Deal seems fine to me for Calgarians given the provincial contribution. The cheaper way to do this was going to be the Olympics route and the citizens turned that down.
For reference to get the Saddledome built the following was paid:
the Olympic Saddledome was funded entirely by three levels of government – $31.5 million from the City of Calgary, $31.5 million from the Government of Alberta and $29.7 million from the Government of Canada – and the Olympic organizing committee ($5 million).
In today's dollars that roughly $300M just for the structure without considering land inflation/other inflated costs not tied to the CPI.
The Saddledome was never funded by an NHL team and it will be interesting to see the full fiscal terms of the rent agreements but they don't look different than what most NHL teams are doing.
Add in the infrastructure we are getting, the upside to an entertainment district, community arena and event center and I am pretty sold.
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