Rideau Canal Opens For Skating On Sunday After Year Off | CBC News

Ottawa

Rideau Canal Skateway opening delayed to Sunday afternoonAfter last winter’s skating season was cancelled due to warm, wet weather, a stretch of the iconic Ottawa winter attraction will open Sunday at 9 a.m., the National Capital Commission says.

Iconic Ottawa attraction will open for skating at 12:30 p.m. after a year offCBC News

· Posted: Jan 20, 2024 3:41 PM EST | Last Updated: 1 hour ago

One of the first skaters of the season takes to the Rideau Canal in 2018. The 2024 season is about to launch. (Christian Milette/Radio-Canada)After nearly 700 days without proper ice, the Rideau Canal is opening for skating again.

After announcing the skateway would open on 9 a.m. on Sunday, the National Capital Commission (NCC) published an update on their website that said the skateway will open slightly later at 12:30 p.m.

“The Skateway needs a bit more time to fully freeze after overnight flooding,” the NCC said in a post on X, formerly known as Twitter.

According to the NCC, the public will be able to skate on a section between Fifth Avenue and Bank Street.

BeaverTails kiosks will also be open, but skate rentals are not yet available, the NCC said.

In a statement, NCC CEO Tobi Nussbaum said he was “thrilled” that the skateway’s 54th season would soon be underway.

“Our team learned a lot from the challenges we faced last year and were able to put measures in place, helped by more seasonal temperatures, to make it happen this year,” he said.

SHARPEN YOUR SKATES! 🙌🎉

We’re putting the final touches on the ice, and the long-awaited green flag is going up on a 1.9 km section between the Pretoria Bridge and Bank Street at 9:00am tomorrow, Jan 21.

Details: https://t.co/ByQ8nBbgwb | #OttNews pic.twitter.com/PVyrElSpFW

—@NCC_SkatewayLast year’s warm, wet winter meant the 7.8-kilometre skateway didn’t open at all for the first time in its more than 50-year history. The lack of Ottawa’s iconic icy pastime was an economic and cultural blow for the area.

There have been years of warnings about climate change shortening the skating season, as well as years of efforts by the NCC to do something about it.

COVID-19 rules also hung over the canal in the two most recent skating seasons.

The ice needs to be at least 30 centimetres thick before the canal can open safely — and even thicker if the quality is poor.

People crowd the Rideau Canal on Family Day 2019. (Sean Kilpatrick/The Canadian Press)Weather station will collect dataWhile this winter started out mild as well, colder temperatures over the past two weeks combined with “excellent work” by NCC crews means there’s a stretch that’s now thick enough for safe public skating, the commission said in its statement.

Skaters will also notice a weather station collecting environmental data this year, the NCC said.

That data will be used to “calibrate numerical models predicting climate change effects on the skateway’s performance and resilience,” according to their statement.

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