?!” Obviously there’s a very good explanation for why they ended up in Kanata but that doesn’t mean they have to stay there forever.
A process like this would be ridiculously complicated (and maybe impossible with the NCC calling the shots) but it’s a good sign that the Senators have at least put the wheels in motion. The catch obviously is that they “feel very strongly that this could only be possible with strong community support.”
Ya, this could take awhile.
