Nationality and US popularity

[Fidel Astro]

You can probably take a guess, then, by what he was responding to, and the responses already made to his video.

Yes, I gather that people in Atlanta have a hilarious inability to deal with to what many people would consider a minor snowfall. I was just looking at a photo gallery of an Atlanta newspaper's site, and the "weather emergency" seems pretty pathetic.

I checked out the temperature down there, too. It's 1 degree Celsius. PLUS 1. On the positive side. ABOVE zero. That's not winter. The weekend weather down there is going to be between +6 and +9. That barely qualifies as winter. The high on Saturday in Winnipeg is -21. With the windchill, it'll feel like -34. The low on Sunday, not even including the windchill, is -29. Suck it up, southerners.

The mere presence of snow doesn't mean outdoor rinks are viable in that part of the world. If people are freaking out and abandoning their cars in the middle of the street because there are a few inches of snow and the temperature barely drops below zero, I can't imagine a bunch of kids willing to brave the "weather emergency" and play hockey outdoors.

 

[TaketheCannoli]

Yes, I gather that people in Atlanta have a hilarious inability to deal with to what many people would consider a minor snowfall. I was just looking at a photo gallery of an Atlanta newspaper's site, and the "weather emergency" seems pretty pathetic.

I checked out the temperature down there, too. It's 1 degree Celsius. PLUS 1. On the positive side. ABOVE zero. That's not winter. The weekend weather down there is going to be between +6 and +9. That barely qualifies as winter. The high on Saturday in Winnipeg is -21. With the windchill, it'll feel like -34. The low on Sunday, not even including the windchill, is -29. Suck it up, southerners.

The mere presence of snow doesn't mean outdoor rinks are viable in that part of the world. If people are freaking out and abandoning their cars in the middle of the street because there are a few inches of snow and the temperature barely drops below zero, I can't imagine a bunch of kids willing to brave the "weather emergency" and play hockey outdoors.

Spoken like someone with no clue about weather and preparedness. I lived for a number of years in Vail, CO. We got a lot of snow and very cold weather, in fact, I skied into August several times. The last 3 years I lived there, the 4th of July fireworks were SNOWED OUT! The last year I lived there we got 468 inches of snow. That's 1119 cm. The temps in winter were cold. My kids waited for the bus many days at - 30 F which is -34 C. Why do I point this out?

Well- the snow plows were on I-70 24 hours a day 7 days per week. They were plowing the roads daily, even in the neighborhoods. Driving was easy. In fact, in the history of the school district there, they have never called off school because of snow. I've seen 36 inches come down in a day and a half there. School was open, everyone went to work.

I went to Denver in a snow storm and the city was paralyzed. Why? They couldn't plow the roads fast enough. Denver actually gets snow regularly, but not like in the Western Slope of the Rockies.

Atlanta probably has no freakin snow plows. I'd love to see a sanctimonious ******* like you try to drive in Dallas in an ice storm or Atlanta in a snow storm.

 

[tarheelhockey]

Yes, I gather that people in Atlanta have a hilarious inability to deal with to what many people would consider a minor snowfall. I was just looking at a photo gallery of an Atlanta newspaper's site, and the "weather emergency" seems pretty pathetic.

You don't seem to understand the nature of the problem.

Snow is not an issue. Anybody can drive in snow. Kids here look forward to snow as a treat, because it's fun. Nobody freaks out.

The problem is ICE. We don't get blizzards, we get ice storms. As in, maybe a tiny crust of snow on top with a smooth quarter-inch of ice underneath, glazed over every surface. That wouldn't be a problem if, for example, snow tires weren't illegal. If there were abundant snowplows which could quickly get the streets cleared. If the city had a huge supply of slag on hand to combat a large storm.

But, being as it's not cost-efficient to keep a fleet of trucks on hand for such a singular event, the ice just sits there for hours or even days until it either melts naturally or the over-worked plows finally get to it. Meanwhile you have thousands of people with no snow tires, who need to get around for various reasons, trying to drive on a sheet of pure ice. I don't care where you live, Winnipeg or Maui, rubber wheels do not gain traction on a sheet of ice. So you either end up stranded (thus abandoning your car), or you find yourself in a collision with the nearest solid object, depending on how fast you were going to begin with.

BTW, the video you couldn't see was of a man skating down the middle of Peachtree Street in Atlanta. Other forumers here have said that outdoor hockey games were spontaneously starting on suburban streets.

 

[Fugu]

Just a reminder about the OP's question:

so for americans: would an increase in both the number of US players and stars in the NHL affect its popularity there?

Fidel and tarheel may need their own sub-board to continue their incessant bickering, which generally goes off the rails.

 

[TaketheCannoli]

However, when equipped areas get ice, they can deal with it. In the mountains, they put down a sand/cinders mixture and it creates traction. Once again, cities like Atlanta are not going to be able to fund the massive expenditure to be ready and really good for something that happens infrequently.

 

[TaketheCannoli]

Just a reminder about the OP's question:




Fidel and tarheel may need their own sub-board to continue their incessant bickering, which generally goes off the rails.

Oh Fugu, the OP's question was answered long ago. This thread hasn't been about that since it was an hour old.

 

[tarheelhockey]

Fidel and tarheel may need their own sub-board to continue their incessant bickering, which generally goes off the rails.

In our defense, the references to outdoor ice were on-topic. And I think it's relevant that as soon as there was ice on the ground in Atlanta, people were outside playing hockey.

Not only relevant, but actually quite a profound statement about the popularity of hockey as a sport.

 

[MoreOrr]

Yes, I gather that people in Atlanta have a hilarious inability to deal with to what many people would consider a minor snowfall. I was just looking at a photo gallery of an Atlanta newspaper's site, and the "weather emergency" seems pretty pathetic.

It's almost equally as "hilarious" in Vancouver, a Canadian city. But it's more "hilarious" that you think it's hilarious. I mean, what should these cities do, spend lots of money to have the equipment to deal with a problem, a temporary problem, that they're going to encounter perhaps one single time every two years.

The fact is that it happens often enough that they know what winter weather is like, but not often enough that it's reasonable to have all of the infrastructure in place in order to deal with it.

 

[MoreOrr]

For Fugu's piece of mind...

Naturally, increased numbers of US-born players would likely make the sport more popular, and as we all know the numbers are increasing, even if relatively slowly. But again, the problem comes back to attracting more people (young people) to getting involved in a sport that most people in many parts of the US don't have easy access to, and when there are so many other options, more easily accessible and most of which are also less expensive. It's an uphill battle for hockey to be drawing more people to actively participate in the sport under those conditions.

 

[tarheelhockey]

For Fugu's piece of mind...

Naturally, increased numbers of US-born players would likely make the sport more popular, and as we all know the numbers are increasing, even if relatively slowly. But again, the problem comes back to attracting more people (young people) to getting involved in a sport that most people in parts of the US don't have easy access to, and when there are so many other options, more easily accessible and most of which are also less expensive. It's an uphill battle for hockey to be drawing more people to actively participate in the sport under those conditions.

I've said this before, but a huge part of that process is going to be integrating hockey into the ACC and SEC. Not many kids are going to get serious about playing a sport if there isn't a nearby option for continuing it after high school.

 

[saskganesh]

It's almost equally as "hilarious" in Vancouver, a Canadian city. But it's more "hilarious" that you think it's hilarious. I mean, what should these cities do, spend lots of money to have the equipment to deal with a problem, a temporary problem, that they're going to encounter perhaps one single time every two years.

The fact is that it happens often enough that they know what winter weather is like, but not often enough that it's reasonable to have all of the infrastructure in place in order to deal with it.

when I lived out west, Vancouver dealt with its irregular dumps by borrowing ploughs from Calgary. The snowploughs would be delivered by train in about 24 hours.

don't know the $ details of this, but it was a plan.

 

[MoreOrr]

when I lived out west, Vancouver dealt with its irregular dumps by borrowing ploughs from Calgary. The snowploughs would be delivered by train in about 24 hours.

don't know the $ details of this, but it was a plan.

When I lived there (in the 90s and early 2000s), I remember that just a few centimeters of snow would shut the city down for a day. And once I remember we had like a slushy-snow storm that then turned cold, and for two whole days the streets were covered with a rough layer of frozen slushy-ice, virtually impossible to drive on, even for a Nova Scotia native such as I. It was chaos, relatively speaking, something that in Nova Scotia would've been dealt with quite rapidly.

 

[tarheelhockey]

When I lived there (in the 90s and early 2000s), I remember that just a few centimeters of snow would shut the city down for a day. And once I remember we had like a slushy-snow storm that then turned cold, and for two whole days the streets were covered with a rough layer of frozen slushy-ice, impossible to drive on, even for a Nova Scotia native such as I. It was chaos, relatively speaking, something that in Nova Scotia would've been dealt with quite rapidly.

I've heard before that Vancouver and North Carolina have a similar climate, but this sounds surprisingly familiar. Makes me want to go to Vancouver just to see if there's any real signficant difference.

 

[MoreOrr]

I've heard before that Vancouver and North Carolina have a similar climate, but this sounds surprisingly familiar. Makes me want to go to Vancouver just to see if there's any real signficant difference.

We're getting OT, but unless North Carolina gets about 8 months of rain, mostly from October until July, then the similarity ends with the winter conditions that are ocassionally experienced. North Carolina is also much hotter in summer than Vancouver.

 

[tarheelhockey]

We're getting OT, but unless North Carolina gets about 8 months of rain, mostly from October until July, then the similarity ends with the winter conditions that are ocassionally experienced. North Carolina is also much hotter in summer than Vancouver.

Last OT comment, I just checked and we have wetter summers and dryer winters. I suspect we get our precipitation in larger increments, with tropical patterns dropping storms instead of daily rain. Just a guess.

 

[Fish on The Sand]

We're getting OT, but unless North Carolina gets about 8 months of rain, mostly from October until July, then the similarity ends with the winter conditions that are ocassionally experienced. North Carolina is also much hotter in summer than Vancouver.

living on the island we will get one or two big time hot spells that last for about a week that might be comparable to a North Carolina summer.

 

[MoreOrr]

Last OT comment, I just checked and we have wetter summers and dryer winters. I suspect we get our precipitation in larger increments, with tropical patterns dropping storms instead of daily rain. Just a guess.

Haven't been able to dig up the data (I used to have all this data readily on hand) on how many days on average Raleigh has a maximum temperate that is below freezing, but I'm sure that you'll have easier access to that than I. But the number of days on average when the temperature goes below freezing is about 75 for Raleigh, whereas it's about 50 for Vancouver. Vancouver, on average only has less than 5 days in which the maximum temperature is below freezing... I'd bet that Raleigh has more than that.
As for snowfall, they're fairly close... Raleigh on average about 19cm per year, Vancouver on average about 16.5cm per year (that's more than I experienced on average during my 13 years there.)

So suffice it to say, there are so-called southern US NHL cities, such as Raleigh, Atlanta, and Nashville that get more "wintery" weather than does Vancouver. I think that's why you rarely see Vancouver fans on here criticizing many of these so-called southern US cities.

 

[Fidel Astro]

It's almost equally as "hilarious" in Vancouver, a Canadian city. But it's more "hilarious" that you think it's hilarious. I mean, what should these cities do, spend lots of money to have the equipment to deal with a problem, a temporary problem, that they're going to encounter perhaps one single time every two years.

Yes, yes. I get it -- they have to deal with winter weather so infrequently that it doesn't justify the cost of all that snow-clearing equipment that would spend most of the year sitting in storage, untouched.

I guess it's just funny to see the level of panic and exaggeration (especially in news stories) that arises whenever southern cities are hit with something that a lot of us would consider to be a minor inconvenience/regular occurrence.

The fact is that it happens often enough that they know what winter weather is like, but not often enough that it's reasonable to have all of the infrastructure in place in order to deal with it.

They have a general idea of what snow is like, combined with late-autumn temperatures. I wouldn't say they have any familiarity with legitimate "winter weather"... the kind of stuff we have in Winnipeg or Edmonton. People aren't at risk of frostbite when it's +2 out.

Anyway, back on track - it sounds like a large part of the US is in a tricky situation. Kids won't play hockey because there's nowhere to do it/it's considered an elitist, "rich" sport (which is ridiculous, but is apparently true, as discussed on many other threads)... and those who actually do play and are talented don't have any local options to advance once they hit a certain age.

How do you solve that problem? Despite freak snowstorms like the one we've been talking about, outdoor ice is obviously not going to become a permanent fixture somewhere like Atlanta, so what can you do? By the sounds of things, it's not that kids are uninterested, it's that it's not feasible for their parents to sign them up.

 

[tarheelhockey]

The free market certainly isn't keeping up. Rinks are booked solid and yet it's rare to see a new one come open. I've heard it's not a very lucrative business, with a lot of overhead and a low upside if you do well. Maybe someone here would know more about the business side.

So, I'm not putting much hope in organic rink growth. The other big possibility is local government, which is obviously dealing with bigger fish at the moment in most cases (schools closing, etc). Not much likelihood of community rinks popping up either.

The only thing left that I can think of would be schools. I strongly advocate introducing NCAA hockey into the region, probably by means of large "seed" donations. If the team can get funding, and play at a local rink in the short-term, eventually the college/university will have to build a rink to house them. That introduces a hockey facility to each campus and relieves the local rinks slightly. Perhaps it can start a domino effect where high school teams begin to need their own facilities, and at that point it might make sense to have a government-funded rink near each school rather than rent space at a private rink. Much like swimming pools and soccer fields, rising demand from organized sports could push the government to act on something that might not otherwise be a priority.

One other factor I can think of -- hockey is definitely much more of an urban/city sport since rinks are near population concentrations. I have absolutely no idea how to introduce it to rural communities.

 

[Confucius]

BTW, the video you couldn't see was of a man skating down the middle of Peachtree Street in Atlanta. Other forumers here have said that outdoor hockey games were spontaneously starting on suburban streets.

If the weather was suitable for hockey throughout the U S. I wonder just how many teams would be in the NHL. Considering cities with a population of about 1 million have teams now.

Hockey would probably be bigger than football and baseball.

 

[Killion]

Hockey would probably be bigger than football and baseball.

If the conditions were such that winter came in like a Lion every November & lasted through March, natural ice surfaces readily available in back/schoolyards, yep, I'd say the history of the game would be considerably different in terms of talent pool, popularity & supremacy. Just remember HH, "if your flying backwards through time & see you see someone else flying into the future, probly' best not to make eye contact".

Jack Handey

 

[Fidel Astro]

One other factor I can think of -- hockey is definitely much more of an urban/city sport since rinks are near population concentrations. I have absolutely no idea how to introduce it to rural communities.

This is interesting, because I think a large percentage of pro hockey players from Canada (and likely the northern US as well) are from rural backgrounds. This is probably due to the increased availability of ice in rural areas (frozen ponds, lots of space for homemade rinks, etc.), often right in people's back yards.

 

[barneyg]

This is interesting, because I think a large percentage of pro hockey players from Canada (and likely the northern US as well) are from rural backgrounds. This is probably due to the increased availability of ice in rural areas (frozen ponds, lots of space for homemade rinks, etc.), often right in people's back yards.

I've always wondered how true this actually is.

 

[Fidel Astro]

I've always wondered how true this actually is.

I don't know. I'm not sure if there are official stats on this anywhere, but just thinking of local examples of former NHLers from Manitoba, they're not all from Winnipeg (although many of them are.)

This site (http://www.hockey-reference.com/friv/birthplaces.cgi?country=CA&province=MB&state) lists 359 Manitobans, past and present, in the NHL. While Winnipeg and Brandon (two largest cities in MB) are the birthplaces of a lot of the players, there are a lot of rural communities on that list -- everything from Foxwarren to Hartney to Beausejour. Some of these guys were NHL stars, too, like Bobby Clarke (Flin Flon) and Ed Belfour (Carman).

The list for Saskatchewan (http://www.hockey-reference.com/friv/birthplaces.cgi?country=CA&province=SK&state=) is even longer (477 players) and is even more varied in terms of the number of rural communities represented. Gordie Howe is from Floral, SK. Not exactly a metropolis.

I'm pretty sure you'll find the same across Canada.

 

[tarheelhockey]

If Canada is anything like the southern US, rural communities have a disproportionate number of good athletes. And a higher number of kids willing to endure extremes for the sake of a game. It's kind of a shame that hockey isn't played in rural areas here, because I could see pro-quality players coming out of the small towns.