Ice rink to skate into Carlsbad

CARLSBAD — With city approval in hand, a new ice skating facility will be coming to Carlsbad in June 2014.

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“(Carlsbad is) the only area in San Diego that really doesn’t have any ice facility,” said Matt Dunaev, the general manager of the Riverside company that is proposing the project, IceTown Skateoplex.

With the closest ice skating rink in Escondido, he said that an IceTown in Carlsbad will fill the void in North County for hockey, figure skating, and other ice sport enthusiasts.

“I know there are people from the community who are excited about the facility in Carlsbad because right now people have to drive down to Escondido or UTC in La Jolla,” said city planner Austin Silva.

He said that the city did not receive any concerns from the public about the project.

The facility will include changing rooms, classrooms, coaches room, referees room, party rooms, pro shop, and snack bar.

Though the ice rink will offer accommodations for ice sport trainings, practices, and competitions, it will also host times for the general public to ice skate.

Without any speakers for the item, the Carlsbad Planning Commission unanimously approved the project as a consent item at its Dec. 4 meeting.

With this approval, the ice rink was granted a 10-year conditional use permit to renovate and operate out of a vacant building at 2283 Cosmos Court near Palomar Airport Road and El Camino Real.

The city also allowed the ice facility to provide fewer parking spaces than normally required for a facility of its size, after IceTown provided a study of a similar ice rink facility that required less parking.