[Senator Clay Davis]

Lol at this being printed the day after sureLoss with the April Fools article.

The Calgary Flames’ vision for its new arena project is a blockbuster that would take up several blocks’ worth of prime land west of downtown — bringing together a new hockey arena plus a football stadium and an amateur sports fieldhouse, the Herald has learned.

It’s a megaproject that could easily cost more than half a billion dollars, and features a component more likely to draw in civic funding support than if it were merely new stand-alone homes for the Flames and Stampeders.

By bundling in a fieldhouse designed for track meets, indoor soccer and other amateur sports, Flames CEO Ken King is proposing to build something on the top of the city’s own project wish list, and potentially gives the proposal the sort of public benefit that Mayor Naheed Nenshi has said is essential if city hall is to become a project partner.

The indoor multi-sport complex could make the Flames project more “palatable” to the city, said Jason Zaran, incoming chairman of the Calgary Multisport Fieldhouse Society.

“A multi-sport facility is needed in this town, and I think if they can be the ones to bring it to the table and get it done, it looks good on them as well,” Zaran said.

His group has been working with the city’s recreation department on a $202-million, publicly-funded development at Foothills Athletic Park, just north of McMahon Stadium. In February, city staff ranked it at the top of the city’s unfunded infrastructure projects.

King has offered the fieldhouse society a tantalizing Plan B — constructing the facility as part of the stadium for the Canadian Football League team, which the Flames own. According to one source familiar with the plans, the football complex and fieldhouse would be part of the same convertible building.

King shared his plans with Nenshi in mid-March, then the mayor relayed it to council in a closed-door session Monday evening, multiple sources have confirmed. But there’s still no formal proposal submitted to council, and it’s unclear when King will finally reveal the ambitious concept to the public, though he did say a month ago the release was a “couple of weeks” away.

But of course...

In a voicemail Wednesday, King said he’s not yet prepared to discuss the proposal, which he’s been working on since at least 2007.

“I’m still in the quiet zone,” he said.

http://calgaryherald.com/news/local-...r-sports-house