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Rogers Arena

Coordinates: 49°16′40″N 123°6′32″W / 49.27778°N 123.10889°W / 49.27778; -123.10889
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General Motors Place
(Canada Hockey Place for 2010 Winter Olympics)
The Garage
File:GMPlacelogo.svg
A grey building with two distincive sections. The section on the left curves in a circular manner away from the viewer. The lower half is composed of windows. The section on the right is shaped like a square and has windows only in the bottom-left corner. A yellow circle and two jagged green shapes resembling triangles are at the top-right of the square building, with the words General Motors Place written in white capitals directly beneath. Several skysrapers are visible in the background.
Map
Location800 Griffiths Way, Vancouver, British Columbia V6B 6G1
Coordinates49°16′40″N 123°6′32″W / 49.27778°N 123.10889°W / 49.27778; -123.10889
OwnerCanucks Sports & Entertainment
OperatorCanucks Sports & Entertainment
CapacityIce hockey: 18,810 [1]
Basketball: 19,700
Concert: 19,000
Construction
OpenedThursday, September 21,1995
Construction costC$160 million
ArchitectBrisbin, Brook and Beynon
Tenants
Vancouver Canucks (NHL) (1995-present)
Vancouver Grizzlies (NBA) (1995-2001)
Vancouver Ravens (NLL) (2001-2004)
Vancouver Voodoo (RHI) (1996)
2010 Winter Olympics (ice hockey venue)

General Motors Place, currently known as Canada Hockey Place (French: Place Hockey du Canada[2]) for the 2010 Winter Olympics and commonly known as GM Place and nicknamed The Garage, is an indoor sports arena, located at 800 Griffiths Way in Downtown Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. The arena is home to the Vancouver Canucks of the National Hockey League. The arena is sponsored by General Motors Canada. As corporate sponsors are unable to brand sporting venues during the Olympics, GM Place has been temporarily renamed Canada Hockey Place for the 2010 Winter Olympic Games, in February 2010.[3]

The arena seats 18,810 for ice hockey and 19,700 for basketball. It has 88 luxury suites, 12 hospitality suites, and 2,195 club seats.

History

GM Place was completed in 1995 at a cost of C$160 million in private financing to replace the aging Pacific Coliseum as the main venue for events in Vancouver and to serve as the home arena to the Vancouver Canucks of the National Hockey League and the Vancouver Grizzlies of the National Basketball Association. The Grizzlies spent six seasons in Vancouver before moving to Memphis, Tennessee for the 2001-02 season.

The arena was briefly home to the Vancouver Ravens of the National Lacrosse League from 2002 to 2004. The operations of the team have since been suspended. Attempts were made to revive the team in 2007 and again in 2008.

The employees of the arena belong to a trade union. In 2007, they chose to change their union affiliation from Unite Here - Local 40 to the Christian Labour Association of Canada. After many months of struggle the British Columbia Labour Relations Board declared the employees choice of a new union. The employee group includes hosts, housekeeping, security and various event staff at GM Place. UNITE-HERE local 40 still represents food service workers in GM Place, they are employed by Aramark.

Entertainment upgrades

The scoreboard and ring display during the 2007 playoffs.

In mid-2006 GM Place was upgraded with a ProAd LED ribbon board encircling the upper bowl and shortly thereafter with a $5 million Daktronics ProStar LED scoreboard. The original Mitsubishi Mark IV displays needed to be removed since the worldwide supply of replacement parts was not large enough to keep them operating throughout the 2006-2007 hockey season.

The new LED scoreboard is built around four of the largest video displays in the NHL. Measuring 13.5 feet (4.1 m) by 24 feet (7.3 m) they are capable of displaying widescreen images in 14-bit colours. Their size combined with their 10 mm pixel spacing gives them an image that is unrivaled in any NHL arena. The corners hold 5.5-foot (1.7 m) by 13.5-foot (4.1 m) displays with two ring displays each capping the top and bottom. The entire scoreboard weighs 49,000 lbs, 2% less than the one it replaced.[4][5] The normally three-week assembly period was completed in only one week and as a result there were some minor technical difficulties during the first home game.

Proposed expansion

A proposal exists to adjoin a 22 storey, 312,000-square-foot (29,000 m2) office tower to the arena.[4] The building will accommodate office space, with a proposed connection from the stadium concourse to the lobby of the tower. The extra concourse space would also accommodate additional fan-oriented areas such as concessions and food outlets.

Past major events

T-Pain performed a concert at the venue in January 2009.

Future major events

Wikimedia Commons has media related to General Motors Place.
  • GM Place will host the ice hockey events in the 2010 Winter Olympic Games. These will be the first Olympic games to use NHL-sized ice. This decision was made in order to maximize the potential crowds and revenue, instead of building a smaller, temporary venue with the international-size ice surface, as has been done for most other Winter Games. On July 2, 2003, 18,000 came to GM Place to hear the announcement that Vancouver was awarded the games[7]. The Arena will be renamed to Canada Hockey Place for the 2010 Games.
  • GM Place is expected to host UFC 115 on June 12, 2010, which will be the first Canadian UFC event held outside of Montreal. [8]

References

  1. ^ Kelowna.com Blue Jackets trounce Canucks 5-3. Retrieved on October 6, 2009.
  2. ^ Official Vancouver 2010 website Template:Fr
  3. ^ Canada Hockey Place - Venues - Vancouver 2010
  4. ^ a b "Canucks Insider". Canucks.com. Retrieved 31 October 2006. {{cite web}}: Unknown parameter |dateformat= ignored (help) Cite error: The named reference "Canucks.com" was defined multiple times with different content (see the help page).
  5. ^ "Canucks Insider". Canucks.com. Retrieved 31 October 2006. {{cite web}}: Unknown parameter |dateformat= ignored (help)
  6. ^ http://www.oasisfanatic.com/gigography/oasis/concert/0/696.html
  7. ^ CBC Clip of the Announcement
  8. ^ http://mmajunkie.com/news/17449/ufc-officials-choose-june-12-for-vancouver-event-ufc-115.mma
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