Editor:
We’ve had Linda Hepner’s Ferris wheel, offering a view of everything the city actually needs. Then Doug McCallum brought us Venice-on-the-Fraser with his canal plan. Now Brenda Locke wants a 10,000-seat arena. Who, exactly, is all this for?
Metro Vancouver already has more than enough event venues. BC Place, Rogers Arena, and the Pacific Coliseum are well-established spots for major concerts and sports. Out in the valley, the Langley Events Centre and the Abbotsford Centre handle smaller-scale events just fine.
Meanwhile, no professional teams are wandering around homeless looking for a home. A 10,000-seat arena would be too small for the Vancouver Canucks and too large for the Abbotsford Canucks. It lands in a strange no-man’s land of “not quite enough” and “way too much.”
Abbotsford, for example, continues to spend millions in public funds each year to support its arena, which has yet to break even, even with a professional team in place. Surrey, on the other hand, would be committing significant taxpayer money to build a venue without a confirmed tenant in a market already saturated with more established arenas that consistently draw major acts.
So again, who is this arena really for? If it is for the residents, then we need to talk about priorities. Surrey still lacks the number of libraries a city its size should have. Community centres like the one promised for Newton have been delayed for years. Public safety continues to be a concern, and we need more officers and services to keep pace with a rapidly growing population.
We do not need another mayor’s legacy project designed to make headlines. We need investments that actually make Surrey a better place to live.
Rob Mumford, Surrey
