On Saturday night, the Toronto Rock returned home to Hamilton (man, that’s a weird sentence) and the Rock faithful were finally able to see the extent of the renovations that forced the team to play in Mississauga last season. I had been looking forward to this for a while. The First Ontario Centre (formerly Copps Coliseum) was opened in the 80’s and was looking a little worn, so having a brand new state-of-the-art facility in downtown Hamilton was going to be exciting. But I have to say that the results were… underwhelming.

Dark

My first impression was that they’d spent many millions of dollars on this renovation, so the least they could do was to buy a few extra light bulbs. The concourse is dark. It was dark outside when we arrived – being mid-December, sunset was around 4:45pm and we didn’t arrive until after 6pm. So no natural light is to be expected at that time, but the place was still very dim. The walls and ceiling are all black (or very dark grey), so it was just dark everywhere.

I think the concourse was narrower than before as well because it felt really crowded. Like, “Rogers Centre during a Blue Jays playoff run” crowded. If the reported attendance of around 5,700 was accurate, that’s just a bit more than what the Paramount Fine Foods Centre holds, and Paramount didn’t feel nearly as crowded last year as TD Coliseum on Saturday.

Squishy

We found our seats and immediately noticed the next problem – the seats are either narrower or closer together, or possibly both. I felt a little more squashed than I remember feeling pre-reno. The seats are padded and there are cup holders in front of each seat, and those additions are very nice. Come to think of it, there may have been cup holders before the reno and I’m remembering the lack of cup holders in the Paramount centre. The seats themselves were quite comfortable, other than the squashed feeling I mentioned. I didn’t notice a problem with leg room but I’m maybe 5'10", so the 6'3" folks in the crowd may have felt differently.

The view from our new seats

Carpet

The carpet on the floor was also brand new. The league has gone with new carpet technology in a few barns now – rather than huge rolls of carpet that are difficult to place properly (because they’re freakin’ heavy), the floor is now made up of hundreds (no idea how many) square pieces that fit together. The sides (i.e. the long axis of the rink) of the floor looked pretty good, in that the carpet wasn’t bunched up like it sometimes used to be, but in the corners and behind the net (see the picture above), it didn’t fit so well. I also saw a number of players slipping on it, but I’ve heard that about this new turf in other places as well.

Parking

The arena is attached to a large indoor mall called Jackson Square, and there is an underground parking garage directly under Jackson Square. But even after the renovations, there is no way to access the parking garage from the arena. You have to leave the arena and try to find an unlocked door into the (closed) mall. Sometimes such doors are hard to find, and a couple of times I’ve had to walk down the access ramp, which is dangerous. Of course, there may be good reasons why they couldn’t add such an access, but it’s still frustrating to have an underground parking garage right there and be unable to use it.

And to add insult to injury, the outdoor parking garage down the street used to be operated by the City of Hamilton, and there was an app you could use to pay for parking. If I remember correctly, it was $12–15 to park there. Not cheap, but it was covered and only a five minute walk from the arena. Now it’s run by some other company and it’s $25, with the additional limitation that you can only park on the third floor and above. We talked to one parking attendant who said sometimes it’ll be limited to the fifth floor and up. I will have to reconsider parking there, but I’m not sure what better options there are.

Positives

My “review” sounds entirely negative but there were some positives. Like I said, the seats were reasonably comfortable if squishy. My 5G connection had trouble with data but there was an open WiFi that worked nicely. I had a sausage with onions that was very good. The video board above the floor isn’t as big as others I’ve seen, but it was bigger and better quality than the one that was there before. This one is (gasp) high-definition! The concourse was dark but the lighting in the arena itself was fine. And of course, this new arena features CJ Kirst, Owen Hiltz, and Sam English, which the previous one didn’t.