THUNDER BAY — Most of the City of Thunder Bay’s outdoor skating rinks are expected to close later this week.
While the waterfront rink is expected to last until the end of March, the city believes, based on the weather forecast, that the rest of the city's outdoor rinks will likely close for the season by Thursday or Friday.
Before the warmer weekend weather, the city said the rinks would remain open for March Break.
However, above zero temperatures have put a damper on that plan, with spring temperatures of 5 C and above from Thursday to Saturday, according to Environment Canada.
Cory Halvorsen, the manager of the City of Thunder Bay’s parks and open spaces, said it’s nice to see the rinks are still operational into the March break, but the city is definitely in a reduced program level right now due to the warm temperatures.
“A few of them are hanging on still. It’s been a tough go the last few days, especially through the end of the weekend,” said Halvorsen.
“But they were still in use, some of the sites, through the weekend and then this week, it looks like we’ll have one or two more days.”
As of Monday afternoon, the city’s eight supervised sites are open for boots-only use due to them being too soft for skating.
However, Halvorsen added that with nighttime temperatures dipping down quite low, the city should be able to flood those sites tonight, which would mean that supervised rinks should be skateable Tuesday.
“With the temperatures into this evening and tomorrow, we’ll see those firm up, so most of our supervised sites, those eight should be going,” said Halvorsen.
Conditions are situational and vary between locations, explained Halvorson, who recommends checking the status of each rink on the city's website.
“Some of the sites (that) get a little less sun, maybe held up a little bit better, so we’re keeping an eye on all of them and updating the conditions on the web map accordingly,” said Halvorsen.
He added some of the sites that have concrete pads as their base also seem to hold up a little bit better, including the Dease Street and North Neebing sites.
The Prince Arthur’s Landing Ice Rink is also still going strong with the refrigerated ice system there, said Halvorsen.
“If you’re looking for a spot that is going to have sort of a guarantee that the ice is there right now, that’s the site,” said Halvorsen.
Halvorsen said the city will update the status of those rinks on its Outdoor Rinks Map as it can in real-time.
“We’re going to keep moving them along as far as we can day by day through the March break,” said Halvorsen.
He encourages everyone to get their last chance at the outdoor rinks program this week and the city looks forward to next year’s season.
