The Gold Coast’s ice hockey team is calling for a purpose built multi-sport facility for the city that incorporates ice sports.
It follows the cancellation of the national competition on Sunday due to rink safety concerns.
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The Gold Coast’s ice hockey team is calling for a purpose built multi-sport facility for the city that incorporates ice sports.
It follows the cancellation of the national competition on Sunday due to rink safety concerns.
I was lucky enough to play ice hockey in the eighties at the rink that was on the current Amart furniture site. A fabulous facility with both ice skating, roller skating and skate boarding, but as with all things Gold Coast the power of the mighty real estate dollar out wieghs the power of entertainment. The council and community cries out for more family friendly venues and tourist pulling venues but the minute it can be pulled down and rebuilt for better rent it goes. Sad.
It’s a great idea, but the Gold Coast simply does not have the fan base, or the population numbers with a desire to become such a fan base, to sustain such a facility.
The Titans are struggling to fill their stadium. The Suns are not looking too good. The G.C. Football team failed. If teams in much more popular sports can’t sustain numbers, how is a hockey team expected to? It’s not, and anybody who believes the Gold Coast can is deluded IMO.
Does S.E. Queensland need such a facility? For sure, but the Gold Coast is NOT the place to put it. Brisbane has the numbers, and a much broarder investor group to fund and fill this type of project.
The problem lies with the Gold Coast being such a transient population, of both residents and travellers. Many people living on the Gold Coast are originally from other places and still hold allegiance to sporting teams where they came from. Hence, the low numbers present at Gold Coast sporting events.
Sam, it is a great idea I agree. However I wouldn’t go as far as to say that there isn’t enough desire or want for better Ice Hockey facilities on the GC.
Your reference to the Titans struggling to fill the stadium lies possibly in the fact that they’ve made going to the footy (particularly for families) completely out of financial reach, and for that matter, value.
A trip to a Titans game is just too expensive – you’re looking at a minimum of $80 for half-decent seats for a family of 4 then the kiosks are simply highway robbery – $6 for a packet of chips?
The Blue Tongues on the other hand—kids were free entry last time I checked and a family ticket is $20. As a team they are doing their best, they are working hard to provide a sporting option for our youth and they’re doing a fantastic job.
Lets get behind the Blue Tongues instead of finding a way to discard a positive outlet for the GC!
The Gold Coast has a family owned, and run, Ice Rink that has been bringing the joy of Ice Skating to Gold Coasters for over 17 years. It accommodates General sessions, Figure Skating, Ice Dancing and Ice Hockey. It opens seven days a week, for most of the day to get these different events happening. People come to this rink, some of them six days a week, because they love two things. Ice Sports and the Gold Coast. The rink might not be the Multi-Million dollar facility that Melbourne has but it is here and it is ours. Obviously Melbourne have forgotten where they were skating a couple of years ago? And if the Blue Tongues don’t want to play here maybe they should look at moving to Brisbane? ? ? ?
Acacia Ridge just went through a renovation. When the Tongues were in Bundall, they had great fan support. Whatever the reasons for leaving the north side of Brisbane, if they move to Acacia Ridge, they’re geographically closer to the fans in the Gold Coast, close to Brisbane, and in a much better facility.
Neil, that’s correct. A.R. provides a menu that caters for both the Gold Coast and Brisbane. The fan support in Brisbane was phenominal, and has not been anywhere near like that since they moved to the Coast.
Also JLB, while the cost of a Tongues game is well priced now, they would not remain that way if a facility was built. The Melbourne Ice games cost $22.50 for an adult I believe, which was a big increase from when they played at Oakleigh. A facility is a great idea, but to an extent things like ticket prices would be governed by the rink, and not the team. For example, the Melbourne Ice game ticket prices are determined by the rink, not the Ice management. Even if they wanted to offer them cheaper, they couldn’t.
As for the Titans, last i looked their tickets were pretty similar to other NRL teams, so the argument of overpriced tickets is a moot point. Other clubs around the country don’t have problems filling stadiums, but the Titans do.
So I have just read the post and it states that the gold coast ice rink has “dangerous ice and board conditions”. I have a few problems with this statement, first of all I can’t personally see what was wrong about the ice condition? As some of you might not have already realised, ice is actually made of water. Being in a climate that is both humid and hot definitely makes the upkeep of a rink much harder, as well as the fact that the rink has been opened for over 17 years now without any government funding. As discussed at the game much higher level teams in Canada and other countries have played in the same or worse ice condition with no complaint. As it is a fact that with rapid temperature and use of the ice surface changes the condition of the ice can slightly deteriorate, creating a layer of thin water over the top. Apart from that the ice was examined pregame for any major problems to do with the level and evenness of the ice.
And about the boards, that the bluetongues had broken at the game held on the previous night, why was it left to the ice rink to fix this problem should it not have been fixed or paid to fix prior to the next game, or maybe at lest checked by the team managers before the game? Why was the game even started if the board conditions were “so bad”, shouldn’t the refs checked the condition before allowing the players on the ice? When the problem was a raised at the end of the first period, the problem was then fixed and returned to a safe state, so why did the game get called off? As well as this two other games of hockey were played with no changes to the ice or boards with no problems or complaints. From what I have heard, the rink that Melbourne ice used to play at was in a far worse condition. Are they seriously saying that now they have new rink they can bring down all the other rinks? Aren’t they trying to keep their sport afloat? Its bad enough anyway that Australia lost every game in the IIFH world cup Division 1 group B Draw?
The last point that I would like to make is that Dave Emblem, (Manager of the Bluetongues ice hockey team) had gone to the local and state-wide news to state how he would like to build a new rink, I don’t believe that he truly knows and understands the level of commitment and cost to build and run a ice rink of any acceptable size. Or why didn’t he mention that it was actually his team that had broken the boarding that was not fixed at the time of the game? From what my understanding is the Blue tongues and Grizzly’s hockey club (of which Dave Emblem is also the president) both have the right to apply for government grants to invest in the ice rink and better the conditions that they play in. However the rink has had no major improvements made by these clubs, the countless times that statements had been made saying that the clubs would contribute to the major development of the rink has sadly never happened and the rink is put in the wrong for something that is not true.
The comment was made in the article posted on the Bluetongues Facebook page.
Roy can I ask were you actually at the game on Sunday? I was and yes the referees made the correct call, the condition of the ice at the Bundall rink was not in a safe state for a national league ice hockey game.
Most of worst of the ice was on outer side (opposite the the limited seating) which saw highly skilled skaters from both sides struggle to keep their feet and it was fast making the game unplayable.
The broken board in shown in the report was not broken on Saturday, it occurred on Sunday and was one of the final incidents of the game.
Shame that Bundall rink is the only one on the Gold Coast, a well located quality rink would be a great success in my opinion.
Gold Coast is the wrong place for hockey, they need to relocate this team to brisbane asap, it will never get the numbers that syd or melb get.
It’s funny now that anyone associated with the rink is blamming the bluetongues for apparently trashing the place. The only improvements that I have notice at that place over the past few years are things that the team have donated their time to do. As for the comment in the bulletin regarding providing a safe place, what a joke! The stands are an accident waiting to happen, the ice surface is tougher than the gravel carpark outside and about as wavey as surfers paradise beach and the hygiene is def lacking. I can’t remember the last time I saw any soap in the female toilet. Seriously
Stop trying to run the teams name into the ground.