The Moose-Heat games are all sellouts, but other Heat games generally garner half the attendance of those games. IMO, the location of the rink is a poor choice, and the parking is woefully inadequate. Yes, it's just off the freeway, but the exit is poorly designed, and it's a pain in the butt to get to the arena. I attended a Heat-Moose game last season, and it took over an hour to get through the ridiculous traffic and into a parking spot. Combine that with over an hour drive to get there, and that's a lot of time and gas wasted, just for an AHL game.
Also, being so far in the valley, they are unlikely to draw crowds from Vancouver, Burnaby, Richmond, etc. Abbotsford does have some population, but it's mostly farmland out there in the valley, low density population on average. The fact that it's the AHL franchise of arguably the Canuck's most bitter rival doesn't help matters, either.
The Moose and the Heat should just switch buildings, IMO. Keep the team names and locations, but switch the personnel. Winnipeg is already a well established AHL market, and the Heat would take off if they were the "baby Canucks".
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