Community faces great opportunities

The Windsor-West Hants community faces a number of positive and potentially great developments – two of which are detailed in this week’s The Hants Journal.

The Hockeyland dream is coming true with $200,000 provincial funding as well as corporate monies such as Transcontinental’s $500,000 being pledged.

As Hants West MLA Chuck Porter says, the new international hockey heritage centre will further secure the community as the official birthplace of hockey.

Endorsements from Hockey Canada and the International Ice Hockey Federation further propel the project.

As far as profile goes, it can’t get much better.

This project shouldn’t take away from current hockey heritage centres, but will, without doubt, enhance their profile. The hard work of a number of people and groups over the decades to bring Windsor’s hockey heritage to the fore nationally and internationally has all been part of the effort on the way to this goal. Patience and cooperation are essential in making this all come to a successful culmination.

The dream is for a multimedia, interactive tourism destination that will attract between 75,000 and 150,000 visitors annually, creating an estimated 80 jobs.

Constructed in the northwest part of town, the 40,000-square-foot interpretive centre will feature a 30-foot high atrium and include several interactive display areas.

There will be exhibits celebrating the contributions of African-Canadians, women and the military to the sport and its heritage.

Plans are to break ground next year and to be ready for the grand opening in 2010.

That’s the physical entity. The spirit has already been here all along. Now it has to spread to those who would want to build this entity and to visit it and learn what it has to teach.

Meanwhile, in the shorter term, the Ring of Fire bike rally slated for mid-June promises to be another major development for the entire area.

Thousands of participants are expected for the event, with folks from all over the province and beyond. After all, motorcyclists are the fastest-growing segment of the tourism industry.

The Town of Windsor’s VanEssa Roberts is correct is saying that the biking event is going to have a long-term effect on the area’s tourism industry.

Once people see what’s available in town and on the roadways around the municipality and county -- and beyond – word will be out and the larger community will play host to ongoing groups of motorcycle enthusiasts throughout the season.

These developments take full advantage of what is here already and the larger community’s position close to Metro and to the Valley as well as other regions of the province.

It’s all there to make a success.