Halifax 2011 Canada Games

Summer is construction season. But it’s not all roads and residential renovations

Several building projects for the 2011 Canada Winter Games, from February 11-27, 2011, are already underway. These improvements will allow Nova Scotia, the proud host of the games, to not only meet each of the 20 Canada Winter Games sports’ requirements, but to offer everyday Nova Scotians updated facilities to enjoy their favourite sports and to lead active lives.
 
“After all this is said and done, and the games are over, we want to leave as much infrastructure as possible so that athletes, particularly young athletes, have a place to train and a place to compete,” says Jean-Paul Deveau, chair of the board of directors for the games. “It’s also important infrastructure for the recreation community to develop sports in Nova Scotia.”
 
To begin with, there’s the new Canada Games Centre on Halifax’s Mainland Common, which will host artistic gymnastics, synchronized swimming and badminton.
 
Other sites are receiving important upgrades to existing structures and equipment, such as  the working going on at St. Margaret’s Centre in the Halifax Regional Municipality (HRM). “One of the ice surfaces there is being converted from a North American ice surface to an international ice surface in order [for us] to have a permanent facility for short-track speed-skating,” explains Deveau.
 
Two other examples of sites receiving upgrades are the Tower at Saint Mary’s University, which will be used for squash, and the Dartmouth Sportsplex, which will be the site for hockey.
 
The 2011Canada Winter Games has a budget of $46 million. All three levels of government provided a total of $36 million in financial support. The host society will raise the remaining $10 million on its own through corporate sponsorships.
 
That budget covers both capital and operating costs. When asked if the construction is on time and on budget, Deveau replies, “Absolutely.”
 
Roughly $7.5 million, according to games CEO Chris Morrissey, is funding improvements at Nova Scotia’s two major ski hills, Ski Martock and Ski Wentworth.
 
In large part, the investment is increasing snowmaking capacity at both venues. “We could have had a more grandiose plan, like bringing in new ski lodges, but we didn’t,” Morrissey says. “We looked at the core things we had to do that also made good business sense for the business owners, and that was mainly increasing snowmaking capacity.”
 
For Leslie Wilson, general manager and president at Ski Wentworth, efficient snowmaking is “essential in our Maritime climate.” She says it also means getting more trails open faster and before the Christmas season.
 
“The snowmaking system at Ski Wentworth will be doubled from its existing capacity,” explains Wilson. “This includes new snowmaking pumps and compressors, plus more snow guns on Canada Games venues.”
 
Wentworth will host the alpine and freestyle ski events. Doug Sutherland, committee chair of Freestyle Nova Scotia, is excited about the work being done there. “At Wentworth there’ll be a mogul course which is great for our kids because there currently isn’t one here,” he says. “So we’ll have a regulation mogul course that our kids can train on.”
 
“It means our athletes will be more competitive in 2011 and beyond,” adds Sutherland. “Having these training facilities, the benefit is that our athletes will become more competitive with kids around the country.”
 
Besides moguls, new trail development at Ski Wentworth includes new aerials venues. Enhancements to existing trails include the alpine trail and halfpipe.
 
Martock will host the games’ snowboarding events. Its halfpipe is being converted to a larger superpipe, while a course is being widened and contoured for snowboard cross, says Andy MacLean, Martock’s operations manager.
 
Like Wilson, MacLean says snowmaking tops the list because it will allow Martock to open its terrain earlier for athletes-in-training and seasonal enthusiasts. “Snowmaking is definitely our biggest priority,” he points out.“It always has been and always will be.”
 
Expansions to the snowmaking system, notes MacLean, includes a new water pump, renovated pump house, more and bigger pipelines and added tower guns.
 
As the venue for cross-country (including biathlon), Martock’s acreage of trails will double, while a new stadium where athletes in both sports will train and compete is also being built.
 
“Hosting the 2011 Canada Winter Games in Nova Scotia is tremendously exciting for biathlon given we are the only province without a biathlon facility,” says Murray Wylie, president of Biathlon Nova Scotia. 
 
“Ski Martock will become our provincial training centre. This legacy will have a significant impact on the development of our challenging Olympic sport.”
 
Chris Morrissey says just over half of Canada’s national Olympic team that competed at the 2006 Winter Olympic Games (not to mention the Summer Games in Beijing in 2008) went through the Canada Games system. “We’re the feeder system to the Olympic program,” Morrissey says. 
That said, future Olympians will come to compete on Nova Scotia’s soil – or snow – in 2011. Already, there’s been a snowboarder from Martock competing in every halfpipe event since the Olympic Winter Games in Nagano in 1998, according to Andy MacLean. That’s an amazing legacy that will be sure to continue, and to grow, at these upcoming Canada Winter Games in Nova Scotia.