if
it's about Cardiff..
Sport, Entertainment, Transportation, Business,
Development Projects, Leisure, Eating, Drinking,
Nightlife, Shopping, Train Spotting! etc.. then we want it here!
I'll tell you the problem with british ice hockey. London has no professional team. There is a few teams close to London but there abit far to travel for first timers. Birmingham has Solihull but it's on the edge and is semi pro. Coventry is not far away but again first timers may not want to travel. Other city's like Leeds, Liverpool and Leicester are in a similar position. And Manchester now play out of Altrincham Ice Dome which is much like what cardiff has right now and they play semi pro. So that's 1/4 of the population pretty much out before we start. Add to that a few other city's most towns and all villages and half the uk population isn't within 30 mins travel of a professional team. Then there is also the problem of bad seating, obstruted views and stands that make you feel separated from the game. Yes the Superleague failed i think the wage cap (£1m and 50k ) was 2 high to start with and that £900k was about right. The TV deal was poor £1million sounds good but the clubs had to pay for the filming ect and once everything was paid the clubs were only about £40k each better off. Also a problem was the diffrence in arena capacity/attendance. Manchester storm had 17245 capacity but some arena's had less then 2000 capacity. Then there was newcastle the problem there was the owner upset the durahm wasp fans so they refused to switch to newcastle when there rink was closed. But also from what i remember the arena at newcastle while new the seating was only on 3 sides ( like shefield). And so on
It will probably feel a bit weird for all the people walking around in their swimming costume behind the glass walls of the swimming pool with all those builders looking in at them for the next year and a bit...
It's been pretty much confirmed that there will be a London team playing out of Wemblry Arena from the 2015/2016 season onwards which is great news for the sport.
The biggest obstacle in my mind for the expansion of the sport is the people in charge. The Premier League (top league that the blue brazil played in last year) is run by the owners of the clubs and is separate to the rest of UK football. So while Premier League clubs co-operate with each other to a degree for the betterment of the league, they're ultimately looking after their own business first, rather than the sport in general.
Something new on site. Knowing next to nothing about building, I've no idea if this is of any significance.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/122778799@N03/
Slightly off topic. There is a 'meet the owners' event tomorrow night so there should be some more info on the Devils future soon.
Edited to add.....I notice Chris Hartrey (who will manage the new rink) has tweeted that the first steels have been delivered and will be erected tomorrow.
It's about time I did an update: The piledriver has gone and they then dug the foundations which were swiftly filled with concrete and now the steel girders have arrived as can be seen in the picture.
It's Friday so it's time for an update - the builders are really fast and there are only about 4 people building this - a crane driver, someone to attach the girders to the crane and two guys screwing it all together!
Yes, I should imagine we are looking at the outside wall/lobby area and a smaller wall that seperates the arena from the second ice pad. This would be for training and public use, so I imagine it would only be the width of an ice-rink, with no seating.
This is just the ice rink(s). The ski slope/hotel is a separate project entirely - I don't think any full planning apps have been submitted for the rest of it, so 2015 would be a real push for all that!
The steel structure proceeds apace and now I think they have finished the smaller rink. Presumably they will proceed with the next bigger one. This is going to be pretty huge!
I apologise for the quality of the picture but the sun was shining on the window