Stadium construction still behind schedule

The CFL season kicks-off in 94 days. And we know the Ticats won’t be playing at Tim Hortons Field that day. So the question becomes, ‘When will they?’
Tuesday at Hamilton city hall, the Pan-Am stadium sub-committee heard more from the stadium contractor about a possible 6-week delay in the construction.

On the other side of the fence that surrounds ‘what will be’ Tim Hortons Field, progress is evident.  But construction is definitely behind schedule. Greg Slack is with Kenaidan Construction: “We believe we can do better than a 6 week delay. I cannot quantify that at this point in time.”

Kenaidan Construction won’t know until the middle of April just how long a delay, if any, there will be. But we do know that the Tiger-Cats’ contingency plan does not involve the University of Guelph. Reports out of Guelph indicate that the school hasn’t even been contacted about the possibility of returning.

Glenn Gibson is team president and COO with the Tiger-Cats: “You hope for the best and plan for the worst.” But Gibson won’t say what than plan is.

In addition to their training camp, the Cats have already scheduled a pre-season game at McMaster — and the odds of Mac being the mystery-contingency-venue are pretty good.

Fans wouldn’t have to travel. But only 6-thousand of them can fit in Ron Joyce Stadium. And there are more than 6-thousand season ticket holders alone. The team will be compensated as much as $1-million dollars for each home game they miss on the new field, so there doesn’t seem to be any financial pressure to go elsewhere. Gibson didn’t deny that McMaster was a possibility. He would only comment on the small-crowd at the pre-season game: “We’re going to manage the disappointment by being as open and transparent as we can with communicating what’s going on with the team.” Gibson says he should have some news for fans who entered a lottery for the pre-season game tickets in the next few weeks.