A successful first year for the new skate trail at LaSalle Landing.
A report going to council on Tuesday provides a full breakdown of the skating season, which ran for 103 days from November 28, 2025, to March 10, 2026.
The town estimates 18,000 skaters and visitors during that time. Despite a handful of weather-related interruptions where there were six full-day closures and five partial-day closures caused mainly by warm, sunny afternoons in February and March, attendance was strong.
More than 1,600 people borrowed skates over the winter through the skate loan program that was offered on the weekends.
The town also states that visitors strongly embraced the warming tent, which is a temporary structure that is expected to remain in use for another five to 10 years.
Financially, the project stayed almost exactly on target. Winter operating expenses totalled approximately $252,000, closely aligned with the original $250,000 budget estimate.
Mayor Crystal Meloche says the town is really pleased with the attendance.
“It’s great to know that so many people came out to use it, and I’ve heard many of our local residents who said they were out there several times a week, and their kids love being able to just go pop by whenever they wanted. So I think it was a success for us, I think it did what we were hoping to do.”
She says being able to operate the trail for approximately 100 days was a success.
“We were really fortunate. Some of the days we actually closed weren’t due to the ice melting; it was actually due to snow or winds that could be harmful and things like that. So it wasn’t necessarily that we couldn’t produce the ice, it was just that the weather had prohibited people from being able to use the facility safely.”
Meloche says the town was almost right on budget with what they expected it to cost.
“There was a lot of things learned during the first year as well, so we may see a little bit of change in this coming forward. But even if you look at how much ice making actually costs, it was only $10,000 for the ice making because we were able to operate that many days without the plant.”
Officials say any future adjustments to the operating budget will be reviewed as planning begins for the 2027 season.
The $9 million project also includes the summer water feature, which opened in the summer of 2025.
The Loop functions as an ice-skating loop during the colder months and a concrete recreational trail for walking, jogging, and biking in the summer months.
The skate trail is part of the $50 million LaSalle Landing waterfront project along the Heritage Detroit River.