MILL CREEK PARK Officials consider options for ice-skating rink

Alternatives include a portable rink, synthetic ice and moving skating.
By PETER H. MILLIKEN
VINDICATOR STAFF WRITER
CANFIELD -- Mill Creek MetroParks commissioners can spend slightly more than $1 million to replace the closed ice rink and its equipment or choose from a list of cheaper, but more limited, skating options, park staff says.
The options are outlined in a 20-page draft report presented by Susan Dicken, park executive director, and other park staff to the commissioners last week.
"This is another opportunity where we need to continue evaluating what we have," Dicken told the board in her oral presentation.
Park officials closed the 35-year-old outdoor ice rink last year after discovering a coolant leak. A report from Mollenberg-Betz Inc. of Buffalo, N.Y., -- the original contractors -- recommended the rink not operate unless its entire concrete bed and 11 miles of coolant piping within it are replaced. The rink is in Mill Creek Park's Wick Recreation Area on Youngstown's West Side.
The $1,030,000 estimate from park staff for rink replacement includes replacing the 200-by-85 foot rink and all its cooling equipment, putting a roof over the rink to protect it from the elements, buying a new ice grooming machine and 300 new pairs of skates, and repairing the rink pavilion and making it handicap-accessible.
Alternatives
Park staff also presented these cheaper alternatives:
UInstall synthetic ice -- a plastic surface with silicon lubrication intended for indoor use -- at a cost of $255,000. Synthetic ice requires a 30- to 40-hour-a-week cleaning process.
UFlood the uneven, cracked concrete ice rink pad, resulting in inconsistent, weather-dependent quality and availability of ice. Park staff said it is difficult to maintain ice with a refrigeration unit, and nearly impossible without it.
UInstall and remove each season a $400,000, 60-by-120-foot portable ice rink mat, with piping in a sand bed and a trailer-mounted compressor system. Such portable rinks are typically used in urban downtowns, Dicken told the board.
UInstall a liner on a sand volleyball court; remove the net poles; and flood the court for a completely weather-dependent skating area.
UOpen the park's Lily Pond, weather permitting, for daylight skating only because there are no lights at the pond. Because the pond is shallow, it would have a better chance of freezing than other park lakes, Dicken said.
Drop in attendance
The park staff report notes a precipitous decline in attendance at the ice rink from 28,849 in 1995 to 7,019 in 2001, which park staff said could be from other activities and commitments competing for skaters' time.
The ice rink's average net annual operating loss in its final five years was $63,316 and amounted to $10 per skater in 2001, the report said. If the park spends $1 million on a new rink, "That's certainly going to be multiplied many times," said Park Commissioner Carl Nunziato. "It's very upsetting to see what kind of cost we're looking at."
If the concrete ice rink pad is removed, the board could face the unknown cost of removing earth contaminated with leaking glycol coolant, said Harry Meshel, board president.
milliken@vindy.com