Winter appears to be here to stay and the City of Barrie has two popular outdoor spots ready for skating.
The Circle at the Centre ice rink, in front of Barrie City Hall on Collier Street, has been open since last weekend. The city hall ice is for pleasure skating only, while the newly named Will Dwyer Park Community Ice Rink, located near Centennial Beach, is for people looking to get a game of hockey in. The Will Dwyer rink opens on Saturday.
Joe Breedon, the city's outdoor recreation facility co-ordinator, not only grew up on the ice in Barrie, but he now tends to it as the Zamboni driver, too.
“It's pretty cool, I’ll admit. When you’re doing laps on the ice, people tend to watch — it's such a Canadian thing I guess,” Breedon told BarrieToday. “Kids will be waving and heads turn when the machine comes out. I enjoy it but we are pretty busy right now.”
The names of the machines differ as Zamboni is a brand, as is Olympia, both of which are used by city staff to create a fresh sheet.
There are about 12 ice-surfacing machines for the city's five arenas, which contain eight ice rinks, as well as seven outdoor rinks.
The city hall rink is the only pad that has a Zamboni-style machine. The Dwyer Park rink still needs maintenance and it has a special technique.
“The infrastructure isn’t there for hot water, so we have to bring some down with a couple booster pumps," Breedon said. "That obviously brings a few challenges — we have to get the vehicle to transport it and time it properly with the snow falling as it is pretty tricky to resurface when the snow falls because it leaves bumps."
The Circle at the Centre and Will Dwyer Park rinks are cleared by staff every morning to open at 10 a.m., including weekends. Shovels are kept on site at Will Dwyer Park for skaters to keep the surface clear of snow during the day, because the city does not have permanent staff at that location on Lakeshore Drive.
The city’s other outdoor rinks — Redpath, Lampman, Holly, Eastview, and Shear — are maintained Monday to Friday between 7:30 a.m. and 4 p.m.
Breedon may be an employee for the city since 2007, but after handling the outdoor rinks since 2014, he knows who his real boss is: Mother Nature.
“I always say that everyone has a boss, but my direct boss is the weather as it dictates everything I do,” he said. “Plan A never really happens with the elements constantly shifting and changing how I do what needs to get done.”
