ATHABASCA – Athabasca’s Regional Multiplex is home to many of the area’s recreational opportunities — from the only indoor ice rink to the pickleball courts, anyone looking to work out or get some games in with friends is likely to wind up there.
In the middle of ongoing discussions between the Town of Athabasca and Athabasca County around the building's capital funding, user data from 2024 was collected to see where the facility’s users lived.
From January to June, memberships, user groups, and drop-in visitors were tracked by the front desk staff. The largest community was Athabasca County, with 6,775 users — each individual visit was tracked separately, meaning an individual could be counted multiple times. The almost 7,000 visits covered 43 per cent of the facility’s use during the time period.
The Town of Athabasca had 4,640 uses, including 1,846 members, good for 30 per cent, and the various summer villages, the M.D. of Opportunity No. 17, and the hamlet of Smith accounted for 867 visits, or six per cent.
The remaining 22 per cent of visitors came from all over, including the Village of Boyle, Lac La Biche County, and other surrounding communities.
“There’s a large opportunity with the M.D. of Opportunity,” said board member and county councillor Camille Wallach during the Jan. 27 meeting.
“If we only have 14 people dropping in from the M.D., that’s not a lot. So, how do we get the word up there, to get more people down here?”
Wallach’s question wasn’t the only one the board was faced with after getting the data. In the summertime, the multiplex’s usage from surrounding communities rose, with the other category increasing by almost ten per cent. Town councillor and multiplex board member Jon LeMessurier warned the table that number could fall in future years once Lac La Biche finishes its own pool.
“We have to be mindful of preparing for that once it finishes. I think its going to draw a substantial amount of users away,” said LeMessurier.
“We should try to start to think that and be proactive about what the approach will be to cover that.”
The Multiplex’s manager, Rhonda Alix, also broke the data down further, comparing the town and the county’s user totals without other communities. In 2024, 13,579 visits to the multiplex came from Athabasca County residents, and 9,411 came from the Town of Athabasca, equal to 59 and 41 per cent respectively.
