SUNDRE — The municipality plans to prepare an old school outdoor skating rink in the coming weeks.
In 2017, the council of the day supported a proposal by administration to proceed with the roughly $6,300 purchase of a collapsible, portable and storable outdoor rink system featuring 18-inch high boards that clip together. Partnerships and sponsorships also led to the installation of lights for night skating.
For the first time since then, the boards won’t be installed this season.
“We were very short of staff this year,” said Sue Nelson, director of community services.
“We’re not going to be able to put the boards up this year,” Nelson said last Wednesday (Dec. 15), adding her department has of late had only two staff members whose time was primarily preoccupied working at the Sundre Arena.
“We just didn’t have staff to go out and put the boards up. So, we’re going to do it the old fashioned way.”
That means clearing out the surface area, located next to the Sundre Skatepark adjacent to the Sundre Aquaplex’s parking lot, by shovelling the snow into mounds along the sides before beginning to flood, she said.
“We’re hoping some time this week, we can start,” she said.
However, she added the recent freezing weather conditions that have seen temperatures plunging nearly as low as -30 C have been too frigid to get started right away.
“It’s just too cold to try and make ice,” she said. “But we are going to try and get it going.”
Even so, Nelson anticipates the outdoor rink should be ready early in the new year.
