Taking a stand for hockey fans all across the DC Metro area, Ward 4 council member Muriel Bowser introduced at Tuesday's council meeting
PR18-0761, "Sense of the Council that the District Of Columbia Should Host the 4th Annual NHL Winter Classic Resolution of 2010." The resolution, which garnered the support of all 13 council members, was in response to the
rumors that started flying last month that the NHL is poised to name Washington as the location of the 2011 edition of
the now-traditional game played outdoors on New Year's Day.
You
can read it here, to see that the council has determined that DC is "the best city to host the Winter Classic, because it is our nation's capital, a world renowned city, a historic city, and a city with a strong hockey fan base" and that the city "can accommodate the largest crowd in the history of the Winter Classic," with
Nationals Park holding 41,888 and RFK holding 46,000. There's about 16 other reasons listed, with my favorite being "This Winter shows that the District of Columbia has a winter climate that compares with any other city in the Northeast." (By the way, section 2.i, which is cut off in the PDF, says "The Washington Capitals are regarded as one of the league's most popular and profitable franchises.")
There could be quite a melee to get tickets if the game does come to DC--307,000 people applied for tickets to the 2010 edition at Fenway, and the Capitals now have the highest attendance rating in the NHL--which, for someone who used to traipse out to the Cap Centre in the 1980s to see the Capitals flounder around in front of a few thousand people, is still rather astonishing.
UPDATE: Though
some commentators are questioning the council's "highest attendance rating" claim.
No word on when the NHL will announce the city and teams chosen for the game.