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There are washrooms, but you can’t use them

Oilers Entertainment Group has stated that Rogers Place has a total of 485 toilets, much more than the 172 required by local building codes. But this number isn’t entirely representative of the on-the-ground toilet situation. Rogers Place is a highly segregated arena, with large premium areas roped off from regular ticket holders. These areas are an important cash cow for the team, but it also means that the average ticket holder can access only 322 toilets — a drop from the 380 or so available at Rexall Place. In the arena’s extremely pricey exclusive areas, meanwhile, washroom lineups are virtually unknown. “Pretty much exclusive access. No lineups. Private washrooms for a few hundred people,” reported one veteran of the premium levels. “I stroll directly to a urinal in the suites and loge but wait forever when I sit with the ‘steerage’ up top,” reported another. According to Oilers spokesman Tim Shipton, however, those 322 toilets still exceed the “level-by-level service targets” found at other recently constructed NHL venues.

It’s a “flow” problem

The favoured explanation by the Oilers Entertainment Group appears to be that the backup is a problem of organization. At the Oilers’ old venue, every urinal got its own queue. But now, with different washroom layouts, lineups have been consolidated into a single queue snaking out the front door. “This gives the perception of longer lineups,” said Shipton. According to fans, it’s also woefully inefficient. With single-file queues, dozens of men are dependent on the “weak link” of a bleary-eyed fan who may fail to notice an available stall or urinal. And as anyone who has endured the self-checkout lineup at a Superstore can attest, it is indeed a monstrous thing when the public is independently trusted with moving a queue along. As one fan bluntly told Postmedia in an email, “the issue with the men’s washrooms in Rogers Place is that other men are too dumb to figure it out.”

Ironically, lineups were one of the reasons cited for getting a new arena in the first place

Yes, every major sporting event has lineups, but Oilers fans are more entitled to complain than most. Way back in 2007, Oilers president Patrick LaForge was pointing to “human dams” of washroom and concession lineups in order to illustrate how the team had outgrown its old venue. “The crush space in the food and beverage area is literally crush,” he said at the time. A decade later, city hall has fronted $600 million for a new venue, ticket prices have surged as much as 60 per cent — and the place is still beset with lineups.

It’s only going to get worse

Last week, the Oilers announced the launch of “concourse passes” — $80 tickets that allow fans to stand in the concourse of Rogers Place and watch the game on TV screens. This is great for Edmontonians who want the privilege of drinking from plastic cups in the vicinity of game noise, but bad news for ticket-holders desperate to preserve scarce washroom space. “I guess I’ll have to wear a diaper,” was the response of one of the less irate fans.