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“We need to have something out here,” Arnold said. “Whatever it is and however it turns out it will be a full Atlantic Canadian initiative. So that’s where we’re at. We’ll all have to buy in in some way, wherever it ultimately ends up. We could certainly do it here. I think everything is on the table but I think Halifax has certainly been working at this a lot longer than we have,” said Arnold

Maritime Football Ltd. has been working to secure a stadium site in Halifax, and an economic impact analysis of a team in that city has begun.

Ambrosie and LeBlanc toured both Moncton Stadium and a $104-million downtown sports and entertainment centre that opens officially on Sept. 8 and will be home to the Moncton Wildcats of the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League.

“They were incredibly impressed with that,” said Arnold. “It gives them a vision of what is possible here in our city.”

Ambrosie said he believes an Atlantic franchise has to consider building a football district.

“You build a stadium and you build a development around the stadium because people are no longer just going into games,” Ambrosie said recently.

“The calculus of their use of their time is not a transport me to a game and then home from a game. It’s take me for lunch and maybe some shopping and then I’ll go to a game and then after I’ll go for a drink or dessert and then I’ll go home.”

• Email: dbarnes@postmedia.com | Twitter: @sportsdanbarnes