Curling club waits anxiously

CORNER BROOK - A wall intended to reserve two-fifths of the ice shed in the Recplex for use as a storage area for the new owners - Sir Wilfred Grenfell College - may not be the great solution it was once thought to be.

The sale of the city-owned building to the university was announced recently and included a deal between the college and its newly acquired tenants - the Corner Brook Curling Club - which would see the club able to operate for the 2008-2009 season. The deal was like a beacon in the darkness for the local curling club, who could potentially have had no curling at all this year.

The original deal involved the curling club retaining the use of the three sheets of ice nearest the ice plant on the University Drive side of the building. A wall would be erected to separate the other two sheets with that space to be used as a storage room for the university.

George Spracklin, the president of the club, knows the situation is less than ideal, but he is glad to have the opportunity given the situation he and his membership are in. His priority is doing whatever can be done to help the club have some place to play this winter.

He understands that the college needs the space and praised them for being so forthright in declaring their intentions.

"I am eternally grateful that they were upfront with us," he said.

Spracklin expects the club will be asked to share in the cost of the wall which, after a recent visit from the fire chief, will be prohibitive in terms of building the wall.

"We are talking a wall that is 150 feet long and 15 -18 feet high," he approximated and thought it would cost well over $10,000. "Walls like that don't come cheap. I don't have final figures, but it is well into the teens. We are not prepared to get into anything like that."

Meanwhile, Spracklin and the rest of the curling community are waiting with "bated breath" to see what will happen.

If the wall is eventually built, there is no guarantee that it will actually be a workable solution. It is likely that the refrigeration tubes in the floors will need to be cut and modified.

"Can we make a cold floor next to a warm floor?" Spracklin wondered. "What is the impact if they don't build a full wall and we have all kinds of heat coming out over the top. It is an ice-maker's nightmare."

Still, Spracklin is optimistic, he said if the wall cannot be built the club would be willing to give up the lounge area for five sheets of ice.

"I would just like to sit a little bit and see what comes back," he said.

Beyond this winter, Spracklin is looking forward to a prosperous future - once they come up with a million dollars to build a new club. The site for the club is next to the Blomidon Golf and Country Club.

"Our proposal is out there and it is a very good proposal and I'm hoping that someone in one of the governments will take a look at it and say 'it looks good,'" he said, though he still wonders why the club has to do all the work, including coming up with a million dollars over and above the $280,000 the city has agreed to pay, when other sites are established by the city and then operated by community groups on user pay system.

"We are more than willing to pay our own way," he said. "You have Jubilee Field, the soccer pitch and the Pepsi Centre and everybody pays to use them, but we are expected to build a curling club."