Fear, frustration and failing infrastructure in Elliot Lake
CBC
It's a rainy October evening and parents are hauling giant hockey bags into the Massey Arena for the weekly practice of the Under 11 rep team.
It seems like a normal northern Ontario scene, but these parents and kids are all with the minor hockey association in Elliot Lake, a 45- minute drive away.
"It's a little bit strange. I'm not going to lie," said Kate Wannan, the association's scheduler, sitting in the stands watching her son on the ice.
"It's strange, but also a relief."
Wannan scrambled to find ice time for the 100 young hockey players after Elliot Lake's only arena was suddenly shutdown in September out of fears the 55-year-old wooden structure could collapse and is happy they found a way to "keep a hockey community going."
"I'm just a little bit more tired, just more time on the road. And so far it's OK, I'm just a little bit nervous about the winter," she said.
"For me it's more like the time budget and I do lots of stuff in town and I might have to sacrifice some of the things that i do for this."
The Centennial Arena is just the latest on the list of buildings in the city of 11,000 to fail in recent years.
The deadly collapse of the Algo Centre Mall in 2012 made international headlines, followed in 2019 by another roof cave-in at the Pearson Centre, which housed the city's theatre, art gallery and museum.
And for more than a year, the municipal swimming pool has been closed for repairs.
"They're surprises, but they're not surprises. We just can't have any more. We want to know what's happening. The community needs answers," said Chantal Robert from the Elliot Lake Skating Club, who is also doing the drive to Massey twice a week.
"It has created a fear in all of us. Like even if they restrengthen the structure, I'm not sure I'm going to feel 100 per cent safe in there."
Elliot Lake city council voted last week to spend some $300,000 to shore up the arena, but that is just so engineers can go in safely to assess the structure and determine if it can be saved.
It's been well known that Centennial Arena was reaching the end of its life. It was closed for a time in the early 1980s and then five years ago, the city did repairs in the hopes the rink would last long enough for plans for a new multi-million dollar recreation hub to come together.